posing questions what fieldworkers do. brainstorming questions now playing “bottle up and go”...

Posing QuestionsPosing Questionswhat fieldworkers do

brainstorming questions

Now Playing

“ Bottle Up and Go”recorded by Allsion Mathisin 1941

provided courtesy of the Library of Congress, American Memory Archive

What questions come to mind?

write them down

brainstorming questionsWho created this music?

Who wrote the words?

Who listens to this music?

What does it mean to the song writer?

What inspired the songwriter to write this song?

What does it mean to the people who listen to this music?

What are the words of the song?

What genre would this be considered? Is it easily classified?

Is this typical American music for the time period?

Was this piece popular in its day?

Did it appeal to mainstream music listeners or some subculture of music listeners?

Was it played on the radio?

In what settings and situations was music like this played?

Do people still listen to this today? Who? Why?

tools of the trade

As fieldworkers, we rely primarily on two techniques:

– observation

– questioning

Question Everything!

Deductive writing is based on making a claim (a thesis) and then working to prove that claim.

Deductive reasoning moves from general assumptions to specific claims to a single conclusion.

Remember the syllogism and the enthymeme?

In deductive models, the argument (i.e., the claim) drives the project. In a sense, you start with your conclusion in mind.

approaches to research and writing

Research work can be thought of as belonging to one of two models or approaches:

Deductive

Inductive

Inductive writing is based on questions. It is an inquiry-based approach to research.

Inductive reasoning moves from specific observations to a general understanding or conclusion.

Inductive models are based on observing and detecting patterns in that which is observed.

In inductive models, the question drives the project. This is the model of ethnographic fieldwork.

Research work can be thought of as belonging to one of two models or approaches:

Deductive

Inductive

approaches to research and writing

it’s about questioning

• Ethnographic fieldwork is driven by observation, questioning, and the detection of patterns

• Ethnography is inductive.

Questioning leads us to Questioning leads us to understanding.understanding.

ethnographic questioning

Questioning can take different forms. Journalists are known for asking questions, but as fieldworkers our questioning goes deeper.

• who

• what

• when

• where

• why

• how

Journalists seek objective, verifiable facts…

Ethnographers seek “objective” and “subjective” truths…

• what’s going on here?

• where’s the culture?

• what’s the insider’s perspective?

These are broad questions that take a lot of work to answer.

ethnography vs. journalism

Journalists peer in from the outside, from the fringes of the insider’s experience.

ethnography vs. journalism

Ethnographers jump in, seeking entry to the insider’s world, becoming participant observers.

honing your fieldworker’s gaze…

Fieldwork depends on a new kind of looking: a fieldworker’s gaze, where you exist both inside and outside, seeing the ordinary as the extraordinary and unraveling the meaning of the details.

the fieldworker, like a novelist…

The fieldworker must choose, shape, prune, discard this and collect finer detail on that, much as a novelist works who finds some minor character is threatening to swallow the major theme, or that the hero is fast taking himself out of his depth. But unlike the novelist…the fieldworker is wholly and helplessly dependent on what happens….One must be continually prepared for anything, everything—and perhaps most devastating— for nothing.

–MARGARET MEAD

why you can’t just be a participant-observer

• The difference between doing fieldwork and just hanging out is writing.

the tool of your trade: fieldnotes

• Immediate personal journal or log fieldnotes• Expanded reflective fieldnotes

• Double-entry fieldnotes

taking double-entry notes

students quiet, cross-legged, leaning, hands clasped, arms crossed, still, chewing gum, baseball caps front and back, corn rows, pierced eyebrows

I don’t associate poetry readings with packed auditoriums. People are wearing red scarves. Do the they have something to do with the poetry?

taking double-entry notes

• Include date, time, and place of observation in your notes

11/6/07 11:30 am Mojo’s Coffee Shop

7

Number each page of your notesfor easy cross-referencing later.

other things to note

• Specific facts, numbers, details

• Sensory impressions: sights, textures, smells, tastes

• Specific words, phrases, summaries of conversations, and insider language

• Personal responses to the act of recording fieldnotes and how others watch you as you watch them

• Questions about people or behaviors at the site for future investigation

let’s practice…

• Question everything

• Assume nothing

• See things like you’ve never seen them before

be inquisitive

““We learn more by looking for the We learn more by looking for the

answer to a question and not finding it answer to a question and not finding it

than we do from learning the answer than we do from learning the answer

itself.”itself.”

� Lloyd Alexander