Bob asked us to reflect on what differences (if any) between ethnography and 
qualitative methods.
So here are some doubts and week ideas taken from my "research autobiography" 

*
I wonder if the ancient idea of participant observation (that is observing 
for participate and participating for observing) could make the difference.

It was the case of mine.
 I worked with and on in depht interviews without using any other 
methodological approach  (making a qualitative analyis of teacher's 
representations of " ethnic minority children" and "culture" as a joint 
construction with the interviewer ) .

I than worked  on videotaped classroom conversations  taken from a setting 
in which I did'nt been as observer (nor I had spoken with teachers) to 
analyse how pupils where constructed as "ethnic" through the way teachers 
speak with them or refer to them during lessons.

Two different methods for two different researches for different purposes. 
But each one qualitative. As interviewer I participate to an event: the 
interview as specific social situation or communicative event with his own 
discoursive rules; as distant observer and conversation analyst I assume 
that meaning, context and ways to interpretate the first one and refer to 
the second one where not outside conversation but its products. I was there 
just to look for that!

Two years ago I tried to combine in depht interviews, analyis of verbal 
interactions (videotaped) and participant observation. And I feel a 
difference that was not on the level of collecting data (interviewing, 
videotaping, audiotaping...) but on the level of their analysis: my own way 
of acting or beeing not able to interact, faux pas signalled me another 
source of  interpretation and gave me knowledge of the taken for granted 
(but changing as time goes by) background of daily life. Shared memory of 
events, shared projects (past and future) were frame for interpretate the 
ongoing interactions and act in them (present). 
 I was not as members because I interpret not the ongoing actions but their 
textualization. But I think that having been there gave me a chance to 
embedd these frozen texts in the story they were part of.
   
**
Count how many times a defined event occur VS establishing the sense people 
accord to it or its consequences on the people life ?
Having a coffee, I discuss with a collegue (Gabriele Pallotti, ethnographer) 
about an hypothetical situation just to compare realistic VS postmodern 
frames of analysis. I submitt You the case:
  
At the end of the school year a child tells more stories (or whatever unit 
of analysis I defined and choose ) in his conversations with peers. This is 
one of the results of my research and it is a quantitative judgement. I want 
to check it. So I could  return to my videotapes and count them. I notice 
that his  story telling in conversation is not more frequent at the end of 
the school year than it was at the beginning.
So I can just notice my mistake and conclude that at the end of the school 
year, tha child did'nt tell more stories.
 But I can reflect on why I had that feeling or I make that mistake.
 Perhaps at the end of the year child is more able to introduce a story in 
conversation (no more stories but better ones), or he improved his ability 
to gain other people attention, or people around him (resercher, too) let 
him more conversational room or react as if he was producing more story 
telling in conversation...
The idea is that if I had that (wrong!, from a quantitative point of view!) 
feeling, something has happened. And perhaps the same ("wrong"!) feeling is 
shared by teachers and pupils. At what situation peers, teachers (and 
researcher) will react? At the one quantitative analysis reaveals or at the 
one ways of interacting produce?
If people interact with the child as if He was producing more storytelling 
(never mind that it is not true from an objective point of view), is this 
response that "creates" the reality.  And so the reality  at work in the 
classroom is that pupil engages in more story telling interactions with peers.

I concluded this discussion saying that: the objective reality of the "how 
many times an event occurred" is a not necessary data. Or at least a not 
sufficient one.
   
If one (not the only one) characteristic of ethnographic approach is that of 
grasping participant perspective and tryng to make sense of the events from 
that, I think that counting "how many times" could be perhaps an 
intermediate data. If I dont move from that I risk to miss what is really 
interesting and do not gain access to the phenomenological reality. We can 
assume researcher mistake as a peculiar interpretation and so look for what 
cues let me interpretate in that way. This perspective could make me see 
some conversational events that would be lost from the quantitative point of 
view. What the child and other participants made to construct this 
phenomenological reality? I think that is the question

What about Your opinions and remarks on that "coffee debate"?

Friendly
Letizia 

Letizia Caronia
Dipartimento di scienze dell'Educazione
Via Zamboni, 34, 
40126 Boogna (Italy)

 



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