Customer Reviews

Essential Ethnographic Methods: Observations, Interviews, and Questionnaires (Ethnographer's Toolkit)

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Over all, the book is well laid out, and the information is quite accessible. Example numbers and graphics set off the numerous case studies. Key points are given in italics and indicated with a graphic in the margin, where the reader will also find critical definitions and cross-references to chapters in other volumes in the series.

This volume provides good introductory material on ethnographic fieldwork techniques. The methods are not given in isolation, but in relationship to theoretical models, and in terms of how operationalization may be done. Methodology is presented as coming directly from a theory, and feeding directly back into a modification of that theory, whatever that theory happens to be. The authors also clearly present the need for making observations operationalizable, allowing for observations to fit into a quantitative analysis that reflects the reality observed in a manner that is valid and reliable.

Before moving to a direct discussion of the techniques, the authors give some needed practical information on getting to the field to do the research (chapter 4). This teaches the student how to avoid another common pitfall: having the technical tools to do the fieldwork, but not being able to get to the field or to survive there long enough to do the research.

The next 140 pages of the book (chapters 5 to 9) give the basics of several types of ethnographic methodology: exploratory or open-ended observation; in-depth, open-ended interviewing; semistructured interviewing; structured ethnographic data collection (ethnographic surveys); and using archival and secondary data.

The book finishes with two chapters (10 and 11), one on sampling, and the final one on validity and reliability. The volume ends with five full pages of references, and an eight-page index, which is subcategorized for easy reference.