I.

Ethnography: Anthropology's Distinctive Strategy

A.
Ethnography is the firsthand, personal study of local cultural settings.
B.
Early ethnographers conducted research almost exclusively among small-scale, relatively
isolated societies, with simple technologies and economies.
C.
Traditionally, ethnographers have tried to understand the whole of a particular culture.
D.
In pursuit of this holistic goal, ethnographers usually spend an extended period of time in a
given society or community, moving from setting to setting, place to place, and subject to
subject to discover the totality and interconnectedness of social life.

II.

Ethnographic Techniques
The characteristic field techniques of the ethnographer include the following:
A.
Direct, firsthand observation of behavior, including participant observation.
B.
Conversation with varying degrees of formality, from the daily chitchat that helps maintain
rapport and provides knowledge about what is going on, to prolonged interviews, which can be
unstructured or structured.
C.
The genealogical method.
D.
Detailed work with key consultants, or informants, about particular areas of community life.
E.
In-depth interviewing, often leading to the collection of life histories of particular people
(narrators).
F.
Discovery of local (native) beliefs and perceptions, which may be compared with the
ethnographers own observations and conclusions.
G.
Problem-oriented research of many sorts.
H.
Longitudinal researchthe continuous long-term study of an area or site.
I.
Team researchcoordinated research by multiple ethnographers.

III.

OUTLINE:
A.
Observation and Participant Observation

B.

C.

1.

Ethnographers are trained to be aware of and record details from daily events, the
significance of which may not be apparent until much later.

2.

Ethnographers strive to establish rapporta good, friendly working relationship based

on personal contactwith their hosts.

3.

Participant observation involves the researcher taking part in the activities being
observed.

Conversation, Interviewing, and Interview Schedules

1.

Ethnographic interviews range in formality from undirected conversation, to open-ended

interviews focusing on specific topics, to formal interviews using a predetermined
schedule of questions.

2.

Multiple conversational and interviewing methods may be used to accomplish

complementary ends on a single ethnographic research project.

The Genealogical Method

1.

The genealogical method includes procedures by which ethnographers discover and

record connections of kinship, descent, and marriage, using diagrams and symbols.

2.

Because genealogy is a prominent building block in the social organization of

nonindustrial societies, anthropologists need to collect genealogical data to understand
current social relations and to reconstruct history.

D.

Key cultural consultants are particularly well-informed members of the culture being
studied who can provide the ethnographer with some of the most useful or complete
information.

E.

Life Histories
1.

Life histories reveal how specific people perceive, react to, and contribute to changes
that affect their lives.

2.

Since life histories are focused on how different people interpret and deal with similar
issues, they can be used to illustrate the diversity within a given community.

3.
F.

G.

Many ethnographers include the collection of life histories as an important part of their
research strategy.

Local Beliefs and Perceptions, and the Ethnographer's

1.

An emic (native-oriented) approach investigates how local people perceive and

categorize the world, what their rules of behavior are, what is meaningful to them, and
how they imagine and explain things.

2.

Cultural consultants or informants are individuals who provide the ethnographer with the
emic perspective.

3.

An etic (science-oriented) approach emphasizes the categories, explanations, and

interpretations that the anthropologist considers important.

The Evolution of Ethnography

1.

Bronislaw Malinowski is generally considered the father of ethnography.

a.

Like most anthropologists of his time, Malinowski did salvage ethnography,

studying and recording cultural diversity threatened by Westernization.

2.

Early ethnographies were scientific accounts of unknown people and places.

3.

Ethnographic realism was the style that dominated "classic" ethnographies.

a.

In such works, the writer's goal was to present an accurate, objective, scientific
account of a different way of life, written by someone who knew it firsthand.

4.

Ethnographers derived their authority from their personal research experiences in alien
cultures.

5.

Malinowski believed that all aspects of culture were linked and intertwined, making it
impossible to write about just one aspect of a culture without discussing how it related to
others.
a.

6.

7.

Malinowski argued that a primary task of ethnography was to understand the

emic perspectivethat is, the native's point of view.

Interpretive anthropologists believe that ethnographers should describe and interpret

that which is meaningful to local people.
a.

Interpretivists like Clifford Geertz view cultures as meaningful texts that locals
constantly "read" and ethnographers must decipher.

b.

Meanings in a given culture are carried by public symbolic forms, including

words, rituals, and customs.

Experimental anthropologists have begun to question traditional goals, methods, and

styles of ethnography, including ethnographic realism and salvage ethnography.
a.

In general, experimental anthropologists view ethnographies as both works of art

and works of science.

b.

According to this view, ethnographies are literary creations in which

ethnographers serve as mediators, communicating information from "natives" to
readers.

8.

In reflexive ethnography, a category of experimental anthropology, the ethnographerwriter puts her or his personal feelings and reactions to the field situation right in the text.

9.

Early ethnographies were often written as though they were describing the ethnographic
presentthe period before Westernization, when the "true" native culture flourished.

H.

I.

A.

10.

Today, anthropologists recognize that the ethnographic present is an unrealistic

construct because it inaccurately portrayed native societies as unchanging and isolated
from the rest of the world.

11.

Contemporary ethnographies usually recognize that cultures constantly change and that
an ethnographic account applies to a particular moment.

Problem-Oriented Ethnography
1.

Although anthropologists are interested in the whole context of human behavior, most
ethnographers now enter the field with a specific problem to investigate, and they collect
data relevant to that problem.

2.

Because local people lack knowledge about many factors that affect their lives,
anthropologists may also gather information on variables such as population density,
environmental quality, climate, physical geography, diet, and land use.

Longitudinal Research
1.

Longitudinal research is the long-term study of a community, region, society, culture, or

other unit, usually based on repeated visits.

2.

Longitudinal research has become increasingly common as improved transportation has

allowed anthropologists to visit their research area repeatedly.

3.

Longitudinal research is often conducted by teams of ethnographers (see team research

below).

4.

Team research involves a series of ethnographers conducting complimentary research in

a given community, culture, or region.

Culture, Space, and Scale

1.
The recognition and study of ongoing and inescapable flows of people, technology,
images, and information are becoming increasingly important in anthropology.
2.

Ethnographic fieldwork is becoming more flexible, large-scale, multi-timed, and multisited.

3.

Anthropologists are paying more

tourists, developers) who impinge
and forces, such as governments,
the effects of power differentials
societies.

4.

Increasingly, the electronic mass media shape local cultures and perspectives by
exposing people to global images and information.

attention to "outsiders" (e.g., migrants, refugees,

on the places they study; to external organizations
businesses, and nongovernmental organizations; to
on cultures; and to diversity within cultures and

5.

K.

Anthropologists increasingly study people in motion, such as those living on or near

national borders, nomads, seasonal migrants, homeless and displaced people,
immigrants, and refugees.
Survey Research
1.

Anthropologists working in large-scale societies are increasingly using survey

methodologies to complement more traditional ethnographic techniques.

2.

Survey involves drawing a study group or sample from the larger study population,
collecting impersonal data, and performing statistical analyses on these data.

3.

By studying a properly selected and representative sample, social scientists can make
accurate inferences about the larger population.

4.

Survey research is considerably more impersonal than ethnography.

5.

Survey researchers refer to the people who make up their study sample as respondents.

6.

Respondents answer a series of formally administered questions.

7.

The personal, firsthand techniques of ethnography can be used to supplement and finetune survey research, thereby providing new perspectives on life in complex, large-scale
societies.

What is ethnography?
"Ethnography is the recording and analysis of a culture or society, usually based on participant-observation and resulting
in a written account of a people, place or institution".(Definition taken from the Glossary of Terms written by Simon
Coleman and Bob Simpson)
Traditionally, ethnographies have focused in depth on a bounded and definable group of people; such as the Nuer, or a
particular North Indian village. Today, they are just as likely to focus on a particular aspect of contemporary social life;
such as new reproductive technologies, the meanings of the veil, virtual communication, or being a Milwall football club
fan. The concept of ethnography has been developed within social anthropology; but the term is now sometimes used in a
looser way in for example opinion and market research.
Why are ethnographies important?
Ethnographies as texts offer excellent insight into how social anthropologists undertake their fieldwork, what it is like to
experience daily life in an environment that may be initially unfamiliar, and the political, economic and social dynamics
involved in collecting data. By providing specific, in-depth case studies, they can serve as excellent means for teaching
about global issues such as climate change, migration and globalisation. Even where ethnographies focus on a particular
practice - such as a religious ceremony, or a culinary ritual the anthropologist will typically place the practice in its full
context to give a holistic, rich and multi-faceted account.
Reading good ethnographies is an excellent way to learn how social anthropologists go about their research; and how they
reflect on their own and one others experiences in the field, and construct their broader theories.