CHAPTER 28
Conducting Interpretive Research in
Engineering Education Using Qualitative
and Ethnographic Methods
Aditya Johri
Introduction
This chapter provides an overview of con-
ducting interpretive research using qualita-
tive and ethnographic methods. The chap-
ter complements Chapters 27 by Case and
Light and 26 by Moskal, Reed-Rhoades, and
Strong in this volume, which respectively
provide an overview of the different qualita-
tive and mixed method approaches to engi-
neering education research. The primary
purpose of this chapter is to provide entry-
level researchers with background infor-
mation on how to conduct interpretive
research. Because every researcher has his
or her own “tricks of the trade,” this chap-
ter necessarily presents methods and ap-
proaches found useful by this author, and
represents an individual perspective on
interpretive research. The number of ref-
erences has been limited to around fifty1
I will like to thank students in my Ethnographic and
Qualitative Research Methods course and students
from Foundations of Engineering Education (Fall 2012)
for their feedback, in particular John Sangster, Vaishali
Nandy, Bushra Chowdhury, and Stephanie Kusano.
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to avoid overwhelming the target audience;
this chapter is not intended as a compre-
hensive review of interpretive research or of
qualitative and ethnographic methods.
Interpretive Research in the Human
Sciences
Social scientists currently distinguish inter-
pretive research from other research tradi-
tions in that the researcher is taken to be
a critical part of the process. The primary
goal of the research is to understand partic-
ipants’ meaning-making, with less emphasis
on the typical flow of the scientific method
followed in other research methodologies.
This type of research requires an investiga-
tor to include his or her own perceptions,
becoming more of a sense-maker than an
objective reporter: Interpretive research is
an umbrella term used to describe studies
that endeavor to understand a community in
terms of the actions and interaction of the
participants, from their own perspectives”
(Tobin, 1999, p. 487).
551
 552 cambridge handbook of engineering education research
Although interpretive methods are par-
ticularly well suited to sociocultural or sit-
uated approaches to learning and educa-
tion (see Chapter 2 by Newstetter and
Svinicki, or Chapter 3 by Johri, Olds, and
O’Connor in this volume), they are appro-
priate in all cases when a researcher wishes
to account for participants’ perspectives in
understanding an issue. The interpretive
approach requires researchers to construct
meaning from the data; there is a “per-
spective” aspect inherent to the process.
Interpretive research sacrifices an element
of objectivity in order to obtain situated
meaning-making; the researchers and par-
ticipants form a partnership in the develop-
ment of understanding. Although interpre-
tive research is by its nature subjective, there
are standards of practice followed to ensure
the quality of information within the field.
An interpretive researcher “seeks to learn
through systematic activity” (Tobin, 1999,
p. 488) and builds an understanding through
a skeptical search for evidence. Put another
way, “the knowledge gained from research
is put to test so that there is a close link
between what is learned and the evidence
used to support claims made from a study”
(Tobin, 1999, p. 488).
This idea of an investigator’s perspec-
tive in interpretive research is in direct con-
flict with the positivist approach toward
research, in which settings are defined and
described using external categories. There
are three areas in which the interpre-
tive approach deviates from a positivist
approach. The first area of deviation involves
the focus on large trends and central ten-
dencies often used by positivist and other
approaches that are primarily quantitative
in nature; the interpretive approach deliber-
ately seeks a sample including a high degree
of diversity, or variability. In interpretive
research, the decisions on who can or should
participate in the study can be made while
the study is ongoing, as new data are col-
lected and new participants are approached.
So long as the investigators’ understanding
of an issue is advanced, corroborated, or con-
tradicted, participants may be added to the
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study. Snowball sampling is one example of
an approach that lends itself well to inter-
pretive research. The second area of devi-
ation between the types of research comes
in the design phase of a research project.
Highly quantitative approaches devote
significant effort to specifying and articu-
lating the hypotheses and propositions of
the study and to ensuring that the data col-
lected are able to address the issues identi-
fied. In interpretive research initial questions
are often open ended, requiring less engage-
ment with and analysis of the data during
the active portion of the study. Rather than
a linear, or a strict cyclical scientific model
of research, interpretive research processes
tend to include more fluidity. The third
area of deviation between interpretive and
quantitative research approaches is that the
results are dependent on the frame of ref-
erence of the researcher. It is important for
the researcher to not only signal their world-
view, but also consciously to use this view-
point in interpreting, acknowledging, and
documenting this activity. Researchers can
be “invisible” in quantitative methodologies,
but they are an integral part of interpretive
research activities.
The effort to understand meaning-
making and expressing or representing can
be fraught with complexity. One of the ear-
liest and strongest proponents of the inter-
pretive tradition, Clifford Geertz (1973),
argued that an intepretivist’s task is to clar-
ify the intersubjective meanings that form
the foundation of social reality, as expressed
in the everyday life experiences of peo-
ple. Becker (1998) argues that just express-
ing the meanings is not enough, that we
need to go beyond reproducing what we
observe, to abstract the information that
can help answer questions. Becker (1998)
takes issue with Geertz’s notion of “thick
description” and related argument that the
intrepretivist’s job is to provide or artic-
ulate meaning-making among participants.
Nelson Goodman (1978) argues that
researchers are bound to have a perspec-
tive, a frame, a way of seeing or worldmak-
ing that is unique to them, raising questions
 conducting interpretive research in engineering education
about the ability of any researcher to faith-
fully represent what is being observed. Any
researcher is bound to relate “affectively” or
emotionally with experiences of data col-
lection regardless of their actual disposi-
tion. As a consequence, the meaning-making
in any social phenomenon being observed
is inevitably linked with the meaning the
researcher brings to the situation. The myth
of objective observation is also questionable
given that observation and meaning-making
are interconnected. This process, according
to Wagenaar (2011), is actually that of recon-
structing the aggregated collective under-
standing of a social phenomenon by taking
into account the individual subjective mean-
ings of participants. This sense-making by
researchers is dependent on our ability to sit-
uate a particular human action into a larger
context; the act of interpretation involves an
understanding at multiple levels – individu-
als, groups, and larger organizational or insti-
tutional levels. Wagenaar (2011) argues that
there are three problems with this process
creating epistemological and methodologi-
cal issues. The first is that investigators may
hold misconceptions about their own beliefs
and intentions. The second is that investiga-
tors may or may not have access to objec-
tive meanings, rules, concepts, and norms
that are implicit in practice (which may not
be explicitly stated). The last is that inves-
tigators may lack an understanding of spe-
cific aspects of a social organization that are
tacit and embodied, requiring actual partic-
ipation to observe. In reviewing the work
of other interpretive researchers, Wagenaar
(2011) argues that:
With important nuances and differences, they
all agree that (1) explicit understanding can
only be partial, (2) meaning resides not in
the individual experiences of actors but in
larger social configurations of which the actor
is an integral part, (3) meaning emerges
from acting upon concrete situations, and (4)
meaning, in the sense of our actions exhibit-
ing sensefulness, is created dynamically in
an ongoing interaction among actions and
between actors and larger social configura-
tions. (p. 51)
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553
Wagenaar further prescribes two ways of
understanding meaning that go beyond or
overcome the problematic aspects of inter-
pretivist approach outlined in the preceding
text. The discursive approach to meaning is
thoroughly perspectivist, in the sense that
it takes for granted that all human knowl-
edge is a “conditioned point of view”; it
implies that there can be no veracity of our
knowledge of the social work. In the dia-
logic approach, meaning emerges only in
relation to an interpreter and meanings may
change depending on the interpretation. As
a result it is essential for an interpretive
researcher not only to capture and expres-
sion of intersubjective meaning-making, but
also to articulate this insight in the service
of a research question.
To make interpretive research more
acceptable and mainstream, Yanow (2006)
argues that researchers need to make their
methods more explicit, as well as elaborating
on the advantages of interpretive research.
Researchers using an interpretive method-
ology should avoid using the word “qualita-
tive” to describe their research; interpretive
research extends beyond qualitative meth-
ods and is more precisely characterized as
uncovering participant’s meaning-making.
Qualitative methods can be, and often are,
used for positivist research without any
interpretive component; any research with
a hypothesis is well served by qualitative
methods. Overall, Yanow (2006) argues that
interpretive methodology has become an
umbrella term subsuming several different
schools of thought, including those drawing,
explicitly or implicitly, on phenomenology,
hermeneutics, some Frankfurt School criti-
cal theory, symbolic interaction, and ethno-
methodology, among others. Many of these
ideas dovetail with late-nineteenth to early-
twentieth century pragmatism and later-
twentieth century feminist epistemology
research methods and science studies (p. 7).
In spite of the differences between inter-
pretive researcher methodology and the
traditional positivist framework, there are
there any similarities. Yanow (2006) argues
that:
 554 cambridge handbook of engineering education research
Despite disagreements on ontological and
epistemological matters, scientists working
out of interpretive presuppositions, speaking
broadly, share in common with those work-
ing out of positivist ones the two central
attributes of scientific practice (what it means
to “do” science or to “be” scientific) named
above: an attitude of doubt, and a procedu-
ral systematicity. Where they differ is how
these are enacted. Interpretive scientists share
the appreciation for the possible fallibility of
human judgment . . . They also have a differ-
ent understanding of what it means to prose-
cute “rigor” in research[ . . . ]; yet interpretive
research, following its own canons of prac-
tice, is not less systematic than positivist-
informed research, which renders the work
“methodical” in different ways from that pre-
scribed in the steps of the ‘scientific method.’
(p. 9)
Another important distinction Yanow
makes is that the social world cannot be
understood by interpretivists in the same
fashion that the natural world can be under-
stood and documented by positivists. This
has specific consequences for engineering
education researchers, particularly in disci-
plinary engineering research. Yanow (2006)
argues that there is an essential between the
natural and social worlds:
Unlike (to the best of our present knowledge)
rocks, animals, and atoms, humans make,
communicate, interpret, share and contest
meaning. We act: we have intentions about
our actions; we interpret others’ actions; we
(attempt to) make sense of the world: We are
meaning-making creatures. Our institutions,
our policies, our language, our ceremonies are
human creations, not objects independent of
us. And so a human (or social) science needs
to be able to address what is meaningful to
people in the social situation under study. It
is this focus on meaning, the implications of
that focus, that the various interpretive meth-
ods share. (p. 9)
Now that we have discussed interpretive
research briefly and have some conception
of what it is, let us explore why engineer-
ing educators should care about it and how
they can go about conducting interpretive
research.
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Why Interpretive Engineering
Education Research?
Empirical issues in furthering engineering
education are similar to those in all other
human or social sciences. Educators, stu-
dents, and others who are involved with
engineering education are embedded within
the same socioeconomic webs as others. The
problems they face in teaching or in learn-
ing often have the same root causes as bar-
riers to furthering education, or other activ-
ity, in other settings. Therefore, positive
change can be accomplished only by under-
taking research that provides an interpre-
tive understanding of issues at hand – by
trying to understand matters from the per-
spective of those involved it might be pos-
sible to bring about change. This does not
mean, of course, that structural change is not
possible or desired and is often attempted.
For instance, accreditation agencies such as
ABET Inc. often play a significant role in
forcing structural change within engineer-
ing education. An interpretive investigation,
though, can alert us to the actual impact
of these proposed and attempted changes
as opposed to the intentioned change. For
instance, what does it mean to implement a
certain criterion? Does it result in a change
in learning or are changes made in curricu-
lum to align with a criterion without any
meaningful learning gains? If change does
happen over time, how does that take place?
These questions are important questions and
are raised frequently by authors of the hand-
book chapters. Although numeric and quan-
titative data is extremely helpful to docu-
ment issues at a larger scale, an in-depth
interpretive examination is equally impor-
tant in meaningfully understanding the issue
at hand.
Even though interpretive research is
exceptionally useful, there are several barri-
ers to conducting interpretive research and
it is prudent to discuss these. First, inter-
pretive research, particularly using qualita-
tive and ethnographic methods, can be very
time consuming. All research, when done
rigorously, takes time interpretive research
owing to the exhaustive data collection
 conducting interpretive research in engineering education
needs and the need for triangulation often
needs more time. Sense-making is involved
at every step of the research process as
each step can be uncertain. Second, inter-
pretive research often requires significant
manpower resources and training for con-
ducting research can often take longer than
many other positivist approaches. Further,
unlike other approaches that can utilize sec-
ondary data, interpretive research, owing to
its localized settings and localized informa-
tion needed for interpretation, has to rely
overwhelmingly on primary data. Secondary
data, even if they are available, have to be
used sparingly and judiciously although it
can often play a central role in triangulation.
Finally, interpretive research requires signif-
icant post-processing effort in terms of out-
lining a convincing case. In many positivist
traditions the basic structure of research out-
put – how findings and results are to be
presented – is standardized. An interpretive
research project depends as much on its pre-
sentation for making a convincing argument
as it does on data collection and analysis.
Given these seemingly significant barriers to
interpretive research for many researchers
the benefits far outweigh its disadvantages.
If the purpose of research is to truly under-
stand an issue with the intent of effecting
useful change, some form of interpretive
research is essential.
In the rest of this chapter I provide a
“methods” guide that can help researchers
conduct interpretive research.2 The guide is
necessarily my own interpretation of how
to do this research but can be useful to
beginning researchers who are getting their
feet wet. As with any research, researchers
over time find their preferred data collec-
tion procedures, protocols, and coding pro-
cedures. The intent of the rest of the chap-
ter is to show one way forward. Given the
many excellent texts available on the design
of research studies (see Table 28.1 for a selec-
tion) I do not discuss that aspect here. I
assume that the researcher wants to con-
duct interpretive research and is looking for
tools to help collect the data and analyze
and write it up. Because analysis and writing
depend significantly on the quality of data
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555
collected and in the interpretive skills of the
researcher that often develop over time, I
emphasize data collection above everything
else. With a weak data set, interpretation is
tricky if not impossible.
Starting Out – First Days in the Field
Every act of investigation begins with some
uncertain moments. In interpretive re-
search, especially when qualitative and
ethnographic methods are being employed,
the first few days in the field are often the
most worrisome for researchers. It is in these
initial moments that rapport has to be estab-
lished, the purpose of research explained to
participants, and “first impressions” formed
and projected. This is the time period when
the “learning” is the highest for any research.
The lack of familiarity with a setting opens
up our senses and we notice and absorb more
information than at any other time during
the research study. Therefore, it is crucial
to take meticulous and detailed notes dur-
ing this time period. The first few days also
provide the researcher the opportunity to
set the terms of the data collection. When
and what kinds of data will be collected?
What affordances does the setting actually
provide as compared to the idealized vision
in the research plan? Are there some partic-
ipants who are likely to become key infor-
mants and can help interpret what is going
on? Do I maintain a distance or do I create an
informal relationship with all participants?
All these are important questions that any
researcher has to address during the initial
days. Some other issues that come up are
how to take observations notes. Although
many young researchers are content to take
mental notes, there is no substitute for writ-
ten notes, and in any setting the note-taking
procedure has to be established as soon as
possible. Will you use a computer? Will you
take short breaks and finish up your notes
in another location? Finally, what kind of
note-taking do you plan to do? Detailed,
extremely details, cues to things you would
remember. All these norms have to be
established from inception and make the
 556 cambridge handbook of engineering education research
Table 28.1. Overview of Introductory Texts on Design of Research Studies
Text
Eisner: Qualitative Inquiry in Education
Glesne: Becoming Qualitative Researchers
Marshall & Rossman: Designing
Qualitative Research
Patton: Qualitative Research and
Evaluation Methods
Taylor & Bogdan: Introduction to
Qualitative Research Methods
LeCompte & Schensul: Designing &
Conducting Ethnographic Research
Rossman & Rallis: Learning in the Field
first days in the field critical to the overall
success of the project.3
Observing Others in Action
Observations are one of the most crucial
components of any field study. Although
observations form the backbone of any
research, including positivist experimental
research, they are critical in interpretive
studies conducted in the field because the
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Brief Overview of the Text
A text about different “ways of seeing” the world around
us; the importance of having non-numerical
representations to think about critical subjects; focused
primarily on education; the critical use of a sample of
one to make sense.
A great introductory text for first time qualitative
researchers; earlier editions were co-written with Alan
“Buddy” Peshkin; Briefly covers all aspects of the
research process; in the tradition of qualitative inquiry;
covers different traditions of qualitative inquiry and
differences with the positivist tradition.
Classic text for understanding the design of qualitative
research studies; covers the idea of having a
“conceptual framework”; uses several examples from
actual studies; great chapter on the “how” of field
study.
A “handbook” of sort; covers almost all topics related to
qualitative research; a great reference; discusses the
conceptual issues, design and data collection, and
analysis and reporting; many examples from actual
studies including codebook samples.
The subtitle says it all: “The search of meanings”; this text
goes to the core of qualitative inquiry – we want to
understand how our informants make meaning and
then we use the data to make meaning on our own;
two comprehensive sections – How to conduct the
research and How to write it up.
Several books and a whole series of seven books on how
to conduct ethnographic research (Ethnographer’s
Toolkit); their field notes book in the toolkit is one of
the few books that discuss it in depth; they talk a great
deal about quantitative data as well. These are good
reference books but keep in mind that they are not
uniquely about interpretive research.
Does a great job of talking about the issues that arise in
the field through actual studies of three of their
students; lots of useful examples and samples; covers
almost all topics.
opportunity to observe any setting at any
given time does not repeat. Therefore, the
ability to capture action in the field accu-
rately is indispensable. Of course, any inter-
pretive researcher will take issue with the
term “accurately” in the preceding sentence
as any act of capturing data through obser-
vations is an interpretive act as well. What
to look at and what to note down are all
interpretive act; even the placing of a video
camera to record a setting is an interpre-
tive act. Therefore, when I say accurately I
 conducting interpretive research in engineering education 557

Table 28.2. How to Conduct Observations

Text Brief Overview
Lofland & Lofland: Analyzing Situation and strategies. Situations: encounters, roles, groups,
Social Settings organizations. Strategies: manner, identity, place timing;
strategies of avoidance; pay attention to action within context
by specific people.
Rossman and Rallis: Learning in Why observe?: Context, tacit patterns, see patterns not
the Field communicated in interviews, direct experience; What to
observe? Social system – formal/informal, events, longitudinal
changes, rituals, ceremonies, interaction patterns, unplanned
activities, artifacts in use.
Brandt: Studying Behavior in Different ways of studying behavior in varied settings through
Natural Settings instruments such as observations, surveys, interviews; narrative
data: anecdotes, specimen records (a specific person is chosen),
field notes, ecological descriptions; examples of activity
recording sheets and other devices to capture observational
records systematically; timeline-based data collection.
Schatzman & Strauss: Field A practical guide with a lot of strategies; strategy for entering,
Research getting organized, watching, listening, recording, analyzing,
communicating the research; angle of observation – it is a
relative activity.

mean in the context of the research question
and the purposes of the research study. The
observers’ perception has to be aligned with
the goal of the observation and the observer
has to ensure that his or her bias does not
shape the observations. The texts reviewed
in Table 28.2 provide further detailed guid-
ance on conducting field observations. The
key to good observations is being rigorous
and steady – observe all the time and observe
as much as you can.
Taking Observation Field Notes
redundant4 but it is good practice, initially
as well as later in the study, to capture as
much as possible. In addition to being com-
prehensive, field notes have to be retroac-
tively useful and therefore they need to cap-
ture critical information such as time, place,
and participants. It is a good habit to start
each field note session by first making a note
of the date and the time. There are many
formats that can be used to facilitate better
note taking, and the texts reviewed in Table
28.3 provide an assortment of such tools.

One of the most critical skills one needs to Conducting Interviews

develop as an interpretive researcher is the
ability to take good field notes. The defini-
tion of what comprises good field notes is
hard to pin down but there are a few char-
acteristics that distinguish them from field
notes that are inept. First, field notes have to
be comprehensive. The data that need to be
captured will vary based on the purpose of
the research study but it is important to note
different aspects of the site, the participants,
and the activities that occur. Over time, and
with experience, a researcher develops some
tricks to keep track of all the happenings and
is able to filter out information that might be
Learning from participants about their
worldview and their settings is one of the
cornerstones of good interpretive work. But
learning from others is much more difficult
than it appears. It starts with developing
good listening skills, which is often difficult
for researchers, particularly academics, who
are prone to advocating their knowledge.
Yet, the importance of being a patient and
sincere learner cannot be underestimated
in interpretive research. Listening comes in
many forms. Some of it has to do with
avoiding interrupting your participants but

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 558 cambridge handbook of engineering education research
Table 28.3. How to Write Observations Field Notes
Text
Emerson, Fretz, & Shaw: Writing
Ethnographic Fieldnotes
Lofland & Lofland: Analyzing Social
Settings
it also has to do with giving them time
to reflect and respecting silence. Often less
experienced interviewers rush to fill in any
empty space within a dialogue but that can
be a mistake. Participants can take time to
articulate an answer, or sometime hearing
their own voice forces them to reflect and
reform their response. These moments have
to be respected within any interview. Table
28.4 lists some classic texts on interviewing,
Table 28.5 presents a list of useful questions
culled from a couple of texts, and Table 28.6
presents a sample interview protocol.
Interviews are often done on an individual
basis but sometime the opportunity arises
to interview more than one person, and this
can change the dynamics of the interviewing
process. In some cases, focus group inter-
views with more than two participants can
be undertaken and these have their own
dynamics. Although they were developed as
a technique by mass media researchers to
find out the opinion of participants, they can
be used by interpretive researchers to delin-
eate nuances and differences among partic-
ipants. To do so, it is important to manage
the group dynamics to ensure that each par-
ticipant gets the opportunity to advance
their viewpoint and that “loud” members
do not take over and lead to groupthink.
One technique for avoiding this, as noted in
the sample protocol in Table 28.7, is to ask
participants to first jot down ideas in writ-
ing on a piece of paper to ensure that their
views are represented in some form before
the group discussion. The participants can
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Brief Overview
Discusses the importance of field notes and then lays out the
different issues involved when you are in the field, then
writing up the fieldnotes afterward, and then processing
them; mnemonic devices and jottings in the field; creating
scenes from the notes, writing commentaries and memos;
trying to understand informants’ meanings from the
write-up; scenes involve description and dialogues
(and characterization); sketches, episodes, tales.
Chapter 5: Logging data; words and action; mental notes,
jotted notes, full fieldnotes – write promptly, content and
style; start thinking about the unit.
then be asked to read this list or the inter-
viewer can collect and use them as prompts.
Analyzing Field Study Data
Data analysis forms the most complicated
but the most rewarding part of the inter-
pretive research process as the fundamen-
tal argument for the approach relies on the
ability to provide an analysis that accounts
for the meaning-making of the study partic-
ipants. Therefore, in addition to reporting
the activities observed and the researcher’s
interpretation of them, an interpretive anal-
ysis provides a meta-analysis from the par-
ticipants’ perspective. The analysis process
varies across researchers and research groups
and many researchers prefer to immerse
themselves in the data for a long period
of time and emerge with an overall con-
ception or argument. Many researchers fol-
low the traditional approach of coding the
data based on broad categories or themes
and use these to triangulate the data. The
codes in interpretive research are induc-
tive; they emerge from the data. Coding
techniques vary by researcher and project,
but certain steps are common. The first step
involves going through the data and docu-
menting common themes that emerge. This
process is usually called “free” coding as
the intent is to capture all the major ideas
that are present in the data. The codes gen-
erated through this process are termed in
vivo codes as they emerge from the data.
 conducting interpretive research in engineering education
Table 28.4. How to Conduct Interviews
Text
Spradley: The Ethnographic Interview
Merton, Fiske, & Kendall: Focused
Interview
McCracken: The Long Interview
Seidman: Interviewing as Qualitative
Research
Kvale: InterViews
Weiss: Learning from Strangers
Gubrium, J. F., & Holstein, J. A.
(Eds.): Handbook of Interview
Research
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559
Brief Overview of the Text and Its Main Message
The “classic” text about ethnographic interviewing; “what do
my informants know about their culture that I can
discover?”; elements of the interview; kinds of descriptive
questions (grand tour); structural questions (examples of
something); contrast questions (alike, different);
relationship between different kinds of questions and their
placement within the interview is critical; domain analysis;
cultural themes.
A contrast to the ethnographic interview; the style that led to
focus groups; comes out of media effects research. The
criteria: range (of situations and responses), specificity
(highly specific aspects), depth (different meanings and
degree of involvement), and personal context (informants’
own distinctive meanings). This method is good for asking
different informants about the same situation or event; can
be carried out with a group of informants.
Deliberately more focused and efficient than the
ethnographic interview; makes use of open-ended
questions but in a focused and intensive interviewing
process; good if interview is the sole data collection
methods being used; literature review is considered part of
the “long interview” process; examining the self is part of
the process; questionnaire construction is an essential step;
a scheme for data analysis based on the prior stages of the
process.
“Understanding the experience of other people and the
meaning they make of that experience.” Three-interview
series: focused life history (everything in light of the
current topic); details of experience (reconstructed);
reflection on the meaning (what sense does this make to
you?); each interview lasts around 90 minutes. Listen
more, talk less; avoid leading questions, ask open-ended
questions; keep participants focused and ask for concrete
details; storytelling.
Phenomenological aspect of qualitative interviewing;
informants’ life-world; working through ambiguity; use of
artifacts in the interviewing process – reflecting on
artifacts; interaction with artifacts; hermeneutical aspects
of interviewing (interpretation of texts).
Good introductory text with lots of examples and practical
know-how of the interview process; The importance and
design of an interview guide; analysis of transcriptions with
comments; issues with interviewing; difference between
survey and qualitative interviewing; also talks about
analysis and writing.
Contains chapters by a lot of experts that focus on specific
issues related to interviewing; covers survey and
journalistic interviews; chapters by Charmaz on grounded
theory and by Adler & Alder on the “reluctant respondent”
are particularly useful.
 560 cambridge handbook of engineering education research
Table 28.5. Interviewing Tips
Tips for building rapport in early interviews (pp. 81–82)
Make repeated explanations of why
you’re interviewing them.
Restate what informants say – but don’t
reinterpret what they say.
Don’t ask for meaning, ask for use – is a
feature of ethnographic interviews.
Tips for discovering questions (pp. 84–85)
Record questions you hear people asking
during the course of everyday life.
Ask directly about the kinds of questions
used by informants and others.
Create a hypothetical situation and then
ask for questions.
Tips on descriptive questions/types of descriptive questions (pp. 85–90)
Make the question longer – you will get
a longer response.
Phrasing questions personally or
culturally
Grand tour questions
Typical grand tour questions
Specific grand tour questions
Guided grand tour questions
Task-related grand tour question
Mini-tour questions
Example questions
Experience questions
Native-language questions
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Spradley (1979)
“As I said earlier, I’m interested in . . . ”
Reinterpreting is when you state in different words what the
interviewee has said; restating is using the same words –
selecting key phrases and words and restating them.
Instead of “What do you mean by that?” or “Why would you
do that” ask questions like “Could you tell me what you
would say to the . . . ” or “What kinds of things would I
hear you saying?”
“What is an interesting question about . . . .?”
“What is a question to which the answer is . . . ?”
“If I listened to waitresses talking among themselves at the
beginning of an evening, what questions would I hear
them ask each other?”
Instead of “Could you tell me what jail is like?” try “I’ve
never been inside the jail before, so I don’t have much of
an idea what it’s like. Could you kind of take me through
the jail and tell me what it’s like, what I would see if I
went into the jail . . . ?”
Might elicit different information or be differently sensitive
for informant.
Persona: “Can you describe a typical evening for you at
Brady’s Bar?”
Cultural: “Can you describe a typical evening for most
cocktail waitresses at Brady’s Bar?” or “How would most
tramps refer to the jail?”
“Can you describe all the different tools and other
equipment you use in farming?”
“What are all the things that you do during the initiation
ceremony for new members who join the fraternity?”
“Could you describe a typical day at the office?”
Take the most recent event or space most familiar to the
respondent to help him or her remember: “Tell me about
the last time you made a . . . ”
“Could you describe what happened at Brady’s Bar last
night . . . ?”
Make them actually walk you around.
Get them to perform tasks and talk aloud while doing them.
“Could you play a game of backgammon and explain what
you are doing?” [Similar to think-aloud method]
Same as grand tour, but about smaller aspects of experience.
More specific. “Can you give me an example of someone
giving you a hard time?”
Asks for experiences in actual settings – tend to elicit atypical
events.
“You’ve probably had some interesting experiences in jail;
can you recall any of them?”
“How would you refer to the jail?”
“How would you talk about . . . ?”
 conducting interpretive research in engineering education
Hypothetical interaction questions
Typical-sentence question
Glesne and Peshkin (1992)
Don’t say final goodbyes to
respondents – leave door open for a
return (p. 64).
Keep questions free of words, syntax,
or idioms respondents won’t
understand (p. 67).
Don’t make questions loaded or
leading (p. 67).
Pilot interview questions with
member of actual group you’re
studying (p. 68).
Don’t ask questions about “hot topics”
before establishing rapport (p. 69).
Keep questions from getting too
vague. Provide mood and props to
help interviewees recall previous
times/events (p. 69).
Use quotations from another source
(p. 69).
“Soliciting Advice” Questions – gets
more idealized answers than direct
“what do you do” questions (p. 70).
Vary the voice or subject of
questions; gets you different
information (p. 70).
Use language that respondents
understand (pp. 70–71).
Put questions that are easy to answer
at the beginning (p. 71).
Watch for interaction effects of
questions (p.71).
“Magic wand” questions (p. 72).
Get the interviewee to help you fill
out the picture (p. 72).
Try to promote regularity of
interviews (p. 73).
Give respondents an idea of how
often you’ll want to interview them
(p. 73) [if you are conducting a
multiple interview study]
Take notes on interviews, in addition
to tapes [recording] (p. 75).
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561
Spradley (1979)
Makes informants less likely to translate for your sake.
“If I were to sit in the back of your classroom, what kinds of
things would I hear kids saying to each other?”
“What are some sentences that use the term . . . ?”
No “Don’t you suspect . . . ” or “Isn’t it the case that . . . ”
“I’d like to have you go back to a time in your. . . . ”
Allows you to attribute to someone else ideas that are
provocative, but that you don’t want them to think reflect
your opinion.
“I’d like you to put yourself in the position of my adviser. I’m a
brand new teaching, never taught here before . . . What
advice would you give me . . . ?”
“Do you . . . ” vs. “Do teachers like you . . . ” vs. “Do teachers in
your school . . . ” vs. “Do teachers in general . . . ?”
“Before we go on to other questions, I’d like to be sure what
word or words you use to describe the different kinds of
kids . . . ”
Gets interviewees talking and reassures them that your
questions are manageable.
You’ll need to keep some questions far apart, because one
would influence the answer to another.
“If you could change anything at Riverview High School in any
way you wanted, what, if anything, would you change?”
“What else should we have asked that we haven’t asked?”
“What have we overlooked?”
“Have we underemphasized important things?”
“Have we overemphasized unimportant things?’
“Same time and place next week?”
“At least two times, and maybe more, certainly no more than is
comfortable for you. And you may – without providing any
explanation – stop and particular session or all further
sessions.”
Account of an interview should include “old questions requiring
elaboration; questions already covered; where to begin next
time; special circumstances that you feel affected the quality
of the interview; reminders about anything that might
prepare you for subsequent interviews; and identification
data.”
(continued )
 562 cambridge handbook of engineering education research

Table 28.5 (continued )

Glesne and Peshkin (1992)
Watch for body language (p. 77).
Useful culminating statements (p. 78). “Here is the ground we covered today. I was pleased to
learn about . . . Would it be okay for next time if we
went back to this and that point . . . ?”
Stick to the time frame you laid out going in
(p. 78).
Although being “naı̈ve” is good, watch out for
asking “What do you mean” too often; it can
sound like you are second guessing (p. 80).
Communicate that you are listening, without “That must have hurt” and “Mm hmmm,” not “I’m with
expressing your own opinion (p. 84). you” or probably not “A-freakin’-men!” either
Don’t rush (p. 85). If you communicate your satisfaction with your
respondents’ short-shrift replies, then you teach them
how little it takes to satisfy you. Say “Tell me more,”
and your interviewees will learn to respond
accordingly.
Silence is one way to probe (pp. 85–86). But don’t stretch it too long so it gets awkward.
“Uh huh, uh huh” and “yes, yes” are also
probes because they encourage talking
(p. 86).
Longer, more direct probes (p. 86). “I’m not sure I got that straight. Would you please run
by again what . . . ?”
Summary statement followed by . . . “Did I understand
you correctly?”
Summary statement followed by . . . “Is there anything
more you’d like to add?”
Take responsibility for all questions not
understood; reframe/recast the questions,
but if still not understood, move on instead
of pushing it and making respondent feel
stupid (p. 88).
The too-talkative interviewee – set it up
ahead of time that you might stop the talk
from time to time, “in the interest of
getting things straight” (p. 90).
Do not point out contradictions during the
interview (p. 90).
To deal with contradicting statements, in a “I heard some people say . . . I’ve heard other people
subsequent interview, you can take the two say . . . What is your thinking on these two
statements and put them in the mouths of positions? . . . Is it possible that both are right? Is there
other people and ask interviewee to a third or even fourth position?”
respond (p. 90).
Leave time at the end to just chat and thank
the interviewee formally (p. 91).

As a next step, codes are grouped together
based on commonalities and tested exten-
sively against the entire data or a specific cor-
pus of data. This step is often called focused
coding. In some cases, categories are related
to subcategories and relationship between
codes is examined. This step is termed axial
coding and its usefulness lies in bringing
together the disparate part of the study
to provide coherence to the overall study.
Initial coding often leads to viewing the
data from too many different perspectives,
and axial coding is a mechanism to pro-
vide an overarching analytical framework
that groups things together. In interpretive
research one has to be open to changing the

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 conducting interpretive research in engineering education 563

Table 28.6. Sample Interview Guide and Protocol

Date and Time: ___________________________ Location: ________________
Respondent: ______________________________ Title: ____________________
Interviewer: ______________________________
Guidelines for Introduction (5–10 minutes)
1. Thank informant for interview and explain project. The goal of this project is to understand how
instructors teach, their thoughts about improving teaching, if any, and challenges instructors face in
improving their teaching. We want to learn about your experiences. We’ll be interviewing you and
if possible conducting an observation of your teaching.
2. Reinforce confidentiality: the identity of the informants will be kept confidential. In addition, the
findings of the study will be reported in a way that preserves the confidentiality of any private
information provided.
3. The interview will be pretty open-ended and generally takes about an hour. (Ask interviewees if
they have any “hard” constraints on time.)
4. Ask informant if he/she has any questions for you before starting.
5. Recording: “I usually transcribe all the interviews. Do you mind if I record our conversation? It will
help me focus on the interview and keeps me from having to write everything down verbatim”
(turn on the recorder).
6. Give them the consent form, explaining that it describes their rights as a study participant. As
them to sign it as long as they feel comfortable participating. Also, ask them to initial that audio
recording is okay.
Sample questions and probes from an interview protocol developed for understanding engineering
work practices
1. Please describe your work.
Alternatively or additionally, ask
Tell me about your day last [Tuesday, Wednesday . . . choose a recent day].
Probes:
If teaching (or research) named predominantly, probe about the other [“you mentioned . . . , what
about . . . ”]:
r Can you tell me about the <teaching> or <research>?
r Can you tell me about the relationship between the two?
Additional probes:
r Tell me about your day last [Tuesday, Wednesday . . . choose a random, recent day].
2. Since you’ve been on this job/position, what kinds of changes have you seen?
Probes:
r How has your work changed?
r Has the relationship between research and teaching changed? How?
r Describe any critical events.
3. Can you describe a time when these differences between the X’s and the Y’s are most apparent?
r Can you give me an example?
r Do you think that the distinction affects how you work? In what way?
r If you could change something, what would you change?
4. One of the advantages of working in academia is the relative freedom to make changes. What have
changes have you made in your work?
Probes:
r Changes in teaching
r Changes in research
r Frequency of changes
r Incentives for changes
r Describe any critical events.
(continued )

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Table 28.6 (continued)

5. Did you teach before joining your present position? If yes, what, if anything, did you learn that
helped you when you joined this position?
6. If you could make some changes in your work or its situation, what would they be? We could talk
about this in two ways: changes that are feasible and changes that would require magic, that reflect
how things would be in an ideal world.
Probe: For example, one of the goals of this study is to identify changes in technology that might
more effectively facilitate teaching. Are there any technical tools or functionality that you think
would be helpful?
Before the end of interview, ask once again if informants have any questions for you. Thank them.
Encourage them to send you observations that they subsequently have about their teaching or
anything they think is interesting about their teaching.
General probes:
r Can you give me an example of (or tell me a story about) that?
r What was your experience of that?

categories – either by eliminating them or categories, and their instances can be an

collapsing them. Often a category will have
to be divided into more subcategories to
capture all the nuances. Ultimately, what
an interpretive article does not do is imply
enumerate the categories and their instances
within the data and report them. Although
the instances of occurrence of a category
are important, their significance for the
participants is a more important element
in interpretive research. Therefore coding,
important preliminary step; they have to
be followed by meaning-making by the
researcher. The purpose of this is to find not
some hidden “truth” but the most illustra-
tive reasoning. Table 28.8 lists some texts
that contain information on how to analyze
field study – observation and interview –
data. As with other examples, these texts are
from the qualitative or ethnographic tradi-
tions but their insights are equally applicable

Table 28.7. Focus Group Protocol

r Turn on the recorder.
r Pass informed consent forms.
r Take introductions as ice breakers.
Discussion starter question: Take a few minutes to write down what comes to your mind when you
think of this course, your role, your design, collaboration, etc. (list some positives and some
negatives).
Start group discussion.
Let’s hear from each of you [give everyone the opportunity to participate and ask about their
motivation for . . . ]
[If you fail to hear a topic or if there is a common topic you want to explore]
One thing I heard several people mentions is . . . . . . . . . . . . .
One thing I am surprised no one mentioned is . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Other useful questions:
When you think about __________ what comes to mind?
Can you describe your project/artifact?
What kinds of things have made ____________ easier/harder for you?
One of the things we are especially interested in is ____________? What can you tell us about that?
That’s something we’re definitely interested in hearing more about. What can you tell us about it?
What will they improve? What can be removed or avoided? What did they learn?

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 conducting interpretive research in engineering education 565

Table 28.8. How to Analyze Field Study Data

Charmaz: Grounded Theory
Becker: Tricks of the Trade
Strauss: Qualitative Analysis
for Social Scientists
Miles & Huberman:
Qualitative Data Analysis
Sourcebook
Strauss & Corbin: Basics of
Qualitative Research
What Does it Entail? Examples When to Use
Coding: initial (line-by-line); focused, axial, theoretical; memo
writing – raising codes to a conceptual level; theoretical sampling
and saturation (earlier version: constant comparative method,
sorting through data).
The idea of a concept: What is it that we are talking about? We
define them and the definitions are shaped by our collection of
cases; tricks to figure out the concepts you are dealing with.
A slightly different treatment of grounded theory; examples of
coding – open, selective; memos and memo writing; illustrations
and examples of working with data; integrative diagrams
(frameworks); presentation and writing.
Great reference resource with chapters on doing the analysis and
visual presentation of data; how to use tables, diagrams, figures to
make meaning of the data and also to present it to the reader.
Coding

to interpretive research. Two texts that pro-
vide extensive and substantial discussions of
the coding process are Charmaz (2006) and
Strauss and Corbin (1998).
Writing Up Interpretive Research
As with any research process, the final writ-
ing and publication, or presentation, of the
research is the usual culmination of the pro-
cess. Although the publication and presenta-
tion of any research, even scientific research
in the natural sciences, is a process of “social
construction,” in interpretive research it is
often hard to separate the writing from the
research – it is an integral part of the process.
Whether it is to be consumed as a research
article, a monograph, or a full-length book,
writing up interpretive research is an often
difficult and time-consuming process. One
of the difficulties of writing is the lack
of standard models. Interpretive researchers
follow different styles and the final writ-
ing can take on many forms. Even if one
eliminates such forms as “autoethnographic”
texts from the canon of regular interpre-
tive writing, the variation among research
papers and books is immense. Yet, there
are some commonalities underlying all inter-
pretive writings and the most prominent
is the attempt to make sense through the
eyes of the participants. Interpretive writing
also balances researcher interpretation, data
snippets, and often theoretical arguments
in equal proportion. There are some com-
mon caveats in these writings where authors
often make the leap from observing behav-
ior to reporting it as participants’ inter-
pretation. The link between what is seen
and what it means is hard to establish and
often missing. This is a common criticism of
interpretive research – do we ever really
know what others think? This is also a
challenge not only to establish but also to
present in the form of written interpreta-
tion. Authors often take the support of other
forms of representations such as analytical
figures, illustrations, pictures, and if possi-
ble, video data. Table 28.9 provides some
references to texts that can aid in writing and
that describe different ways of writing that
might be applicable to interpretive research.
Conclusion
This chapter provides a guide on conduct-
ing interpretive research using ethnographic
and qualitative methods. This approach is
becoming increasingly common in engi-
neering education research and can benefit

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 566 cambridge handbook of engineering education research

Table 28.9. How to Write Up Interpretive Research

Text Brief Description of the Text
Wolcott: Writing Up The most useful book on writing up qualitative research that I have
Qualitative Research encountered; Wolcott is a great writer himself and most of his
books on qualitative research are worth reading (and some of them
have been quite controversial).
Becker: Writing for Social Not a book about qualitative writing per se but still a great book to
Scientists think about how to write any social science topic; talks about the
importance of editing; great complement to Tricks of the Trade.
Golden-Biddle & They take examples of great qualitative journal articles, and through
Locke:Composing conversation with authors and documents of the reviewing process
Qualitative Research reconstruct how the arguments in the paper were constructed; the
articles focus on organizational research but the process of
constructing an argument, especially in the space offered by a
journal article, is very well explained.
Van Mannen: Tales of the A “classic” text about writing about ethnographic studies; the author
Field outlines three different kinds of tales: realist (dispassionate,
third-person voice), confessional (narrated through self), and
impressionist (striking stories); the book starts with a great review
of the “cultural” turn and where this piece fits in; gives examples
from his own writing (and rewritings).
Goodall: Writing the New Represents the movement toward “auto-ethnography” and the
Ethnography engagement of self with the narrative; the trials and tribulations of
an ethnographer who does not fit in the mainstream; issues of
representation, voice, reflexivity.
Wolf: A Thrice-Told Tale Anthropological critique of the “cultural” (and postmodern) turn;
consists of three different texts that showcase the same set of
events: a fictional short story, unanalyzed fieldnotes from
observations and interviews, and a journal piece that appeared in
American Ethnologist.

the coverall research agenda of the field by
providing a more ecological valid look at
why and how students persist in engineer-
ing, learning engineering, and institutional
issues that shape engineering education.
Interpretive research can use many dif-
ferent approaches for data collection and
analysis; Table 28.10 provides some exam-
ples of this diversity.
Finally, Table 28.11 recaps many of the
issues that have to be considered in field
study driven interpretive research. The list
is broken down into four different sections:
“Before the Field,” “In the Field,” “After the
Field,” and “Rest/All the Time.” These are
ideas based on my personal experiences, and
the list can be useful if personalized by each
researcher to meet his or her needs.

Table 28.10. Methods Appropriate for Interpretive Research

Linguistics
Cognitive anthropology
Network analysis
Conversation analysis
Unobtrusive measures
Interaction analysis
Ethnomethodology
Heath: Language and social structure, linguistic analysis
Hutchins: Distributed cognition approach, learning in network of artifacts
and people
Wasserman & Faust, Scott & Carrington: Network data, in combination
with observations and interviews
Sacks & Silverman: Analysis of talk
Webb et al: Documents and other artifacts that are available in the setting
Jordon & Henderson: Journal of Learning Sciences
Garfinkel, Sommerville et al.: Ethnography and system design

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 conducting interpretive research in engineering education 567

Table 28.11. Field Study Checklist

Before entering the field
Institutional Review Board application and consent form: Ensure you have the proper permissions and
documentations to conduct the research and enough copies of the consent form for your participants.
Research questions: Ensure that the purpose of the study, in terms of research questions, is well
articulated and is helpful in framing the data collection.
Access: Ensure you have access to the research site and have worked out details of entry and other
logistics.
Site: Make sure you have done background research on the site and know its specifics – where it is,
how to reach it, etc.
Logistics: Related to the site, prepare for logistical issues such as where to conduct the interview.
Proposals: If your research requires funding or support in some form and make sure you have done
that background work.
Working hypothesis: Although interpretive research requires an open mind, it is often critical to have
some working hypothesis to frame your work to support but more likely refute it.
Ethics: Think through the ethical implications of your work, especially how your presence in the field
might impact them, particularly those who might be in a less powerful position.
Familiarity with site/Subjectivity: Do background research to build some form of familiarity with the
site to be aid interpretation.
Technology (batteries): If you plan on using any technologies such as computers or recorders make sure
they are in working condition and you have spare machines and batteries.
Interview/Observation protocol: Prepare the protocols and take copies of them with you to the field.
Make a checklist: Make your own checklist that you can use to quickly prepare before any trip to the
field.
Format for filenames: Make a proper coding system/scheme for storing data.

In the field
Ethics/Subjectivity: Ethical issues become increasingly salient in the field given the numerous occasions
that arise where ethics are tested. Any interaction with a participant or any opportunity to enter and
observe an event or activity has potential ethical implications. Do you tell the people present who
you are? How and when do you do that? How much information about your project do you divulge?
If you tell them you are not going to record any information, do you completely stop data collection?
Does your experience not even count towards your interpretation? Can it even be completely wiped
out from your experience? These questions arise routinely and often the ethical implications come to
individual subjectivity and doing what is right. When there is no IRB or another researcher to
monitor, your own sense of ethics will take precedence and therefore to undertake ethical research
more than rules, regulations, and training, one has to develop a self-sense of ethical doing.
First days: As discussed in this chapter in detail, navigating the first days in the field is often tricky and
your impressions as a researcher can play a significant role in subsequent data collection. Therefore, it
is important to map out the first days in the field as well as be extra vigilant in note taking.
Introductions, including who you are and what you are doing at the site, are two important questions
for which you must be prepared with credible and honest answers.
Memos: Memos are a useful mechanism to keep track of the field study as well as reflect on the data
collection. Memos taken during the field study can also be important resources in data interpretation
in later stages.
Observations: Obvious, but observing the right thing in the right amount is crucial for good quality
data and even though “right,” often can be assessed only post hoc; it helps to have a plan.
(continued )

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Table 28.11 (continued)

Interviews: With interviews, it is important to remind yourself that the critical thing is using
open-ended questions and respecting silences.
Unobtrusive methods/Archival data: Often, a research site will provide the opportunity to collect data
through unobtrusive means, often archival data, and one has to be prepared to collect this data as well
as make efforts to gain this data if possible. These data can be extremely useful in triangulating.
Rapport: Building rapport with informants is important and it requires building a safe environment
and developing trust. The important thing to keep in mind is to not be devious but honest.
Field notes/Recording of data: Ensure data are being recorded in a reliable manner. Complete all field
notes by the end of the day, especially if what you have from the field are rough jottings. Memory
fails us often.
Discussion with colleagues: Sometimes, especially in large projects with multiple data collectors, it can
be helpful to discuss your data collection with your colleagues. Of course, it is important to maintain
participant privacy.

Rest/All of the time

Planning: Plans are helpful although things do and will change as the field study goes on. Before
entering the field and even while you are in the field it is important to plan your data collection
efforts with the goal of obtaining good and adequate data in mind.
Reading: Often, it helps to read other studies related to your current field study or research methods
texts to keep your data collection fresh. You get new ideas and can often come with new ways to
triangulating your data and interpretations.
Practice: Practicing your observation and interviewing skills is very important. Practice helps you
smoothen out the rough edges but also lets you try out different ways of asking the same question.
Thinking: Thinking and reflecting about the data collection are important to ensure an in-depth
analysis.
The politics: Every field sites has its politics and it is almost impossible to stay neutral but that should
always be the first goal. Never pick sides. If in a difficult position of agreeing or disagreeing with
someone, be honest, be consistent, and explain your stance.

After the field

Subjectivity: Interpretive research is subjective research and therefore your stance and framing of the
problem and research should be laid out in your text.
Validity: The validity of your research, of any research, comes from doing a thorough job of the field
study and being able to support your findings and arguments with proper evidence from your data.
Transcription: Using a professional transcriptionist or transcribing on your own often depends on the
resources available and often on personal taste. The level of transcription also depends on the research
question but verbatim transcriptions should be preferable to summaries.
Inductive/Deductive/Grounded theory/Cross-comparative: During analysis the process to follow
depends on the objective but different options can include grounded theory or cross-comparative
analysis and following an inductive approach overall.
Software: Which software to use for analysis, and whether or not to use software, is an important
decision and the choice depends on several factors such as the team involved in analysis, the nature of
data – interview transcripts and observations notes or other media, and cost considerations. Several
popular options include NVivoTM , InqScribeTM , AtlastiTM , and others.
Writing: Writing considerations involve how much to write, how to pace the writing, how to balance
analysis and writing. During writing, tying data with theory is very important. Representing data in
different ways to help with analysis and making findings accessible to others are other issues to
consider.

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 conducting interpretive research in engineering education
Footnotes
1. One of the most comprehensive online
resources for qualitative research methods is
the bibliography maintained by the University
of Georgia, Athens, GA, which contains list
of references for almost all approaches to
qualitative and ethnographic research: http://
www.coe.uga.edu/leap/academic-programs/
qualitative-research/qualitative-research-
resources/bibliography/
2. I often use the term “ethnographically infor-
med” to describe my data collection approach
as it captures best the close involvement with
the research site but is not an ethnogra-
phy in the true sense of the word because
the ethnographic tradition requires long-term
engagement with the research site – extending
several years. The ethnographically informed
approach still follows many of principles and
traditions outlined by ethnographers – in terms
of the structure of interviews, the interpretive
nature of the work, and so on – but deviates in
other ways.
3. A useful reference is B. Geer, “First Days in
the Field,” in P. Hammond (Ed.), Sociologists
at Work (New York, NY: Basic Books, 1964),
pp. 322–344.
4. This is always problematic as researcher bias
might be at play and what the researcher might
not think is important may prove so later on.
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