F. Michael Connelly

F. Michael Connelly (born 1936) is a Canadian academic and a leading figure in narrative inquiry in education. He is professor emeritus at the University of Toronto’s Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), which he joined in 1968, and has served as Director and Founder of the Centre for Teacher Development, Chair of the Department of Curriculum, and director of the joint doctoral program between OISE and the Hong Kong Institute of Education.

Connelly is widely recognized for his collaborative work with D. Jean Clandinin, with whom he co‑authored Narrative Inquiry: Experience and Story in Qualitative Research (Jossey-Bass, 2000), a foundational text on narrative approaches to qualitative research in education. Together, they helped coin and develop the concept of narrative inquiry and authored the influential article “Stories of Experience and Narrative Inquiry” in Educational Researcher (1990). Connelly also founded and previously edited the academic journal Curriculum Inquiry and has received honours such as the Canadian Society for the Study of Education’s Outstanding Canadian Curriculum Scholar Award (1987) and the Canadian Education Association’s Whitworth Award for Educational Research (1991).