Overview
Ethnography: observations of human discourse, interactions, and communicative acts in order to understand a culture, cultural event, or cultural phenomenon.
* “Any human group of people interacting together for a period of time will evolve a culture…standards for deciding what it is, what can be, how one feels about it, what to do about it, how to go about doing it” (Patton, 2005, p. 81).
- Hymes (1962) finds that EOC understands communication as a “continuous flow of information, rather than a segmented exchange of idea” (p. 44)
For this activity, students will conduct an abridged ethnography:
Designing study/research question:
- This will be an individual activity that includes at least one full hour (60 minutes) of observation
- You will choose a communication environment in which to conduct your observation e.g. park, game, office, bar, etc.
- You may choose what you intend to study based on your chosen environment or the research question may help you choose where to conduct your research
- When choosing your environment you need to ensure that you can take notes uninterrupted, it should not be done in tandem with another activity e.g. socializing while observing
- Uninterrupted attention on observing your environment
- Need to consider the time of day and the environment in which we will conduct this study i.e. will you be able to examine your phenomena during the time of day that you have chosen?
- Once you’ve made all these decisions, carve out the time, get a notebook, and begin your fieldwork (step 2)
Fieldwork:
- Fieldwork spend at least one hour observing human behavior in a public setting
- Each student will develop handwritten field notes that include their observations and initial analysis
- Thick and detail descriptions of everything they see
- Two column approach column i) detailed descriptions of what you see in the space ii) What you think it means/thoughts, analysis what you see
- Keep these two columns separate lefthand is the data, and righthand is your claims, you need your data to support your claims
- You are never done observing—focused and observing the entire hour
- Be as detailed as possible include the way individuals are positioned, what they are wearing, what they are doing, what nonverbal messages they use, their verbal messages, etc. No detail is too small to be recorded
- Map out your territory—what space are you observing in and how does this impact interaction?
- Actual drawing of the space
- What is your place in the space?
- Handwritten field notes should be about 4 -5 handwritten pages using the two column approach, scanned and submitted online
Example of Field Notes
This is an example of what field notes might look like as well as a map. This example give a brief look at field notes—yours should be much longer to account for your hour of observation.
What I see | What I think this means/thoughts |
| Deliverable 1: Students will submit their full field notes and map individually |
- Include all raw data as well as initial analysis that include themes
- Deliverable 2: In the class discussion (in-person or online) students will unpack what they found and how it helps to answer their research question