capitulo 7 merrian

8/13/2019 Capitulo 7 Merrian

1/13

CH PTER SEVEN

MININ D T FROMDocuMENTS

Interviewing and observing are two data collection strategiesdesigned to gather data that specifically address the researchquestion. Documents, however, are usually produced for reasonsother than the research at hand and therefore are not subjectto the same limitations. The presence of documents does notintrude upon or alter the setting in w ys that the presence of the


2/13

14 Ql.' \1.11A 11\'V. Rr '-I ' \IH 11; andthe statistical database of the Cenrer for EducationaJ Statistics.Since many case sntdies arc at [he program level. it is particular }important to seek out the paper tratl for what it can reveal aboutthe program-"things that cannot be obs


3/13

142 Qt iAIHA II VI. Rt.W.AR ' IIdat.a rather thau Ll'lt th( raw data a,., a basis for anah,..,is. These

t ~ l e t a - a n a J y , e s , s the) atl' C411ed. arc more common quantitalJH r e s c a ~ c h , althougl there has bt>cn "orne recent thinking asto how ttm strategy mtght apply ro qualitative studies. For largescale ot c r o s s c t ~ l t . u r a l research, relying on previous studies maybe the only realtsuc way to conduct the imestigation.

. An example of a data bank that is potentially U )eful in qualitatl\e .research. espciall} ethnographic ~ t u d i e s (see ChapterTwo), IS the Human Relations Area File (Murdock. 1983). Thisfile b a compilation of ethnographic .,tudies of more than 350societies; data arc classified and coded by cultural group andaho by m.ore than ~ 0 0 topics. Education is one broad topic

~ n d c r wh1ch subtoptcs c;uch as t:lementary education, educatwnal theory and method", students, and vocational educationcan be found. The index is organi7ed so that a resca1cher canreLJicve documems related to the educational practices of onepankular cultural group, or documents can be retrieved abouta specific practice -.uch a" 'student uprisings" across many cul

t u r e ~ . Tvpes of d o c u m ~ n t . s found in this file include ethnographer field notes. dial) entries, reports to \'arious agencies,books, newspaper article-,, works of fiction about the culture,and photographs.

PERSON l D o c U \ f E ~ r sIn contrast LO public \Omceo; of data, personal document.s "1eferto anr fir,t-pel"on nancuin: Lhat descdbes an individual's actionsexperiences. and beliefs" (Bogdan and Biklen, 2007, p. 133):Such documents include diaries, letters, home videos. children'sgrowth records, scrapbook.-. and photo albwns, calendars. autobiographies, and travel logs. In some ways documents are likeobservat Ons in that documents gi\'e us a snapshot into what

t h ~ author thinks is imponam, that is, their personal perspt:ctive.while observation-. allow us to see O\ert behavior. Such documentscan tell the r e s e a r c ~ l l about the inne t meaning of everydayevent' , or they may ytelcl descriptions of highly unusual or idiosyncratic human experiences such a'i can be found in AdmiralByrd'-, 1eport of his e'\.periences alone at the South Pole or HelenKeller\ accoum of overcoming multiplt' phystcal handicap'>.

Pecl on the author's exp


4/13

J44 QtJAII' I: HfVJ. ltcSJ .ARCHfor dealing with questions about some aspect of society at a giventime, tor comparing groups on a certain dimension, or for tracking cultural change and trends. The changing nature of U.S.presidential political campaigns, for example, could be lookedat through the medium of televised debates, with the 2008 campaign incor-porating YouTube Internet technology. Studies havebeen conducted on the roles of minorities in television, thepresence of ageism in cartoons, and teenage culwre in movies.Hughes (2003) and Hollenbeck (2005) both made use of popular culture sources for their studies. Hughes asked what mid-lifewomen learned from watching .soap operas. and Hollenbeckstudied contemporary Internet-based social protest groups (antiMcDonalcls, anti-Starbucks, and anti-Wai-Mart).

Unlike recod-; that are part of a program's history, or personal documents that might augment an interview study, theremay be an infinite number of popular cultural documentc; thatmight be relevant to a particular study. Bogdan and Biklen (2007)offer some advice when using popular culture as a data source:

Of alllhe thousands of hours of commercial videos, films, and popular records a s well as the millions upon millions of printed wordsand pictures that appear each day in lhe media. how do you evernarrow down the scope to make }'Our task manageable . . Thinksmall. Most people who read research do not expect the researcherto cover the universe. Pick a particular program. or a panicularevent, and wot-k on it imensely rather lhan spreading yourself toothin. (p. 65)

VISU L DocUMENTSFilm, video, and photography are visual documents. Of coursethese can be found within the categories of document


5/13

J46 Q.U\1 11 . \ I IH ~ Q - ~ 1 - U U . Ho b ~ e r v - a t i o n . provide a means of rcnu:omhering and .,tudyingdetail that might be overlooked if' a photogtaphic image Wt.'J enot a\'ailablc for reflection (Bogdan & Biklen, 2007. p. 1:11 ).A.nothet u ~ e o f h o t o g r a p h ~ in qualitative research j., ~ o m c t h i n gcaJled pholo elicitation. in which participants are shown \arious photos of the topic of interest in order to stimulate di tw.sion of the l()pic (Harper. 2002). T h c ~ e photos could havt hecntaken by the researcher, found in public or personal r e c o r d ~and so on. They are basically prompts for verbal data.

ln yet another use of photos. tlw participants can lx prO\ideddisposable cameras and asked to take pictures of the plu-nomenon of interest. Participant-generated photos can then lx: analyzed by lhe rcseat-cher or used bv tlw r e ~ e a r c h e r with participant:-.in the photo elicitation method just chscussed. In a studv of' dillcring percep1jons of white and African American Greek member


6/13

Two basic mcaus of studying p h y ~ i c a l U


7/13

I10 Q u '' '.' RJ..,t..,uc.HUSING DOCUM\TS QUALITATI VER ESEARCH

~ s i n g documenLary material as data is not much differentfrom uc;ing interviews 01 observations. Gla.o;er and Strauss 1967)cornpan:: fieldw01k \\ith library reo;ed hv micesbegging to be heard. Every book., C\t:f \ magazine article, repre~ c t ~ t s at least one person who is e q u i v ~ i l e n t LO the anthropologisL'stnlonnant or the sociologist's in terviewee. ln those pu b lications,people converse, a.nnounce positions, argue .,.,ith a range of eloqmnce, dec;cnbe ennts or o;cencs in ways entirely comparahle to what ts ~ e e n and heard during fieldwork (p. 163)

\1\ 'hcther m fieldwork. or libra ) wot k the data collection isguided bJ queo;tions. _educated huncht's, and emerging findings.Altl.lOugh the search s systematic, both settings also allow or Lhe

a c ~ d e n t a un covering o l valuable data. Tracking down leads.bemg op en to new insights, and being sensitive the data arethe c ; a ~ e whether the researcher ill interviewing. obscning. oranai}'Lmg d o c m ~ e n r s Since the investig-ator is the prim,111 instntment for gathenng data, he or she rehe-. on skillc; and intuitionto find and interpret data from documentsignmentc;, o b j e c t ~ ; in the classroom. officialgrade reports school records, teachet evaluations, and so on.Besides the setting it-;clt, lhe logical places to look are libraries his-tmical societies. archi\es. and institutional filec;. O t h e r ~ haw o c ~ t e dperson_al doctunenL.., like letters and dituics bv placing acherlisemem_s m e w s p a p e r ~ and new-;Jetten. or on relevant Internet sites.

hus t l ~ e researcher must 1--eep an open m ind when it comesd 1 s ~ o v e n n g u s d ~ I I . c l o c u n ~ e n t s . ~ e i n g open to any p o s ~ i b i l i

c ~ n lead to serendptous dtscovenes. Tobacco company exposes of the late 1990s were buttressed by the discovery of buriedt.nemos in, which the addictive qual t' of nicotine is discussed; the

f ~ m o u s \ 1 \ . ~ r e ~ g a t e t a ~ e . . wen literalh .,tumbled upon during routme questtorung of\ \ h1tc House staff.

\11 N i r;


8/13

u important distinction for hi,torians that qualitaLi,eresearcher., might abo attend to is whether documenLs l in time and place to the phenomenon bv a qualified person. Given rhis definition, moc-,t pt'rsonal documents and eyewitness accouru.s of


9/13

purpo'e". The matcri.th mav thtrcfi,rc be incomplete from art.>search perspective. In contrast to field notes, avai lable materials rna> not 'afford a continuity of unfolding evencs in the kind ofdetai l that the theorist requires" (Giac;er & Strauss, 19b7, p. 182).\Vhether personal accounts or nffic.ial documents are involved.the source may prm ide um epresen tativc c;amples. "Oftl'll no oneon the project keeps ver-y good notts 011 processes. few memo

~ a n d a a J ~ e ?enerated. and, even more often, the 011l} wliting that1s done I S m response to funders' requests for technical reportsor od1er periodic statements abou t the progress of the program or prqject. If no documents exic;t, however, or if the documents are sparse and ~ e e m uninformative, this ought w tell theinquirer something about the comext" (C.uba & Lincoln. 1981,pp. 234-235).

~ e c a u s e ?ocuments are not produced for research purposes,the mformat1on they offer rna> not be in a form that is useful (oruncerst..


10/13

Thus, like :lll} utllrna} not fit the contcptual framework of the research. and theirauthenticin mav be difncult to determine. Howe\'(r, b e c a u ~ ethey exist indepenclem of a re-.eaJ-ch agenda. thev are nonreacthe. that is. unaffecred b) the research process. The> are a product of the comext in which the) were produced and thereforegrounded in the real world. Finally, manv documents or artifactscost little 01 noLhing and arc often cas} obtain.

ONLINE DATA SOURCES~ y o n wl.10 nads a newspaper has seen the te1m in omw-wu Juperlughwfl l applied to the Internet and heard about theexplosive growth it has und


11/13

)'i8 Q ll .\11 \A I I \ ' 1 R ~ ~ l ( t II

I Iowevcr, on im data collection has some important t i f i c r e u c e ~clue to the nature of tlw medium through which i is conducted .These d i f l e , ~ e n n - . havt a profound influence on t w study thatmust noL be tgnorcd 1 uiviali/ed. F01 example, individuals who donot han access to computer'> will be automaticalh excluded fromthe study. Is tlw. appropriatl' fm the 'itudy. or will demographic dif:ferenccs that correlate wah computer access diswrtthe findmgs?

Though the amount of informatjon mcreases to an overw h e h ~ i n g degree, not all cdtical interactions are necessarily a\ ailab le tor o;rudv. Students in an online course mav also communicatethrough private e-m.til rnes O m f > t i m e ~ in totally different and e\enmisleading contt.xL'i.. E v e ~ 1 as. they become familiar with the evolvin g co nven

tions of on h nc cxpressi()n, rcse:archcrs need to remain alert tothe variables of electronic communication. Participan ts in Jistservs_and uscnct group -.tability can no longerbe taken for granted. Version con trol , once only of concern to


12/13

160 (. t Tl'.\ J l \ 1 Rt .., \Kprogrammer and editots. cmergts a" a nitical issue (OJ' a.nvuntusing the Jntcrnet as a rdercnn or a rc.,ource.

This is JWW tenitmy, with u n f ~ u n i l i a r rules that change asq u i c k ~ as the} .tre idt>ntified. Mv IJarch conducted from online data.

EFFEcTs o 1 uE ~ h o r u . M oN Ot\T\ C A T H E R I ~ GJn addition to the dif1(rcnces between online and off-line data,di fferences caused by tlw manner in which data are gatheredmust be considctccl. In qu ali tative research. the re'iearcher is theprimary ins trument for data co llection and analysis. This factoris mually perceived a'i an advantage. because humans are bothresponsive and adaptive. At the samt' lime, it canies the rcsponsibilit1' of assessing and reporting researcher biases rl1at might havean impact on the stuch.

vVhcn collecting data from the Internet, the researcher ts nolonger the pdmarv instrument for data collection; a v thev arerecalled in retrospect. Participants-rc'iearchct and r c ~ e a r c h c d -mav revisit the data. ask fut elm ifkation, t'xtend a poml or redirectthe 1-esearch. In comrast to th


13/13

lnwmct research. The fir t i > obtaining mfonned consent; tractitionall}.' Jart icipams sign a statement indicating their \.,.iiJingnessto. paruCJpate and .nc>cd to be eighteen year but inth ts mc:dlllm thev are not as effective as in person-to-per-;on datagarhedng. A third ethical issue is determining what is public andwhat is private: 'The cmcial question is whether the rese f k e e n tnterest. forqualitative researchers. H owever. a m 1 1 ~ 1 b c : of s s u ~ s m u s ~ bC: considered when using data from an onltnc InteractiOn; I 1ev1ewedsome of these issues in this chapter.