| 1-2 |
Introduction: About Ethnography |
Emerson, Robert. "The Development of Ethnographic Fieldwork." Contemporary Field Research. R. Emerson, ed. Prospect hills, Ill.: Waveland Press, 2001. Pp. 1-26.
Emerson, Robert. "The Face of Contemporary Ethnography." Contemporary Field Research. Pp. 27-53.
Geertz, Clifford. "Thick Description." in The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books, 1973.
Goffman, Erving. "On Fieldwork." Contemporary Field Research. Pp. 153-158.
Clifford, James. "On Ethnographic Authority." Predicament of Culture. Cambridge, MA: Havard University Press, 1988.
[This is one of the major articles "indicting" anthropology for its denial of subjectivity to the people and cultures it traditionally studied. It was part of the reflexivity that has suffused contemporary / post-modern anthropology.]
DuBois, W. E. B. The Souls of Black Folk. Modern Library Edition. New York: Modern Library, 2003. Excerpts.
[I mentioned DuBois's classic work as an illustration of double consciousness, or vision, that which the ethnographer must develop. DuBois describes the double consciousness of black folk, as they are seen by whites and as they experience the world. The ethnographer needs to develop these multiple visions. Van Maanen says that the ethnographer must get as close as possible to her subject. DuBois suggests an unbreachable divide, or does he?] |
| 3-4 |
Science as a Field / Site |
Anderson, Robert S. "The Necessity of Field Methods in the Study of Scientific Research" Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook Volume V. Boston: Dordrecht, 1981, pp. 213-244.
Collins, Harry. The Golem at Large: What You Should Know About Science. Cambridge: Cambridge Unversity Press, 1993.
Traweek, Sharon. Beamtimes and Lifetimes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988.
Gusterson, Hugh. Nuclear Rites. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996.
Gusterson, Hugh. "Scientific Experiment as Ritual." Naked Science. L. Nader, ed. New York: Routledge, 1996.
Helmreich, Stefan. Silicon Second Nature. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
Cetina, Karin Knorr. Epistemic Cultures. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999.
Woolgar, S., and B. Latour. Laboratory Life. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986.
Rabinow, Paul. Making PCR. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1996.
Verran, Helen. Science and an African Logic. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001. |
| 5 |
Doing Fieldwork: Designing
Getting and Fitting In
Fieldwork Data |
Angrosino, Michael V. Doing Cultural Anthropology. Prospect, Ill.: Waveland Press, 2002.
Buroway, Michael. Ethnography Unbound: Power and Resistance in the Modern Metropolis. University of California Press, 1991.
Scott, Judith, and Susan Silbey. How to Turn an Internship into Research. (PDF - 1.3 MB)
[This is a handbook, Judith Scott, Wellesley College '99, and I wrote for students who wanted to do internships and get course credit. It is really an overview of fieldwork drawm from others' writings with extended bibliography.]
Silbey, Susan. Designing Qualitative Research. (PDF)
[This is a short statement I prepared for a workshop at the National Science Foundation on qualitative research for sociologists. While not all qualitative research produces ethnograhy, much ethnography draws upon the various forms of qualitative methods. The paper was well received and I was asked to make it available to graduate students at other universities. Thus, I include it here as an aide to my students.]
Trost, Jan e. "Statistically Nonrepresentative Stratified Sampling: A Sampling Technique for Qualitative Studies." Qualitative Sociology 9, 1 (1986): 54-58.
Sieber, Sam. D. "The Integration of Fieldwork and Survey Methods." AJS 78 (1983): 1335.
Jackson, Jean. "On Trying to be an Amazon." Sex and Gender in Cross Cultural Fieldwork. Mary Ellen Conaway and Tony Larry Whitehead, eds. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1986. Pp. 263-273.
Howe, J., and J. Sherzer. "Friend Hairyfish and Friend Rattlesnake or Keeping Anthropologists in their Place." MAN 21, 4 (1986): 680-693.
Emerson, R., R. Fretz, and L. Shaw. Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.
Shearing, and Erikson. "Culture as Figurative Action." British Journal of Sociology 42 (1993): 481-506.
[This is a wonderful article about how stories are basic data for cultural analysis. I think a close reading of this paper will provide much instruction on what to do in the field.]
Silbey, S. "Apprentice Field Notes." Consumer Justice.
[These are my notes from the very first day in the field at the Attorney General's office, July 1970. I will also append the analysis/ text that was produced from these observations (dissertation chapter VI, Situational Demands Upon Law Enforcement" (1978) and the article that was eventually published, "Case Processing in an Attorney General's Office" (1980-1981). These pieces appear under the topic "ethnographies."]
Silbey. "Case Processing in an Attorney General's Office." Law & Society Review. First Draft Ethnography. Chapter VI. 1980-1981.
Lofland and Lofland. "Brief Notes on Notes." Analyzing Social Settings. Excerpt.
[This is an excerpt from Lofland and Lofland, Analyzing Social Settings, on how to take field notes. It is the shortest, briefest instruction.]
Spradley. "Field Notes." Doing Ethnography. Excerpt.
Spradley, James P. Participant Observation. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1980. Chapters 2, 3, and 4. |
| 6 |
Interviewing |
Pawson, Ray. "Theorizing the Interview." British Journal of Sociology 47 (1996): 295-314.
Gusterson, Hugh. "Becoming a Weapons Scientist." Technoscientific Imaginaries. G. Marcus, ed. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1995.
Berg, Bruce L. "Dramaturgical Interviewing." Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences. Allyn & Bacon, 2003.
Flick, Uwe. "Semi-structured Interviewing." Introduction to Qualitative Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998.
Silbey, S. Conversational Interviewing Techniques. (PDF)
Silbey, S. Interview Protocol for Scientists Career Project (1). (PDF)
[This is a first exploratory interview I conducted with a dozen scientists. I planned to do three: the first on how they became a scientist; the second on their work and organization of their lab; and the third on their other professional work (associations, consulting, business, patents etc.) I had begun this thinking I would interview a matched sample of men and women (same fields, years of degrees etc.) and see how their careers were the same or differed. After about a dozen interviews, I realized I had another project, much more to my liking. Most of the scientists told me "there is no law here." But, I kept seeing law (the BL signs, radiation signs). Why didn't they see that as law. So, I abandoned these interviews. They are an example however of exploratory inquiry, and formatting for interviewing with probes and follow ups.] |
| 7-9 |
Variations in Reflexive Analysis |
Strauss, Anselm. Qualitative Analysis for Social Scientists. New York, Cambridge University Press, 1987.
Becker, Howard. "Problems of Inference and Proof in Participant Observation." American Sociological Review 23 (1958): 652-660.
Ewick, Patricia and Susan Silbey. The Common Place of Law. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. Pp. 28-32, and 251-261.
Seron, Carroll. The Business of Practicing Law. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1996. Pp. 151-160.
Lamont, Michèle. Money, Morals, and Manners: The Culture of the French and the American Upper-Middle Class. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1992. Chapter 1, and Appendix III.
Duneier, Mitchell. Sidewalk. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999. Pp. 333-357.
Kunda, Gideon. Engineering Culture. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1992. Pp. 229-240.
Cetina, Karin Knorr. Epistemic Cultures. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. Pp. 265-298.
Katz, Jack. Seductions of Crime. New York: Basic Books, 1988.
Katz, Jack. How Emotions Work. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999.
Leeson, Jamie, Ewick, and Silbey. Coded Transcript. Used with Permission (PDF - 1.4 MB)
Silberman, D. Interpreting Qualitative Data. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1994. Chapters 1-3, and 5-6.
Silbey. Exercises, Aides, Analyzing Data. (From Weber, Mills, Lightman, Scott etc.)
Ewick, and Silbey. Codebook.
Ewick, and Silbey. The Common Place of Law. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998.
Mills, C. Wright. The Sociological Imagination. London: Oxford University Press, 1978. Excerpt.
Weber, Max. "Understanding." The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. New York: Free Press, 1964. Excerpt.
Silbey. "Maigret's Law." Weber's Concept of Understanding. Excerpt.
Weber, Max. "Social Relationship." The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. New York: Free Press, 1964. Excerpt.
Lightman, Alan. "Everyone Lives in the Mountain." Moving from One Fact to Hypothesis.
Scott, Nathan. The Virginia Quarterly Review. Excerpted from Gary Peller. "Violence and the Mob." Tikkun Magazine. Volume 2, No 3. Pp. 28, 30.
Flick, Uwe. "Narratives as Data." Introduction to Qualitative Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1998.
Silbey, S. "The Last Aristocracy." (PDF)
Huising, Ruthanne. Beginning to Analyze Field Notes. [This is a very fine piece of work from the field. Ruthanne has been observing the EHS (environmental health and safety) staff. She is thinking about a second year paper from her work. This is her first effort to identify a "problem." This work usually follows months in the field, and prior commentary or mini-analysis called "memos" (thoughts on what you have observed).]
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| 10 |
A Debate About Methods and Epistemology |
Social Studies of Science. Volume 21, 1991.
Social Studies of Science. Volume 24, 1994.
Hirschauer. Manufacture of Bodies in Surgery. 1991, pp. 279-319.
[This is the paper that prompted the debate among Collins, Lynch, Fox and Hirschauer that appeared in Social Studies of Science 1991, referenced in Mody's paper on "dirt."]
Collins. Dissecting Surgery: Forms of Life Depersonalized. 1994, pp. 311-333.
Hirschauer. "Towards a Methodology of Investigations." Social Studies of Science 24(2): 335-346.
Fox. Fabricating Surgery. 1994, pp. 347-354.
Lynch. "Collins, Hirschauer and Winch." Social Studies of Science. 24(2): 354-369.
Collins. "Scene From Afar." Scoial Studies of Science. 24(2): 369-389. |
| 11-13 |
Writing Ethnography: Memory, Politics, and Representation |
Van Maanen, John. Tales of the Field. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988.
Fischer, M., and G. Marcus. Anthropology as Cultural Critique: An Experimental Moment in the Human Sciences. 2nd Ed. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1999. Excerpt.
Becker, Howard. Writing for Social Scientists: How to Start and Finish your Thesis, Book, or Article. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986.
Slymovics, S. "Rebbele Mordkhele's Pilgrimage in New York City, Tel Aviv, and Carpathian Ruthenia." YIVO Annual. Volume 21, Going Home. Pp. 369-394.
Fischer, Michael. "In the Science Zone: The Yanamamo and the first for Representation." Anthropology Today 17, 4 and 17, 5 (2001): 9-14 and 10-13.
Mody, Cyrus. "A Little Dirt Never Hurt Anyone: Knowledge-making and Contamination in Materials Science." Social Studies of Science 31, 1 (2001): 7-36.
Rosenthal, Claude. "Certifying Knowledge: The Sociology of a Logical Theorem... " American Sociological Review 68 (2003): 623-646.
Clifford, James. "Identity in Mashpee." Predicament of Culture. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988.
[This is the final chapter in Clifford's work, The Predicament of Culture. The book is a collection of his essays, mostly cultural criticism. By placing this essay last, I infer that he means this to be an example of how to do better ethnography. It was considered innovative at the time.]
Ewick, and Silbey. "Narratives Against the Law." The Common Place of Law. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998.
Jackson, J. Camp Pain. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999. Excerpt.
Walley, Christine. Rough Waters: Nature and Development in an East African Marine Park. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2004.
Willis, Paul. Learning to Labor. New York: Columbia University Press, 1981.
MacLeod, Jay. Ain't No Makin' It. Boulder: Westview Press, 1995.
Duneier, Mitchell. Slim's Table. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992.
Duneier, Mitchell. Sidewalk. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1999. |
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