Install this application on your home screen for quick and easy access when you’re on the go.
Just tap then “Add to Home Screen”
Install this application on your home screen for quick and easy access when you’re on the go.
Just tap then “Add to Home Screen”
Member rate £492.50
Non-Member rate £985.00
Save £45 Loyalty discount applied automatically*
Save 5% on each additional course booked
*If you attended our Methods School in Summer/Winter 2024.
Monday 30 July - Friday 3 August
09:00-10:30 / 11:00-12:30
This course provides a hand-on introduction to undertaking fieldwork using interpretive/ethnographic methods, with a focus on gaining familiarity with key methods of field-based data generation and awareness of related practical and conceptual issues. Following an initial introduction to fieldwork and “the field”, the course will focus on three methods of data generation that are commonly utilised in fieldwork: observation, participation, and interviewing. Each method will be explored using a combination of readings, practical exercises and discussion in order to provide participants with the opportunity to apply principles and concepts and then reflect on the issues raised. In doing so, the course seeks to promote understanding of fieldwork as a reflexive practice that generates “thick description” of socio-political events and phenomena in order to gain insights into their meanings and significance. The course is designed for those who are intending to undertake fieldwork, but who as yet have very limited or no formal experience.
Tasks for ECTS Credits
To receive an additional one credit, participants will be required to submit field notes from daily practical exercises (4 x no formal word limit).
For two additional credits, participants are required to produce and submit a write up of field notes into a thick description of the field site (1000 words).
Cai Wilkinson is an Associate Professor in International Relations at Deakin University in Australia, with teaching interests in the areas of Critical Security Studies, genders and sexualities in international relations, and intercultural communication.
Her research focuses on how identity shapes people’s individual and collective experiences of in/security, which she investigates using critical interpretive ethnographic methods.
Cai has conducted fieldwork in Kyrgyzstan on societal security and on LGBTQ activism, coached on humanitarian leadership courses and led experiential learning programmes in Japan, the US and Sri Lanka.
She is the author of a number of papers and book chapters that explore how field-based methods can be used to research security, and from 2012–2018 convened the Critical Security Studies Methods Café at the International Studies Association annual convention.
Traditionally considered the domain of anthropologists and ethnographers, conducting fieldwork has become increasingly common in a wide range of social science disciplines as researchers have sought to gain new insights into socio-political phenomena in an increasingly complex world with multiple – and often conflicting – knowledge claims.
Yet despite the increased prevalence of field-based methods, discussions of fieldwork frequently ignore the gap between theory and formal methods (how fieldwork is supposed to happen) and practice (how fieldwork really happens), with fieldwork presented as an objective and mechanical data collection exercise rather than as a complex, iterative and intersubjective process of data generation and interpretation. As a result, novice fieldworkers are left unprepared to negotiate the methodological, emotional, logistical and ethical challenges of working in the field.
The course is designed to begin addressing the gap between fieldwork theory and practice by providing people who are intending to conduct ethnographic/interpretive fieldwork but who as yet have little or no formal experience of fieldwork with a hands-on introduction to three key methods of data generation (observation, participant observation, and interviews) and issues related to their use.
The course begins on day 1 with an overview of the course and the underpinning notion of an “ethnographic sensibility”, before moving to explore what fieldwork is and related questions, including what and where “the field” is, what is distinctive about ethnographic fieldwork, and why fieldwork is used. Participants will be set the first of five practical exercises at the end of day one, and will be expected to draw on their experiences in subsequent discussions.
Day 2 will focus on the first of the three methods covered in the course: observation. Discussion will explore what it means to see ethnographically and observation as a way to generate “thick description”. Particular attention will be paid to what and how one observes and how to record one’s observations in field notes, and participants will have the opportunity to practise observing ethnographically in the second practical exercise.
Building on day 2, on day 3 the topic is participant observation. In addition to discussing the spectrum of ways in which the research can participate in the field and the implications of different forms of participation, consideration will be given issues of positionality including the researcher’s role in data generation and her research more widely, as well as relationship management, power dynamics, ethics and consent, and safety and wellbeing. The third practical exercise will provide participants will the opportunity to try participating in “the field” and experience (albeit in a limited way) the implications of positionality first-hand.
Interviews are the topic for day 4. Following an overview of how interviews can be used in interpretive fieldwork, discussion will focus firstly on the practicalities and potential complexities of interviewing, and secondly on processes of interpreting interviews in terms of maintaining reflexivity and an ethnographic sensibility. As with preceeding days, participants will then put discussion into practice in the day’s practical exercise.
The final day of the course is devoted to the end phase of fieldwork and making the transition from “the field” to “home” and from fieldwork to deskwork. The primary aim of the session is to explore fieldwork as an embodied and situated experience of knowledge production and how field researchers can effectively manage the “dirt” and “baggage” that often accompanies field data both personally and professionally. The final practical exercise will require participants to conduct a fieldworker debrief in pairs, reflecting on their experiences over the course.
The course utilises a combination of presentations by the instructor, daily practical exercises, and group discussions of key readings and practical exercises. It is expected that all participants will undertake all practical exercises. Participants will be encouraged to relate discussion of each day’s topics and questions to their own research projects and perspectives, and as far as possible requests to discuss particular issues will be accommodated.
Note from the Academic Convenors to prospective participants: by registering to this course, you certify that you possess the prerequisite knowledge that is requested to be able to follow this course. The instructor will not teach again these prerequisite items. If you doubt whether you possess that knowledge to a sufficient extent, we suggest you contact the instructor before you proceed to your registration.
This course is designed as a “hands on” introduction to ethnographic (interpretive-qualitative) fieldwork. It is for students who have little or no formal experience of fieldwork, but who intend to conduct fieldwork as part of their research. There are no prerequisites for this course, but participants should be open to engaging with materials drawn from a range of social science disciplines including anthropology, human geography, political science, and sociology.
Day | Topic | Details |
---|---|---|
1 | Course overview and participant introductions |
Overview of course structure, readings, and an ethnographic sensibility. Readings: chapters and articles by Edward Schatz; Peter Loizos; Carole McGranahan; Erving Goffman; Susan Thomson, An Ansom and Jude Murison. |
Note |
The schedule below outlines the basic structure and content of the course, but it is not the official, final syllabus for the 2018 course. Full details of required and additional readings will be made available to students who register for the course. The final syllabus will include details of the daily practical exercises, which participants are required to complete as part of the course (generally exercises will take around 30-45 minutes plus writing up time) and which will inform class discussion each day. |
|
2 | Fieldwork: Where, What, Who and Why? |
Questions: What is fieldwork? Where is “the field” and how does one access it? Who does fieldwork? Why do fieldwork? Readings to include chapters by Vered Ami; Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson; João de Pina-Cabral; Giampetro Gobo, and articles by Cindy Katz; Floriang Kern and Janis Vossiek; Iva Pleše; Soledad Loaeza, Randy Stevenson and Devra C. Moehler. Practical Exercise 1: Finding “the field” and first impressions. |
3 | The Ethnographic Eye: Observing and Thick Description |
Questions: What does it mean to see ethnographically? What are we observing and how? What are the characteristics of “thick description”? How “thick” should description be? Readings to include chapters and articles from Clifford Geertz; Wolff-Michael Roth; Michael Agar; Robert L. Emerson, Rachel I. Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw; Lisa Wedeen. Practical Exercise 2: Observation in the field |
4 | Not Just an Observer: Participation and Positionality |
Questions: How can the researcher participate in the field? What are the consequences for the research? What are the consequences for the researcher and her relationships in the field? What is positionality and how is it affected by participation? Readings to include chapters and articles by: Danny L. Jorgensen; Vincent Crapanzano; Kim England; Gillian Rose; Paul Routledge; Ferhana Sultana; Lorraine Bayard de Volo; Stephen O. Murray; James P. Spradley; Louise Ryan; Barbara B. Kawulich. Practical Exercise 3: Participating in the field |
5 | Leaving the Field: Bringing Back Data, Dirt and Baggage |
Questions: When is it time to leave the field and how does one leave? How does field data travel? What tensions are there between the “thick description” and experience of the field and the demands of academic writing? How do we handle the “baggage” that comes back from the field with us? Readings to articles by and chapters by Stephen J. Taylor; Ulrike Schultze, Michael D. Myers and Eileen M. Trauth; Larissa Begley; Roxanne Lynn Doty; Martyn Hammersley; Cai Wilkinson; Franziska Fay; Amy Pollard. Final exercise: Researcher Debrief |
Day | Readings |
---|---|
Note |
Please see below for core literature. The full reading list will be provided to registered participants and will be drawn from books, journal articles, blogs and other relevant sources. |
None
None
Coleman, Simon and Collins, Peter. 2010. Locating the Field: Space, Place and Context in Anthropology. London: Berg Publishers
Emerson, Robert L., Fretz, Rachel I. and Shaw, Linda L. 2011. Writing Ethographic Fieldnotes, 2nd edition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Schatz, Edward (ed). 2009. Political Ethnography: What Immersion Contributes to the Study of Power. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Shaffir, William B. and Stebbins, Robert A. (eds). 1991. Experiencing Fieldwork: An Inside View of Qualitative Research. Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications
Wolcott, Harry F. 1999. Ethnography: A Way of Seeing. Walnut Creek, CA: Altamira Press,
Yanow, Dvora and Schwartz-Shea, Peregrine, eds. 2014. Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn, 2nd edition. Armonk, NY: M E Sharpe.
Summer School
Introduction to Interpretive Research Designs
Knowing and the Known: The Philosophy and Methodology of the Social Sciences
Winter School
Introduction to Qualitative Interpretive Methods
Knowing and the Known: The Philosophy and Methodology of the Social Sciences
Summer School
Ethnographic and Other Field Research Methods: Advanced
Introduction to Interpretive Research Designs
Knowing and the Known: The Philosophy and Methodology of the Social Sciences
Expert Interviews for Qualitative Data Generation
Interpretative interviewing
Winter School
Writing Ethnographic and Other Qualitative/Interpretive Research: An Inductive Approach
Knowing and the Known: The Philosophy and Methodology of the Social Sciences
Interpretative interviewing