Ethnography and Participant Observation

The study of the 'other'?

Traditions in Ethnography

• Chicago School
• British Social Anthropology
• Community Studies

More recent developments

Ethnographic Questions

• 1970s
• Increased focus on gender, race, and ethnicity
• Increaed focus on mobile groups
• Studying groups with a shared perspective
• Incorporating critiques of science
• Reflexivity

• What is happening, specifically, in the social action that takes place in a particular setting?
• What is the meaning of the action to the actors in the setting?
• How are the events that take place patterned in a way that reveals aspects of the social organization or setting?
• How is the action in the setting related to other contexts and society as a whole?

What is Participant Observation?

• Trying to understand a social scene
• Doing this by observing what is going on
• Doing this by participating (to some extent) in what is going on
• Subjectivity of participant and objectivity of researcher
• Listening to/thinking abiout how and why people act as they do within that social scene

"Participant observation is about engaging in a social scene, experiencing it and seeking to understand and explain it" (May 1997)

"One cannot simply observe. A question such as 'what is going on here?' can only be addressed when fleshed out with enough detail to answer the related question, 'In terms of what?' (Wolcott, 1999)

What is Ethnography

"The underlying purpose of ethnographic research is to describe what the people in some particular place or status ordinarily do, and the meanings they ascribe to what they do..." (Wolcott, 1999)

"[Ethnography] involves the ethnographer participating overtly or covertly in people's daily lives for an extended period of time, watching over what happens, listening to what is said, asking questions -- in fact, collecting whatever data are available to throw light on the issues that are the focus of the research" (Hammersley and Atkinson, 1995)

Ethnography and Participant Observation

Potential Problems

Participant Observation and Ethnography

• Focus on the present may blind researcher to previous important events
• The risk of overly identifying with participants or voyeurism/exploitation
• The risk of artificalyy 'bounding' communities or cultures through the research focus
• The risk of empiricism/simple description

• Participant observation: central and defining feature of ethnography

• Links to Chicago School
• Interactionism
• Interest in micro no macro

Field Notes: Reflexivity and Reflections

Jottings

Additional Considerations

Thick Description

Full Field Notes

Writing Up and Analysis

Practicalities of Participant Observation

• Negotiating access
• Gatekeepers and trust
• Non-negotiated access
• Online vs. face-to-face
• Field notes and reflexivity
• Writing up and analysis

Negotiating Access

Participant Observation and Field Notes

Implications of the Gatekeeper Relationship

• Initial access, situational access, ongoing access
• Personal revelations
• Tests of confidentiality
• Importance of confidentiality and trust

• What do people usually do in this setting and why?
• Phsycial space
• Verbal communication
• Non-verbal communication

• Gatekeeper
• Different gatekeepers
• Access route and implications

Establishing Trust

Online vs. Face-To-Face

• Layers of trust

Non-Negotiated Access

• Ethical issues
• Limitations of textual/multimedia interactions vs. face-to-face observations
• Issues of representation/identity of research participants

• Some settings do not require formal negotiation of access

• No official gatekeepers for such settings