#ethnographic methods

[earthsapien]

Co-creative design as ethnographic practice

I’m currently reading Design Anthropology: Theory and Practice in order to orient myself around what I want my flavor of applied anthropology to look like. I’ll begin fieldwork in Japan in the spring of 2023, but between now and then I’m also laser focused on building my skills as a product manager, information architect, and designer in the edtech space. My first impressions of design anthropology were that it might be just the right theoretical fit for how I design my workflows in my job, and how I design my upcoming fieldwork. 

Ethnography has seen a few variations, from a way to satisfy an imperialist’s worldly curiosity to a concentrated effort to decolonize Western academic thought. Long-term, ongoing participant observation has been the foundation of the practice. However, design anthropology puts forth a new paradigm of ethnographic fieldwork: one that is short term and decidedly interventionist. 

Why? According to Ton Otto and Rachel Charlotte Smith, the incorporation of design thinking into ethnographic practice encourages a future-oriented mindset that gives greater weight to emergence. In other words, the past converges with the present to produce the future - meaning the human capacity for change is appreciated, analyzed, and participated with by the fieldworker. The design anthropologist doesn’t use ethnography as a tool to freeze a culture in space and time, but to contextualize the now while participating in future-building. 

"Since the present includes both its past and its future potential, anthropologists have to develop ways to include the anticipation and creation of new forms in their ethnographic descriptions and theorizing. ... A new criterion of success would be how design anthropologists are able to correspond and collaborate with people as co-creators of desirable futures and to be the facilitators of knowledge and meaningful practices that transform the present.”

Otto and Smith acknowledge that this is a significant step for anthropologists who typically take great efforts to either blend into their community of study or disappear. There is a treasure trove of analysis and theorizing around the possible changes in a community’s or informant’s behavior caused of the very presence of the anthropologist. The assumption in many of these discussions is that a change in behaviors caused by the anthropologist’s presence has a negative effect on the data gathered. How can one be sure that certain behaviors were performed, adapted, or hidden from the fieldworker? 

Design anthropology embraces this problem as an opportunity. Thoughtful interventionist strategies can benefit the community, and anthropologists are uniquely positioned to engage in these transformations. 

“We consider this a necessary step in the face of contemporary local-global transformations and the corresponding academic requirement of developing responsive conceptual frameworks and interventionist practices. A growing body of literature addresses the entanglement of culture and design from a more transformative and imaginative stance (Balsamo 2011; Dourish and Bell 2011). What emerges from these interdisciplinary approaches to technology and change is that culture and design are not separate analytical domains or extensions of each other. Rather they are deeply entangled, complex, and often messy formations and transformations of meanings, spaces, and interactions between people, objects, and histories. It appears now an accepted premise that culture is always already an ingrained and situated part of design practices, but the reverse is equally valid and relevant: by designing objects, technologies, and systems, we are in fact designing cultures of the future."

Quotes from the chapter "Design Anthropology: A Distinct Style of Knowing" by Ton Otto and Rachel Charlotte Smith in Design Anthropology: Theory and Practice

Image sourced from @bamagal on Unsplash 

[arwriterlove-blog]

Ethnographic Methods in Qualitative Research

Firstly, this essay outlines a definition of both qualitative and ethnography methods. It will then explain how four articles of qualitative research have used the ethnographic method. It will discuss each article then compare and contrast them. Finally, the essay will look at a critical analysis of ethnography by linking the articles to the data written. They are as follows: Impact of financial incentives on clinical autonomy and internal motivation in primary care: ethnographic study is article one; Assessing the promise of user involvement in health service development: ethnographic study is article two; Receptionist input to quality and safety in repeat prescribing in UK general practice: ethnographic case study is article three; and Role of ethnographic research for assessing behavior of employees during cleaning and sanitation in food preparation areas is article four. And finally, it will look at different perspectives on ethnography such as feminist and postmodernist.

[thegeekanthropologist]

It has pluses and minuses, as the Alice Goffman controversy highlights. But the methodology complements other approaches in crucial ways.

“Yes, all research needs oversight. If you conduct ethnography, you must have others check your work — as Goffman seems to have done, with her adviser interviewing some of her informants and the IRB at Princeton approving the study. The subjects too, of course, should be able to voice any thoughts or reservations about the research. In my case, I used photos not just to observe but to elicit, showing the officers pictures of themselves at work and asking them about their thoughts during and about the documented moments. Scores of ethnographers, like Mitchell Duneier in his essay "How Not To Lie With Ethnography," have advocated for ever more rigorous checks and balances.But instead of valorizing some research methods over others, let’s consider that many academics lament that policy makers and the public don’t pay attention to us. For a relatively obscure academic research method, ethnography can provide the findings that grab the attention of those audiences, especially when the findings correlate with those of other methods.Details matter in ethnography, as in every form of research. But let’s guide it, not gut it. It’s too important a tool to waste.“

[anthropologybythewire-blog]

Archival YouTube Channel for Anthropology by the Wire

[anthropologybythewire-blog]

The Nexus Project--Multimedia Anthropology with Tablets

With Marcel Griaule as our dubious muse, Anthropology By the Wire prepares to document Baltimore's Honfest with Google Nexus tablets. 

[rceballosnsf-blog]

The Spirit of Anthropology

I sit here wondering what exactly it is I should be deeming worthy to put on this first ABTW Tumblr post.  In the very field of anthropology, it is part of the scientific process to code and decipher meaning to what informants have said and select which quotes may have significant representation for the question being researched.  It was a strange sensation to know that the barrage of very technical aspects of audio documentation learned today were tools to give voice to PEOPLE.

This goes back to my experience in the neighborhood of Sharp Leadenhall and the wonderful Mr. Thomas Gillard. While it was discouraging to be shown and understand the machinations of gentrification and systematic dislocation, his optimism and fond appreciation of his memories really hit me hard. Despite what happened to the neighborhood he knew and the hardships that residents faced to fight against the encroachment of “development ideology”, it was inspiring to know that he could find such solace for the future in his memories.  This goes towards the idea of documenting in general. People’s stories, whether collectively as an upbringing or place of worship, or individually, are worth telling and preserving.  Ethnography is not simply a documentary showing one side of an argument, but a mindful telling of a story that actually happened, and is historically and continuously being affected by social, economic, and political forces.

This is my first Tumblr post and it may not be as anthropologically sound as it could be, but I guess that will come in time.