Download Chapter 2: Field Methods

Chapter 2 Blue Book: Field Methods in Ethnography
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Preface: The below notes explore and compare cultural anthropological field methods
with that of other social sciences, as well as how they are used in modern settings
o Background: Anthropology was separated from sociology around the 20th century
by people like French scholar Emile Durkheim.
 He studied religions of Native Australia (1912-1961) and mass
phenomena in modern nations (1897-1951)
What is Ethnography?
- Ethnography: (noun) the scientific description of peoples and cultures with their customs,
habits, and mutual differences (Oxford Dictionaries)
- Traditionally, ethnographers have tried to understand the whole of an alien culture
o “Ethnographers adopt a free-ranging strategy for gathering information. They
move from setting to setting, place to place, and subject to subject to discover the
totality and interconnectedness of social life.” (from the book)
- This expanded our knowledge of human diversity, and provided more understanding of
human behaviour and social life
Ethnographic Techniques 101
- Observation
o Pay attention to details such as daily life, seasonal events and unusual happenings
 Observe individual and collective behaviour in a variety of settings
o Keep a personal diary and separate them from formal field notes
 These diaries usually have “first impressions” and things the
anthropologist finds very “different”
o First impressions like these are important in pointing out the most
basics of life (i.e. noises, gestures, eating habits, etc.). This helps to
define basic aspects of cultural diversity
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Participant Observation
o Ethnographer do not manipulate subjects or try to induce certain behaviours
o Ethnographers get involved in community life, in which impartiality is impossible
o Ex: Author in Madagascar 1966-67, observing the Betsileo life
o Helping at Harvest time
o Stamping stacks of rice stalks
o Reburial ceremony
o Becoming a god father
o Because of the common humanity between the studier and the studied, participant
observation is inevitable
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Conversation, Interviewing and Interview Schedules
o Conversation: Ethnographers partake in talk with ranging formality, i.e. anything
from gossip chit-chat to formal interviews
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Ethnographers must learn the language, starting at the naming phase
(asking names of objects), then gradually become better, to the point
where they can understand group conversations
o Then it is the ethnographer’s job to record special dialect such as
liturgies (formal sequence of words and actions) that can be
recorded for later analysis with a local expert
o Interviews and Schedules
 An ethnographical survey takes the census about basic information of
everyone in the community, by interviewing them face-to-face about
certain subjects. This technique provides structure, but does not confine
the ethnographer
 This provides comparable information between villagers, with core
questions to every interviewee, but also allows informal follow up
questions that may lead to interesting side topics
o Questions Ex: sex, religion, expenditure, diet, possessions, etc.
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The Genealogical Method
o Deals with history of kinship, descent, and marriage of the people
 Used to reconstruct history and understand current relationships
o Societies that are non-governmental are usually kin-based, where marriage is
crucial in strategically establishing political alliances to benefit both clans
 Kin relationships and pre-determined marriage contribute to forming a
social structure amongst this type of society
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Well-Informed Informants
o Every ethnographer would have this “guide” to the studied culture, someone who
came from that culture that was willing to help the ethnographer gather his or her
information and who was usually very knowledgeable about the culture
 A well-informed informant would be knowledgeable in particular aspects
such as general or specific history, customs, religion, etc.
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Life Histories
o The recorded past of people, usually one of the more “odd ball” characters that
the ethnographer observes, as ethnographers are always sensitive to those with
“extraordinary” experiences in the people that they study
 This provides intimate and personal cultural portraits which reveal how
people act in certain situations, and it also helps to highlight individual
diversity among the people studied
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Emic and Ettic
o Emic (native’s P.O.V.)
 Seeks the views of how the culture is doing by asking those that
participate in that culture
o Since the natives are well-informed on their own culture, the
ethnographer reasons that getting the best information or most
accurate opinion is from those that hold influence in each location
o Etic (observer’s P.O.V.)
 The anthropologist evaluates the actions of the natives in a way as
unbiased as possible
o Since the “culture bearers” (those that act in the culture that
maintain specific roles) may be too biased to give a realistic
description, the ethnographer takes notes in his or her own
perspective instead
o To describe different ethnographies one must recognize the biases of the culture bearers,
as well as one’s own biases, as they can never totally be eliminated
o In practice, since there is no way of completely erasing bias, so a combination of both
Emic and Etic research strategies are used
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Problem-Oriented Ethnography
o Most Ethnographers enter the field with a specific problem to investigate.
 since one cannot know everything of that one culture, focusing on one aspect
and collecting relevant data would help narrow the field of study
 Aspects like population density, environment quality, climate, physical
geography, diet and/or land use, etc. could all be variables
o Information is not limited to what informants tell ethnographers. Sometimes, the
information can be found in government records or archives
 I.e. Rainfall, temperature, fields, yields, dietary quantities, time allocation,
etc.
 One can neither rely on participant observation nor intensive local
interviews wholly, as informants lack knowledge about many factors that
affect their lives (i.e. external influences like contact with other societies)
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Longitudinal Research
o Long term study of a community, region, society, culture or other, usually based
on repeated visits to provide insight about changes in the community
o The project is visited multiple times, with multi-sites visited to get a comparison,
since no single village or neighbourhood is the exact same within a culture
 To get a more accurate data set, people who migrated to other villages are
used to compare with the natives of the original village, local traders,
officials, and foreigners who work with religious missions or even NGOs
are also conferred with to reach optimal results
o This type of research can lead to insights about problems in communities
 Ex. The Gwembe people, where the people were forced to resettle due to
the hydroelectric dam project on the Zambezi River plain, which brought
them more closer with the rest of Zambia due to roads that were built
thereafter, and their problems with education and alcohol consumption in
the 1960s (Colson 1971,1980,1988; Scudder 1972,1980,1988; Scudder and Habarad 1991)
Ethnographic Techniques 101 (summary)
o Observation
 Paying attention to details of daily life, seasonal events, and unusual
happenings
o Participant Observation
 First hand observation through participation in community life
o Conversations
 Learning the language so that important cultural phrases such as liturgies
can be better understood, ranges from formal to informal conversations
o Interview Schedules
 Face-to-face interviews with the everyone with core questions, to ensure
quantitative information, allowing for follow ups into personal topics
o Genealogical Method
 Maps important links in kinship, determined by marriage and descent
o Well-informed informants
 highly knowledgeable guides who are from the studied community who
aids the ethnographer
o Life Histories
 Biographical accounts of interesting individuals
o Emic (actor-oriented)
 Research focusing on natives’ point-of-view
o Etic (observer-oriented)
 Research focusing on the ethnographer’s point-of-view
o Problem-oriented research
 Entering into the field with a specific question, looks for specific variables
o Longitudinal research
 The long term study of an area by coming back to note differences
Survey Research (method for large population data collection)
- Survey research is mostly sampling, impersonal data collection, statistical analysis and
questionnaires that come from a small group representative of a larger populace. This
helps to make an inference of how the larger community is doing as a whole
- This style is mainly used by sociologists, social psychologists, political scientists,
economists, and the like
o In smaller-scale societies, ethnographers get to know most of the people, but
given the greater size and complexity of nations, survey research cannot help
being more impersonal.
 Sample: A manageable study group
 Random sample: A manageable study group where all members of the
population have an equal statistical chance of being chosen for inclusion.
Selected by randomizing procedures such as tables
o During sampling, researchers gather information about age, gender, religion,
occupation, income, and political party preference. These characteristics, known
as variables (Attributes that vary among members of a sample or population), are
known to influence political decision
 Ex. Sampling in the United States or Canada
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o Polling used to predict political races, and the media hires agencies
to estimate outcomes and exit polls to find out what kinds of
people voted for which candidates.
o Respondents are like the “informants” for anthropologists; people being studied
by survey researchers. Sometimes, they are personally interviewed, or after an
initial meeting, they asked to fill out questionnaires, but the respondent is never
intimately talked with as with those of an ethnographic study
 Predictor Variable
o A predictor, i.e. something that will influence the outcome
o In social science, predictor variable influence how people behave
 Dependent Variable
o Any variable that is to be predicted or explained
o Ex: “Those with risk of heart attack” the dependent variable is those at risk of
heart attack, while predictors would be sex, age, history, weight, blood pressure,
etc. Each predictor contributes to the likelihood of the dependent variable.
The number of variables that influence social behavior can be associated with social
complexity
o Ex: in Canada and United States there are many factors which influence our social
behavior and attitudes which may differ from a genealogical based society
Differences between Survey Research and Ethnography
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Ethnography
o Studies whole functional communities
o First hand word with personal connections
to establish rapport (friendliness)
o Interested in every aspect of the society
o Does not exclude illiterate people
o Has “informants”
o More personally analyzed
o Studies groups that are not as large
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Survey Research
o Randomly chosen samples
o No connections aside from interviews
by phone or questionnaires
o More focused on a particular aspect
o Normally sticks to the literate people
o Has “respondents”
o Statistically analyzed
o Studies large groups
Anthropological Research in Complex Societies
- Unlike small communities, anthropologists cannot hope to meet everyone in a complex
society, instead, they do a series of community studies
 The method of study where several groups of people in different
geographical or economic situations in the same society are observed
- This allows the anthropologist to acquire a generalized picture of a complex society
- Complex Societies and communities
o Complex societies: Nations, large & populous, with social stratification and
central governments.
 Example: Canada
o Communities within Canada:
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o French Canadians, Major Multicultural cities, Rural settlements,
Farmers, Native peoples, Immigrants
A mix of ethnographic and survey techniques are used to understand societies better
It needs to be noted that the techniques of ethnography are, with the right time
requirements, applicable anyplace and anywhere with any people
For contempory societies, anthropologists increasingly supplement traditional techniques
with new procedures, mainly borrowed from survey research, such as gathering data and
using statistics to determine situations. This is because quantifiable information may give
more precise assessments of relations between communities, and statistical analysis can
generalize ethnographic accounts of local social life.
Urban Anthropology (studies of humans in an urban setting)
- Urban Anthropology is the solution to limited data of the ethnographic data of small
communities that do not sum up the entirety of a nation. Since the 1950s, anthropologists
have systematically investigated urban problems and life styles in the United States,
Canada, and abroad.
 Ex: Having students at a college do research on sororities, fraternities,
teams, campus organization, and the local homeless population
- However, the ethnographic method and emphasis on personal relationships in social
research are valuable gifts that anthropology brings to the study of a complex society.