Multiculturalism---ETHNOGRAPHIC REPORT of Chicago

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ETHNOGRAPHIC REPORT

DIVERSITY IN THE URBAN LANDSCAPE

You will write an Ethnographic Report after doing observations on a situation or place of your choosing, which may include interviews with key informants, on a central question relevant to multiculturalism and diversity in the urban landscape. You may choose any street, neighborhood, venue, event or instance of urban life where you have the chance to observe. You will pose an open, interpretive research question and then take detailed field notes, or conduct formal or informal interviews, or a combination, resulting in a set of ethnographic data you will use to write a brief report on the meaning of your findings. The paper should be 5 – 7 double-spaced pages in 12 point font, submitted with an additional 5 – 10 pages of field notes, in printed copy in class, and also under Submissions online on D2L. You will conduct observations and write detailed field notes over the course of several weeks, or conduct 1-3 interviews with engaged respondents, or a combination of both, and finally you will use your notes and transcriptions to write the Report. Spelling, grammar, and sentence structure should all be edited and clear, and organized into an argument using claims, warrants and evidence. Field notes and/or transcriptions do not have to follow these rules, but should provide an accurate record of what you observed, and should be as long as the paper or longer, but may be typed or hand-written. You will turn in both your field notes and your Report in paper copy.

ELEMENTS OF YOUR REPORT

site, object of study, subjects, question, hypothesis, plan

You are encouraged to fill out the categories at the end of this description in order to outline your project, which you may share with your professor for review before you begin. You may print and fill out page 3 to turn in, but you should keep a copy for your ongoing work. Your site is the place where you do your observation. You might designate your workplace, a wider neighborhood in which their civic engagement is situated, or even a single venue or event as the scope of your site. Your object of study is the social condition, custom, event, problem, or issue you want to investigate, and it may be the central concern of the organization where you work, or anything else you find relevant and important. Your subjects are the people you want to study. While it may seem obvious to designate all of your co-workers or organizational constituents, be as specific as needed about targeted demographics, social roles, or forms of solicitation you will use. Your question is perhaps the most important element in your observation. What are you trying to find out? What do you want to know that can be answered by an observation? Your hypothesis is your best intuition and calculation of the answer you expect to find to your question. Your plan of action tells how you will accomplish your observation. Where will you go, when, and for how long? What will you take with you, and when will you write up? Who will you try to interact with and how? What do you plan to say? What will you want to gather to know you are done? How will you organize your information once you start getting it?

COURSE SOURCES

Any of our readings and discussions may give you some idea of how to proceed in your observations, but you are recommended to review these resources listed under Course Resources on D2L:

( “Participant Observation”

( “Fieldnotes in Ethnographic Research,” R. M. Emerson, etal.

( “The Ethnographic Interview,” James Spradley

( “Transcript Handling,” Michael Agar

WHAT TO OBSERVE

PEOPLE: number, race, ethnicity, class, gender, age, appearance, behavior

SPACE: the built environment, layout, design, line of sight, social effects

OBJECTS: furniture, tools, food, items and materials of any kind

SYMBOLS: visual, spoken, enacted

SPEECH: language, word choice, gesture, tone, effect

EXCHANGE: objects, money, affection, threats, gifts

RELATIONSHIPS: roles, positions, intimacy, distance, contact

ETHNOGRAPHIC INTERVIEWING

If you choose an interview component to your ethnography, remember that no matter where you host your conversation, pay attention to context, the place and its meanings, including the layout of the space, its design and social effects. Always test your equipment hours before your planned conversation, and then again immediately before you begin, and note the distance needed to the microphone Note material culture such as objects, images, symbols and items of importance. Note and describe all of the speakers: their number, race, ethnicity, class, gender, age, appearance, and behavior. Describe the language or languages, paying attention to accent, word choice, gesture, tone, effect, speed, volume, emotion and character of any kind. What actions are taking place among the speakers in terms of exchange? What are the relationships, roles, positions, intimacy, distance and contact? You will spend a good amount of time listening to your recording to identify the most interesting part to transcribe, and then carefully and slowly playing, writing, rewinding, and playing in small bits, until you have it written down exactly as it was spoken. About 10 pages of transcription should also be typed and submitted with the paper. Format yours accordingly:

1. Indicate the speaker on the left of the text, using their name or initials, followed by a colon

and a consistent indentation.

2. Transcribe all words and sounds exactly as spoken, to the best of your ability to hear.

3. Indicate major shifts in tone and delivery using specific forms of punctuation.

4. Use single spacing for each speech event, but skip lines between speakers.

WRITING UP

You are evaluating some program, effect or quality of civic engagement by looking and talking directly with the people involved. Using your field notes you will build an argument for your interpretation of what you observed. Look for patterns, tropes, correlations, intersections, likenesses and differences in your categories of observation. In your writing use at least 5 major terms or ideas from our class discussions and readings, and refer to at least 2 sources, either those assigned in class, or outside sources that use real research findings. As you turn the data from your field notes into a Report, follow the general guidelines for social science writing: claim, evidence, and warrant. You claim that something is true, you provide the evidence from your observations, and then you link them by showing how the evidence warrants such a claim. Your claims need not be earthshattering but they should not be obvious; rather, a solid interpretation from your own perspective and in your own words of the dimensions of this form of civic engagement.

ETHNOGRAPHIC REPORT

Outline of Approach

NAME: ______________________________________

SITE: ________________________________________________________________________

ORGANIZATION: _____________________________________________________________

EVENTS OR ACTIONS (if applicable): ____________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

OBJECTS OF STUDY: _________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

SUBJECTS: __________________________________________________________________

RESEARCH QUESTION: _______________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

HYPOTHESIS: ________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

PLAN OF ACTION: ____________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________