scholarly journals Authenticity and the interview: a positive response to a radical critique

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (6) ◽  
pp. 619-634 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emilie Morwenna Whitaker ◽  
Paul Atkinson
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Single Case ◽  
Formal Analysis ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Critical Commentary ◽  
Radical Critique ◽  
The Social ◽  
Authentic Voice ◽  
The Uk

We respond to recent discussions of the interview, and the ‘radical critique’ of interviewing, as reiterated in publications by Silverman and Hammersley. Reviewing and extending the critical commentary on the social life of the interview and its implications for qualitative research, we endorse criticism of the Romantic view of the informant as a speaking subject, arguing that the interview does not give access to the interiority or private emotions of social actors. We focus especially on the search for the ‘authentic’ voice of experience and feeling, arguing that the expression of authenticity is performative, and that such interviews need to be analysed for their performative features. The biographical work of the interview demands close, formal analysis, and not mere celebration. The argument is illustrated with a single case-study, derived from an ethnographic study of a social-work service in the UK. We suggest that it is possible to derive constructive responses to the radical critique, by adopting an analytic stance towards respondents’ biographical work, as expressed through extended, qualitative interviewing. The speaker’s use of positioning rhetoric is discussed.

scholarly journals Situational Domestication and the Origin of the Cafe Worker Species

Sociology ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 52 (2) ◽  
pp. 351-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ida Marie Henriksen ◽  
Aksel Tjora
Keyword(s):  
Public Space ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Smart Phones ◽  
Social Spaces ◽  
Work Habits ◽  
Work Spaces ◽  
The Social ◽  
Close Study ◽  
The Uk

Given the pervasiveness of free Wi-Fi zones in cafes, use of laptops, tablets and smart phones supports the transformation of cafes from social spaces to work spaces for many customers. In this article we analyse, on the basis of an ethnographic study of individuals’ laptop work in urban cafes in Norway and the UK, (1) what it is about cafes that makes people visit them for working purposes, and (2) how individual laptop work changes the social life of such venues. By linking our analysis to theories of communal processes and the domestication of technologies, we put forward the concept of ‘situational domestication’, encompassing the aspects of socially embedded individual working. Consequently, the close study of how cafe spaces are being used for work offers insights into how progressively technologised work and work habits influence not only work itself, but also public space at a broader level.

scholarly journals A terceira margem do Rio Oiapoque: comércio e garimpo na fronteira franco-brasileira

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (32) ◽  
pp. 242
Author(s):  
Antonio Sabino da Silva Neto ◽  
Leonardo Damasceno de Sá
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
French Guiana ◽  
Social Experience ◽  
Analytical Tool ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
The Third ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
First Approximation ◽  
The Social

Este artigo discute as formas da experiência social na fronteira franco-brasileira. A partir da ideia heurística de terceira margem, pensa a fronteira como lugar de deslocamentos e tensões. Baseado em trabalho de campo etnográfco, descreve e analisa as atividades de garimpagem e comércio do ponto de vista dos atores sociais. O objetivo é realizar uma primeira aproximação do campo, discutindo fronteira como ferramenta analítica. Percebe-se como principal conclusão que as dimensões morais e simbólicas estão conectadas com as atividades propriamente socioeconômicas, que a vida social na fronteira franco-brasileira exige uma abordagem de suas múltiplas realidades.Palavras-chave: Amapá. Guiana Francesa. Fronteira franco-brasileira. Garimpo. Comércio.THE THIRD MARGIN OF THE OIAPOQUE RIVER: COMMERCE AND MINING IN THE BRAZILIAN-FRENCH BORDERAbstractThis article discusses the forms of social experience on the Franco-Brazilian frontier. From the third-margin heuristic idea, it thinks of the frontier as a place of displacements and tensions. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, it describes and analyzes the activities of garment and trade from the standpoint of social actors. The objective is to make a first approximation of the field, discussing frontier as an analytical tool. It is perceived as the main conclusion that the moral and symbolic dimensions are connected with the activities properly socioeconomic, that the social life in the French--Brazilian border requires an approach of its multiple realities.Keywords: Amapá. French Guiana. French-Brazilian border. Mining. Trade.

Jaziret Fadel

2021 ◽  
pp. 104-126
Author(s):  
Amal Adel Abdrabo
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Arab Countries ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Mutual Interaction ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Preliminary Research ◽  
The Village ◽  
Key Questions

The plight of refugees fleeing from Palestine in 1948 raises several key questions regarding their historical fragmentation as a nation and their future. From a social anthropological point of view, the existing literature seems to tackle the Palestinian case from different perspectives influenced by the mass exodus of Palestinians from their homeland. Such perceptions took for granted the recognition of the state of “refugeeness” of the exiled Palestinians around the globe, while, in reality, it is a mutual interaction between people, place, and time. In the aftermath of the Arab-Israeli War at the beginning of the year 1948, more than 700,000 Palestinians fled their homes in Palestine to the nearby Arab countries, among them was Egypt. Some thousands settled in different areas all over Egypt. Based on a preliminary research on the literature, the author can argue that this is the first ethnographic study of the social life of the village of Jaziret Fadel and its Palestinian inhabitants in Egypt. The chapter is about tackling the historical trajectories, genealogies, memories, and present of the inhabitants of this village who seemed to be torn between two nostalgic pasts. The author's emphasis within this chapter is about how the narratives of the past memories could reveal a lot about the present time of the human societies and their future.

Everyday Ritual and Ethnographic Practice: Two Cases Showing the Importance of Embodiment and Reflexivity

2021 ◽  
pp. 089124162110606
Author(s):  
Cindy L. Cain ◽  
Brie Scrivner
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Data Collection ◽  
Social Group ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Making Sense ◽  
The Social ◽  
Embodied Experiences ◽  
Symbolic Meanings ◽  
And Training

Moments of ritual reveal symbolic meanings, reinforce boundaries of the social group, and tie actors to one another. Because rituals are so important to social life, ethnographers must be attuned to both institutionalized and everyday rituals of their sites. However, methodological literature rarely discusses how everyday rituals should be treated during data collection, analysis, or presentation. We use data from two ethnographic sites—a yoga studio and training for health care volunteers—to illustrate the challenges of observing others during rituals and making sense of our own experiences of rituals, especially given varying levels of participation and resistance to rituals. We argue that greater reflexivity, especially of embodied experiences, is needed when studying everyday rituals and provide methodological recommendations for improving ethnographic study.

scholarly journals Book Reviews

1987 ◽  
Vol 143 (1) ◽  
pp. 159-198
Author(s):  
M.A. Bakel ◽  
A. Appadurai ◽  
C. Baks ◽  
Ákos Östör ◽  
W.E.A. Beek ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Los Angeles ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Pacific Islands ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Cultural Perspective ◽  
Social Anthropology ◽  
Cambridge University ◽  
The Social

- J. van Goor, Rechtzetting. - M.A. van Bakel, A. Appadurai, The social life of things. Commodities in cultural perspective, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1986. XIV + 329 pp. - C. Baks, Ákos Östör, Culture and power; Legend, ritual, bazaar and rebellion in a Bengali society, New Dehli etc.: Sage Publications, 1984, 224 pp., including notes and glossary. - W.E.A. van Beek, B. Bernardi, Age class systems; Social institutions based on age, Cambridge University Press, 1985, 199 pp. - H.W. Bodewitz, J.-M Péterfalvi, Le Mahabharata. Livres I à V. Livres VI à XVIII. Extraits traduits du sanscrit par Jean-Michel Péterfalvi. Commentaires, résumé et glossaire par Madeleine Biardeau, Paris: Flammarion, 1985 and 1986. 381 + 382 pp., M. Biardeau (eds.) - Paul Doornbos, Raymond C. Kelly, The Nuer conquest - The structure and development of an expansionist system, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1985, 320 pp. - Henk Driessen, Paul Spencer, Society and the dance: The social anthropology of process and performance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985, 224 pp. - D. Gerrets, Daniel Miller, Ideology, power and prehistory, Cambridge: University Press, 1984. 157 pp. numerous figs., Christopher Tilly (eds.) - Peter Kloos, Jacques Lizot, Les Yanomami Centraux, Editions de l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris 1984, 267 pp. - Peter Kloos, Jacques Lizot, Tales of the Yanomami; Daily life in the Venezuelan forest, Cambridge Studies in Social Anthropology no. 55, Cambridge University Press, 1985, 196 pp. - Peter Kloos, H. Zevenbergen, Zwakzinnigen in verschillende culturen, Lisse: Swets & Zeitlinger, 1986, 109 pp. - Piet Konings, Freek Schiphorst, Macht en Onvermogen: Een studie van de relatie tussen staat en boeren op het Vea-irrigatie project Ghana, Universiteit van Amsterdam, CANSA publikatie nr. 20, 1983, 107 pp. - S. Kooijman, E. Schlesier, Eine ethnographische Sammlung aus Südost-Neuguinea. - H.M. Leyten, Bernhard Gardi, Zaïre masken figuren, Museum für Völkerkunde und Schweizerisches Museum für Volkskunde, Basel, 1986. - J. Miedema, Bruce M. Knauft, Good company and violence: Sorcery and social action in a lowland New Guinea Society, Berkeley, Los Angeles/London: University of California Press, 1985, X + 474 pp. - David S. Moyer, David H. Turner, Life before genesis, a conclusion: An understanding of the significance of Australian aboriginal culture, Toronto Studies in religion volume 1, Peter Lang, New York, 1983, vii + 181 pp. - B. van Norren, Peter Kloos, Onderzoekers onderzocht; Ethische dilemma’s in antropologisch veldwerk, DSWO Press, Leiden, 1984. - Jérôme Rousseau, Victor T. King, The Maloh of West Kalimantan. An ethnographic study of social inequality and social change among an Indonesian Borneo people, Dordrecht-Holland/Cinnaminson-U.S.A.: Foris Publications, Verhandelingen van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde no. 108, 1985. viii + 252 pp., maps, diagrams, plates, glossary. - Jérôme Rousseau, Alain Testart, Le communisme primitif, I. Economie et idéologie, Paris: Editions de la Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, 1985, 549 pp. - Arie de Ruijter, David Pace, Claude Lévi-Strauss. The bearer of ashes, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul (Ark Paperbacks), 1986. - B.J. Terwiel, Roland Mischung, Religion und Wirklichkeitsvorstellungen in einem Karen-Dorf Nordwest-Thailands, Weisbaden: Franza Steiner Verlag, 1984. - B.J. Terwiel, Niels Mulder, Everyday life in Thailand; An interpretation, Second, Revised edition, Bangkok: Duang Kamol, 1985. 227 pages, paperback. - R.S. Wassing, Sidney M. Mead, Art and artists of Oceania, The Dunmore Press, Palmerston North, New Zealand, 1983. 308 pp., drawings, black and white illustrations., Bernie Kernot (eds.) - Harriet T. Zurndorfer, Maarten van der Wee, Aziatische Produktiewijze en Mughal India, Ph.D thesis, Katholieke Universiteit, Nijmegen, 1985. xv + 399 pp. - M.A. van Bakel, J. Terrell, Prehistory in the Pacific Islands. A study of variation in language, customs and human biology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1986, XVI + 299 pp.

scholarly journals Inclusão digital: sistema de engrenagens | Digital inclusion: systems of gears

2009 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Diana Cubillos ◽  
Alberth Sant’Ana Costa da Silva
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Social Life ◽  
World Order ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Technological Advancement ◽  
Digital Inclusion ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
The Social ◽  
Information And Communication

Resumo O conceito de inclusão digital, presente no campo científico, e aplicado socialmente, tem gerado estudos que trabalham a questão ora como combate à desigualdade social na compreensão dos mecanismos distanciadores entre ricos e pobres, ora como instrumento econômico baseado no conhecimento e avanço tecnológico.  Esta reflexão torna-se relevante, uma vez que os avanços tecnológicos têm impulsionado transformações na economia política local e global e em nova ordem mundial de consumo frenético e sem questionamento.  A inclusão digital, no escopo deste trabalho, é comparada metaforicamente a um sistema de engrenagens. As peças que se acoplam para o funcionamento de um sistema são, neste contexto, aqui tratadas como políticas de informação inseridas nas ações públicas. Essas ações interligam-se com as ferramentas de tecnologias de informação e comunicação (TICs) que, por sua vez, se conectam com os atores sociais que, por motivos diversos, encontram-se excluídos de oportunidades, bens e perspectivas.Palavras-chave inclusão digital; economia política; política de informaçãoAbstract The notion of digital inclusion, present in the scientific field as well as in social life, a way in field scientific, how much in the practical life, it has generated studies on the question however as combat the battling social inequality in the comprehension of mechanisms of differentiation between rich and poor, to understand the different mechanisms between rich and poor, however and served as an economic instrument based on the knowledge and technological advance progress. The results are relevant insofar as accomplishment of this reflection is excellent, a time that the technological advancement have has stimulated transformations in the local and global political economy and in the new world order: frantic and unquestioned consumption and without questioning. The digital inclusion is here compared to a system of gears. These parts that if they interconnect for the functioning of a system are seen here in this context here treat, as information policies inserted of in the criminal public actions. These actions establish a connection with the tools of information and communication technologies (TICs) that in their turn it is are connected with the social actors, who, for diverse reasons, find themselves excluded from of chances opportunities, goods and hopes for the future visions.Keywords digital inclusion; political economy; informational policies

scholarly journals Beyond Social Media Determinism? How Artists Reshape the Organization of Social Movements

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 205630511775071 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alberto Cossu
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Research ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Organizational Models ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
The Social ◽  
Creative Workers ◽  
Digital Methods

Artists and creative workers are engaged once more in the social and political space. In the current wave, which started in the early 2010s, they have taken part in broad social movements (e.g., Occupy, Tahrir Square), created movements of their own (e.g., Network of Occupied Theaters in Italy and Greece), experimented with alternative economic models and currencies (e.g., Macao and D-CENT), carried out social research and radical education, partnered with institutional and social actors, supported neighborhoods, filled the void left by states’ retreat from the social, and hosted and co-produced art at a time when the budget for culture and independent art is being decreased in numerous countries across the world. This article aims to investigate the organizational and relational aspects of artistic social movements. Drawing on a 2-year-long ethnographic study conducted for my PhD dissertation and deploying a number of research techniques, including participant observation, digital methods, and semi-structured interviews, I propose a new understanding of the meaning of organization in contemporary artistic social movements. My article, focusing especially on data gathered on Macao, “The New Centre for Arts, Culture and Research of Milan,” constitutes an attempt to reflect on emerging organizational models in social movements.

Contexts and Temporalities in Andrew Abbott's Processual Sociology

2016 ◽  
Vol 71 (03) ◽  
pp. 361-392
Author(s):  
Morgan Jouvenet
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Social Structures ◽  
American Pragmatism ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
The Social ◽  
Andrew Abbott ◽  
Social Entities ◽  
Patterns Of Interaction ◽  
Original Approach

Since the 1970s, Andrew Abbott has promoted an original and ambitious project for the social sciences. In particular, he has argued for the development of a “processual sociology” based on precepts first articulated by the Chicago tradition of sociology and in his view somewhat forgotten. Against functionalism, against the “variables paradigm,” he has emphasized the Chicago tradition's focus on patterns of interaction and their contexts, and has deepened our analysis of the local and ever-particular dimensions of social entities by considering their inscription in successive sequences. As well as seeking to formalize these sequences, this vision aims to link processes playing out at different rhythms and levels. As a project it is based on a conception of social life as a “world of events,” where “change is the normal nature of things” and “not something that happens occasionally to stable social actors.” This makes it possible to explain the emergence and durability of social entities (for example, professions and disciplines) in the flow of events. The originality of this approach consists in founding a new institutionalist analysis of social realities on this ontology of perpetual movement.Marked by American pragmatism but also traversed by the question of order and social structures, Abbott's oeuvre offers an original approach to the diversity of contexts and temporalities in processes that, through the intermingling of various “lineages,” constitute social traditions and entities. This article presents Abbott's contextualist theses and the intellectual background against which they emerged. It also considers the place that the processual approach accords to contingency and personhood, factors that enable Abbot to work toward a synthesis of history and sociology.

scholarly journals Sensory sociological phenomenology, somatic learning and ‘lived’ temperature in competitive pool swimming

2020 ◽  
pp. 003802612091514
Author(s):  
Gareth McNarry ◽  
Jacquelyn Allen-Collinson ◽  
Adam B. Evans
Keyword(s):  
Aquatic Environment ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Theoretical Perspectives ◽  
The Senses ◽  
The Rich ◽  
Somatic Learning ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Competitive Swimmers

In this article, we address an existing lacuna in the sociology of the senses, by employing sociological phenomenology to illuminate the under-researched sense of temperature, as lived by a social group for whom water temperature is particularly salient: competitive pool swimmers. The research contributes to a developing ‘sensory sociology’ that highlights the importance of the socio-cultural framing of the senses and ‘sensory work’, but where there remains a dearth of sociological exploration into senses extending beyond the ‘classic five’ sensorium. Drawing on data from a three-year ethnographic study of competitive swimmers in the UK, our analysis explores the rich sensuousities of swimming, and highlights the role of temperature as fundamentally affecting the affordances offered by the aquatic environment. The article contributes original theoretical perspectives to the sociology of the senses and of sport in addressing the ways in which social actors in the aquatic environment interact, both intersubjectively and intercorporeally, as thermal beings.

scholarly journals Institutions as a Philosophical Problem: A Critical Rationalist Perspective on Guala’s “Understanding Institutions” and His Critics

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Agassi ◽  
Ian Jarvie
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Philosophical Problem ◽  
Critical Rationalism ◽  
Critical Commentary ◽  
The Social ◽  
Theoretical View ◽  
Critical Rationalist ◽  
Philosophical Viewpoint

The symposium on Francesco Guala’s Understanding Institutions was thought provoking. Five critical papers took issue with Guala’s reconciliation of the game-theoretical view of institutions and the rule-governed view. We offer some critical commentary that adopts a different perspective. We agree that institutions are central to social life and, thus, also to the social sciences; they are also prior to and more fundamental than individuals. We add some historical points on the ways previous philosophers thought about institutions, and we come at this from a philosophical viewpoint that is not that of analytic philosophy but rather that of Popper’s critical rationalism. In that framework, we espouse an idea of the relation between philosophy and the philosophy of science that is different from that of Guala and his commentators, and we recommend a reformist philosophy of institutions that is neither radical nor traditionalist and that makes better sense of the institution of the scholarly symposium than do games or rules.

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