scholarly journals Surveillance, Radicalization, and Prison Change Self-Analysis of an Ethnographic Survey Under Tension

2021 ◽  
pp. 089124162110194
Author(s):  
Gilles Chantraine ◽  
David Scheer

This article is based on a sociological research, combining qualitative interviews and ethnographic observations, undertaken in “radicalization assessment units” in French prisons. We will first summarize the context of negotiating the research agreement, amidst a climate of panic on the part of political authorities who feared terrorist attacks. Then we will describe empirically the way the researchers were particular objects of surveillance on the prison grounds, in a way that was different, in its nature and unusual intensity, than the usual surveillance of other people who come into the prison. Lastly, we will show that this surveillance spreads beyond the prison walls, for example, the researchers were tailed when they left the prison. A reflexive work would explore all the ambiguities of this surveillance—from protection to control—and at the same time consider this surveillance of the researchers not as a contextual element of the study, but an object of the analysis in its own right. In doing so, this case study more broadly examines the methodological challenges of ethnography undertaken in difficult fieldwork together with a grounded theory capable of integrating into the analysis the vicissitudes and uncertainties of the research process itself.

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 307-318 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan C. Lindstedt

Sociologists frequently make use of language as data in their research using methodologies including open-ended surveys, in-depth interviews, and content analyses. Unfortunately, the ability of researchers to analyze the growing amount of these data declines as the costs and time associated with the research process increases. Topic modeling is a computer-assisted technique that can help social scientists to address these data challenges. Despite the central role of language in sociological research, to date, the field has largely overlooked the promise of automated text analysis in favor of more familiar and more traditional methods. This article provides an overview of a topic modeling framework especially suited for social scientific research. By way of a case study using abstracts from social movement studies literature, a short tutorial from data preparation through data analysis is given for the method of structural topic modeling. This example demonstrates how text analytics can be applied to research in sociology and encourages academics to consider such methods not merely as novel tools, but as useful supplements that can work beside and enhance existing methodologies.


2019 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 160940691984932 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graeme Law

In this article, the author reflects on the process of interviewing professional footballers about the sensitive issue of money and the lessons learned from this process. The article discusses a case study approach using in-depth qualitative interviews, which generates an innovative insight into a closed social world. The focus is on the difficulties of obtaining a sample where challenges faced are discussed. The article also focuses on the interview style employed when dealing with individuals who are experienced at being interviewed regularly. It also examines the issues of being an “insider” when conducting research and ways in which this can benefit the research process. The issue of research being a messy process is also discussed as when conducting this research, it was imperative that the author could deal with unpredictability and had to be flexible to conduct the research. Finally, the article discusses the insecurities of the participants and the issues of trust, as the current position of the author led him to be seen as an “outsider” by some participants.


2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (6) ◽  
pp. 661-680 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimberly Devotta ◽  
Julia Woodhall-Melnik ◽  
Cheryl Pedersen ◽  
Aklilu Wendaferew ◽  
Tatiana P Dowbor ◽  
...  

Engaging peer-interviewers in qualitative inquiry is becoming more popular. Yet, there are differing opinions as to whether this practice improves the research process or is prohibitively challenging. Benefits noted in the literature are improved awareness/acceptance of disenfranchised groups, improved quality of research, and increased comfort of participants in the research process. Challenges include larger investment in time and money to hire, train, and support peer-interviewers, and the potential to disrupt peer recovery. We illustrate, through case study, how to engage peer-interviewers, meet potential challenges, and the benefits of such engagement. We draw upon our experience from a qualitative study designed to understand men’s experiences of problem gambling and housing instability. We hired three peers to conduct semi-structured qualitative interviews with 30 men from a community-based organization. We contend, that with appropriate and adequate resources (time, financial investment), peer-interviewing produces a positive, capacity building experience for peer-interviewers, participants and researchers.


Sociologija ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladimir Ilic ◽  
Marta Veljkovic

This article aims to achieve two main goals. Firstly, authors have tried to reconstruct the position of Vojin Milic (1922-1996) in the development of thought about (research) method. Therefore, they compared his standpoint with those developed one generation earlier (Znaniecki), those of his contemporaries (Good and Hatt), as well as with the work of present-day authors (Bryman). Special attention was paid to the importance of Milic?s study of the history of methodological thought and epistemology regarding the emergence of his ideas on data collecting methodology and procedures relevant for the analysis of causality. Secondly, along with this historical and scientific study, and guided by Merton?s critics of adumbrations, authors undertook a systematic examination of relationships between various research and analytical procedures within sociology: primary (original) experience, observation, sequential analysis, grounded theory, comparative method and multiple-case study.


2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 112-132
Author(s):  
Andy Wier

This article explores the relationship between ‘descriptive’ accounts of contemporary ecclesial practice and ‘normative’ claims of theological truth. It argues that practical theology needs to give more attention to the way that the tensions between these two voices or tasks are negotiated. A case study is provided of a research project that attempted to move beyond the descriptive to the normative by articulating a theological response to tensions that charismatic-evangelical urban churches experience. This study illustrates both the methodological challenges and benefits of combining the descriptive and the normative in studies of the Church. It also points to the possibility of a more fruitful charismatic-evangelical engagement with practical theology.


2020 ◽  
pp. 146247452095214
Author(s):  
Gilles Chantraine ◽  
David Scheer

This article is based on a sociological research, combining qualitative interviews and ethnographic observations, undertaken in “radicalization assessment units” (RAU) in French prisons. The RAUs are units that hold, for a fixed period of time, a dozen prisoners described as “Islamic terrorists” or “suspected radicalization” so that a multidisciplinary team can evaluate their degree of radicalization. In the first section we will show how the climate of terrorist attacks during the period prior to opening of the RAUs not only engendered a warlike rhetoric that would overdetermine the decline of trust in detention. It also engendered institutional improvisation whereby these special units were set up one after another without much preparation. Secondly, we will detail the RAU’s security organization and the warlike relationship that grew between the guards and prisoners, between radical defiance and criminology of the Other. In the third section we will return to the evaluation work itself. During this evaluation work in the RAU, although each professional makes efforts to refine the prisoners’ profiles, the job is deeply biased by an obsession to fight against the “ taqîya” and against “dissimulators”. Lastly, at the end of the evaluation, the evaluation summary and recommendations for final orientation are overdetermined by the imperative to avoid professional risks.


Author(s):  
Jacob van Zyl ◽  
Elsje Cronjé ◽  
Catharine Payze

In this article the story of 11 male psychotherapeutic patients with low self- esteem is told within the context of the research process. The literature suggests that the concept of “self-esteem” has a significant influence on the way an individual experiences his/her world. Therefore, the meaning that the psychotherapeutic patients associated with negative and positive labels, as it relates to self-esteem, was examined using grounded theory. The main storyline is conceptualized as follows; negative suggestion from the patient’s past leads to low self-esteem which is, within his emotional problematics and by means of a negative thinking scheme, unhealthily handled. Therapy from a medical hypno-analytical perspective is used to replace negative labels by facilitating the attachment of positive meaning to his self-esteem.


Author(s):  
Urszula Kazubowska

The issues of family functioning constituted and still constitute an interesting, multidimensional and integral area of learning and research for many sciences and scientific disciplines. Among them, pedagogy, psychology and sociology are the leaders. In a special way, researchers focus on the specificity of family educational and socialization processes and their axiological and normative context. Without it, all family influences as the first and primary educative environment would be half-hearted and ineffective. The family as a primary and basic social group or a natural educational environment is a collection of people who strive for common goals, constitute an autonomous separate whole, where the attitude of building its interior are direct and indirect influences and a system of norms and values. A family understood in this way has a strong, mutual, long-lasting emotional-emotional bond; personal, direct saturation with the emotions of contact between family members; internal consistency and high involvement in activities for other members; informal, spontaneous way of organizing life within the family, community of residence, name, property and spiritual culture, and biological continuity. The family carries out the most important process for the development of the individual, namely education and socialization (Tyszka 2001, 15). Education and socialization in a family saturated with a specific normative dimension directly contribute to the optimal development of the individual in all areas of its functioning and effective fulfillment of various functions in social life. The aim of the research was to learn about the system of values in the family, which significantly contribute to shaping the identity of a child brought up in a professional foster family acting as a family emergency. I draw attention to the fact that I considered this process in a dualistic perspective, i.e. I also took into account the quality of the primary impact of families of origin of children staying in foster families in the context of educational activities of families serving as family emergency services. The presented material is a part of the research project "Foster family - an opportunity for a better future for the child" carried out at the University of Szczecin at the Faculty of Humanities. In the research process, I used a triangulation research model, i.e. I combined survey studies with a qualitative case study. The techniques used in the survey are: questionnaires for foster care coordinators, social workers, family assistants or other people supporting educational and socialization activities towards children growing up in family emergency. However, as part of a case study, qualitative interviews with foster parents and family observation were conducted. 


2003 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 16-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Judith Burnett

This paper explores the limits and possibilities of research in the sociology of generation by taking the ‘thirtysomething’ cohort as a case study. It addresses a number of critical research issues, namely: how does one identify the parameters of a generation? Are there different sorts of generations, and if so how can this fact be established? And how can one deal with the internal diversity of generations, both in terms of their stratification and in the lived experiences of its members? The empirical research for this study was conducted using focus groups, and analysis loosely follows a grounded theory approach. In the paper, I reflect upon how the context of doing research in an ‘entertainment and consumer society’ might affect the research process and its findings. This leads me to conclude that research methods themselves have an historicizing character, and that sociology also has a generational flavour.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 60-72
Author(s):  
Mansour Safran

This aims to review and analyze the Jordanian experiment in the developmental regional planning field within the decentralized managerial methods, which is considered one of the primary basic provisions for applying and success of this kind of planning. The study shoed that Jordan has passed important steps in the way for implanting the decentralized administration, but these steps are still not enough to established the effective and active regional planning. The study reveled that there are many problems facing the decentralized regional planning in Jordan, despite of the clear goals that this planning is trying to achieve. These problems have resulted from the existing relationship between the decentralized administration process’ dimensions from one side, and between its levels which ranged from weak to medium decentralization from the other side, In spite of the official trends aiming at applying more of the decentralized administrative policies, still high portion of these procedures are theoretical, did not yet find a way to reality. Because any progress or success at the level of applying the decentralized administrative policies doubtless means greater effectiveness and influence on the development regional planning in life of the residents in the kingdom’s different regions. So, it is important to go a head in applying more steps and decentralized administrative procedures, gradually and continuously to guarantee the control over any negative effects that might result from Appling this kind of systems.   © 2018 JASET, International Scholars and Researchers Association


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