Midterm 1 Flashcards
1
Q
What is ethnography?
A
- one of many approaches in social science research
- a descriptive account of a community or culture (originally contrasted with ethnology)
- meaning term is fluid, and is not limited to anthropology
2
Q
What do ethnographers do?
A
- participant observation: participate in and observe daily life (methods include interviews, document gathering and analysis, survey, and observation)
- direction and course if research are determined as research progresses
3
Q
Major features of ethnography
A
- observation occurs in natural rather than controlled settings
- researchers employ range of methods
- research methods are largely unstructured (does not require fixed research design, categories for interpretation emerge out of data collection and analysis)
- emic rather than etic
- focus on a limited # of cases
- analysis more about interpretation that explanation
4
Q
Emic
A
- subjective or insider accounts
5
Q
Etic
A
Objective or outsider accounts
6
Q
Two major approaches in social science research
A
Positivism and naturalism
7
Q
Popper and Hempel
A
- logical positivism
8
Q
Logical positivism
A
- Popper and Hempel
- emphasis on the experiment, controlled competitive inquiry can determine cause and effect
- reality exists outside our bodies, operates according to universal and physical laws that we can express as mathematical formulae
- experiment is the gold standard for determining causation
9
Q
The logic of the experiment
A
Controlled comparison:
- Generate a hypothesis
- Figure out way to test hypothesis and a research design
- Evaluate your results in light of the theory you used to make your initial hypothesis
10
Q
Major tenets of positivism
A
- The methodological model for social sciences should be physical sciences (ie the experiment)
- The goal of science is universal or statistical laws
- The foundation for science is observation (need standard methods so that we can get more stable measures reliability and replicability)
- Observe things directly or indirectly via devices that measure their effects
- Science needs standard methods of assessing measurements (measurements must be stable across observers)
- Reliable measures provide sound, theoretically neutral based upon which we can build stable knowledge (procedural objectivity)
11
Q
Issues positivism with social sciences
A
- most social science research is not experimental
- rather than exorcism for experimental control over variables, positivist a in social science research use statistical methods to exercise control and test hypotheses
- use other methods to collect data too (surveys, structured interviews, questionnaires - devices that measure the effects of what we presume to be social or cultural causes)
12
Q
Naturalism
A
- more akin to biological sciences
- the knowledge we get from experiments is limited and not representative of what occurs in the “real world”
- we cannot truly understand things outside of the context in which they “naturally” occur or exist
13
Q
Naturalism agrees with Positivism
A
- there is a world that extends beyond our bodies that exists independent if us and our minds
- we can know the world through observation and other empirical methods
- we can be objective (we can create theoretically neutral descriptions of the real world)
14
Q
Naturalism disagrees with positivism
A
- naturalists believe t is best to study things as they are without disturbing settings in which they occur (researchers should be sensitive to nature of the setting)
- primary aim is to describe things as they are, and to document how actors understand the phenomena and contexts in question (constructionism)
- researchers should respect and appreciate the social world they study (our work should be true to the phenomena not to the scientific methods)
- we shouldn’t be looking to explain the cause of social things as if they were physical things (material has interpretation and is about meaning, maybe there are no standard measures in the first place)
15
Q
Constructionism
A
- people construct their social world, both through interpretations of it and through actions based on those interpretations
- interpretations sometimes reflect different cultures, through their actions people create distinct social worlds
16
Q
Anti- realist and political critiques of naturalism
A
- there is no such thing as value free research
- the world and its objects do not exist independently of the researcher
- researchers’ knowledge is not more objective or superior to those of the people researchers study
17
Q
Questioning realism:
A
- constructionism and realism only works if we do not apply them to ourselves as researchers (if so how can they describe real world beyond social, how is it objective?)
- all that we see we see through a cultural lens
- ethnographers descriptions have to be unpacked
- we can’t capture social meanings on their own terms (we have to examine our texts as creative works that are shaped by contexts, dispositions, biases etc.)
18
Q
Post structuralism
A
Derrida
- ethnography is writing and all forms of writing are creative endeavours involving the use of rhetoric
19
Q
Post modernism
A
Foucault
- ethnography is part of the social service machinery that has served the surveillance and control of societies
- truth and falsity are a matter of power and political authority
20
Q
Politics of ethnography
A
- the mid 1980s saw the rise of advocacy in ethnography - emancipatory anthropology
- most people ethnographers studied were economically, politically, and socially marginalized
- advocates argue that ethnographers should be using their skills to “help” the people they study
21
Q
Reflexivity
A
- researchers are part of the world they study
- our research has consequences
- our background status impacts the manner if our research
22
Q
Reflexivity and realism
A
- just because social and historical factors impact us does not disallow the existence of a real world
- we have to learn to accept that we have imperfect knowledge of the real world
- just because our knowledge is constructed doesn’t mean it fails to represent the world
- we can use our social historical positions to enhance our research as much as they can hinder our research
23
Q
Reflexivity and the political character of research
A
- ethnographic work can have importance to social and political policy
- problem using ethnography as vehicle of political emancipation risk undermine the truth/ what ethnography is
24
Q
Issues about hypotheses
A
- you never confirm a hypothesis, you only nullify or falsify
- you have to state the bill and experimental hypotheses so that they are mutually exclusive
- you can never get absolute certainty
25
Understanding things in natural settings
- kind of like species and their respective habitats
- environments only make sense in light of the creatures that inhabit them
- creatures can only be understood in light of the environments in which they evolved
26
Two possible extremes to ethnographic research
1. Cookie cutter approach: prepare an explicit research program, detail every act and question; learn a bunch of techniques and perform them in a non- reflexive way
2. Don't do any preparation
27
Foreshadowed problems
- Malinowski
- start with a notion of what you would like to accomplish by doing fieldwork
- the problem or project can emerge in a number of ways
- just about always starts with lots of reading in a subject area
28
Research motivations
- hypothesis from a well developed theory
- area of research underdeveloped in the literature
- research with political and/ or practical implications
- natural experiments
- chance encounters and personal experiences
- hot, sexy topics favoured by funding bodies
29
Developing a research problem
- starts with translating a foreshadowed problem into a research question that you can answer
- great researchers have a talent for asking the right questions
- the questions you ask will at least imply the methods you will employ in your fieldwork
30
Topical
- less abstract and require us to focused on concepts found in common language; more concrete
- why kids break rules in public schools in Zebilla (focus on specific area)
31
Generic research
- less concrete and involve the use of academic concepts; more abstract
- rule breaking as deviance (focus on broad conceptual area)
32
Selecting settings and cases
- setting often drives the research (example spradley's work among hobo's)
- opportunities in certain places, among certain people, in certain situations
- once you get working in setting you will likely revise and refine your research plan
- consider pragmatic as
- people chose you
- one setting or number of settings
33
If your problem is well developed
- surveys of potential study sites
- case out variety sites to find best setting
- pilot project to test site feasibility (help shed light on appropriateness and efficacy of methods)
34
Natural settings
- from Chicago school (rock)
- bounded entities that exist as a natural part of a larger society or grouping
- local societies that are internally stable and relatively discrete (self contained groups or communities, small scale face to face societies and local collectivities, community of practice)
35
Critical responses to natural setting
A & H say settings are not naturally occurring phenomena
- constituted and maintained through cultural definitions and moral strategies
- boundaries are not fixed - they change over time as people redefine and renegotiate the dimensions of the setting
36
Setting
The context in which you carry out your research
- content can be examined in a number ways (impossible to attend to all details of a setting)
- one setting may include many cases (ex courses are cases in the setting of a school)
- cases may extend beyond the bounds of a setting
37
Cases critique representativeness
- cases not representative of the larger population
- but we're not interested in generalizing, and can also look at many cases that would allow us to generalize if we wanted to
38
Theoretical sampling
When we want to generalize but have only limited resources to study a small number of cases
- oriented toward developing and testing theory adopt a strategic selection of cases or theoretical sampling
- if research oriented toward generalizing to a finite set of cases we can compare our sample of cases to target population (use of formal census data)
39
Cases and categories
- we select our cases so as to identify as many categories and properties of categories as possible
- example Strauss and Glaser's work on the awareness contexts surrounding patients dying in hospitals
40
Sampling within the case
- also need to generalize from observations of the case to the case
- sampling according to time, people, and context
41
Sampling people
- use emic and Eric
| - you can't just hang out with people you like
42
Sampling context
- Goffman front stage and backstage
43
Getting in
- emerges during design stage of research: who to study and what is the setting
- getting in may not even be half the battle (institutions have way of controlling movements and activities of researchers- ex Barbera Stein and daycare)
44
Access as ongoing negotiation
- example Sampson and Thomas' experience on board a ship
- access is based in relationships we establish with our participants throughout our research project (new relationships new negotiations, go over ethical consent with each participant)
- personal attributes (modifiable vs non- modifiable)
45
Access starts with the literature
- chose settings and topics based off of literature & what we find interesting
- some groups may be nearly inaccessible
46
Ethical issues to access
- human subjects protect participants from harm; can't ruin setting for future researchers
- consent: covert or overt?
47
Public vs. Private
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Civil inattention (Goffman)- intently watching someone likely conspicuous
- hanging out in public can open up private groups
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48
Vouchsafing and established networks
- act leverage for establishing new relationships
49
Gatekeepers
- people that can block and allow passage into more restricted or private settings (could be clear or unclear)
- can be multiple
- concern for whole research not just initial entry
- censoring of research efforts
- don't always understand researchers intentions
50
Personal front
Goffman - like front stage
Manner- what sort of tile the actor will play in a situation, and appearance - the items or garb that indicate the social status of the actor
51
Gold & Junker's field roles:
- complete participant
- participant as observer
- observer as participant
- complete observer
52
Complete participant
- ideal for covert work
- minimizes reactivity
- dramaturgically tough
- if they find out it could be bad
- tougher to focus on doing your anthropology
53
Complete observed
- researcher has no contact with study subjects
- like sitting in a duck blind
- minimizes reactivity
- very tough to generalize
- the data set is more limited than what the complete participant role generates
54
Managing marginality
- insider- outsider
- going observationalist vs a going native
- if participant becomes friends might not be doing research
- sometimes hard not to take on biases if participants
