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Interpreting Communication
Research
Ethnography
Overview
Ethnographers describe how communication occurs, rather
than making “if-then” predictions or critiquing messages
Ethnographers seek to infer patterns in Ss’ communication.(e.g.,
the opening of a telephone conversation, roles, ethnic groups,
rules of etiquette and social class, behaviors deemed
appropriate and competent)
Ethnographers build theories from the ground up, rather than
approaching their work armed with a theory
Overview
Ethnography usually involves fieldwork
they have direct contact with the people they
study--they “gain entry”
Ethnography studies communication as it occurs
naturally in ongoing social context, e.g., in a home,
business, or institution
Ethnography is especially applicable when researchers
want to study how people interact in a particular
setting
Overview
Ethnographers tend to subscribe to a symbolic
interactionist approach to human communication
As symbolic interactionists, ethnographers take the
position that what people do is influenced primarily
by their interpretations of (meaning they ascribe to)
themselves, others, and the situations they are in
This is in contrast to a positivist or behaviorist
orientation that leads experimental researchers to seek
universal laws regarding human behavior (see p. 248)
Conducting Ethnographic
Research
To describe interactions and to identify patterns that
underlie them, ethnographers take one or both of these
approaches:
(a) External (etic) Approach
(b) Internal (emic) Approach
Etic Approach
• Focus on observable communication
phenomena
– cultural forces
– environmental forces (OBSERVE)
Emic Approach
•Infer a pattern from the observed data
•how subjects think about their communication
•what categories, assumptions, rules guide the Ss’
behavior (INTERVIEW)
The Logic of What
Ethnographers Are Doing
What they are not doing is testing a priori hypotheses
They are themselves gathering and analyzing their own data
They must take care not to impose their own preconceptions
on their data--they are like a foreigner learning things afresh
Some Things Ethnographers
Don’t Do or Can’t Do
• They Don’t study a large and random
sample from the population being
investigated
• They Can’t easily check on reliability
• They don’t collect all their data and then
analyze it--instead, collecting data and
analyzing go back and forth
They Don’t
Go from hypothesis to data collection
They go from data collection to hypothesis--grounded theory