Is Ethnography A Suitable Meth
od for Research on Residential Satisfaction and Community Participation.
Ethnography within its wider field of research is described as the study of people’s behaviour in terms of social contexts, with emphasis on interaction in everyday situations (Lindsay, 1997). It is further defined as research that constitutes the art and science of describing a group or culture (Fetterman, 1989). However, the specific definition that will be used throughout this work, is that of its role within qualitative research, which is summarised by Wainwright (1997) in his paper in The Qualitative Report, stating that ethnography can be distinguished as:
“...the attempt to obtain an in-depth ...
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(Goetz and LeCompte, 1984; Hammersley, 1990; Lindsay, 1997; Wainwright, 1997).
This discussion aims to analyse ethnography as a method of qualitative research and discuss its usefulness in a research question based around residential satisfaction and community participation. This will be achieved by analysing the main advantages and disadvantages of both methods of ethnography; that of interviews and observation techniques, with a holistic approach. Hereafter, assessment of the direct usefulness of the method relating explicitly to the two research variables of residential satisfaction and community participation. An overall critique summary and conclusion will follow this, on ethnography’s context and suitability in such a study.
The first form of ethnographic research is interviews. These are where a respondent is asked a number of questions by the interviewer, and the interviewer records the answers. Interviews can be of the in depth conversational type, which are like ...
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may be expected and this may transmit to the respondent and influence his or her reply (Haralambos, 1986; Lindsay, 1997).
Additionally, difficulties also arise from the effect that discussions are artificial situations, especially when comparing this method with observational techniques. Respondents frequently tell researchers what they think they want to hear, and also what might be more acceptable than what actually goes on or is true (Lindsay, 1997).
Another disadvantage of interviews as a technique of ethnography are that they tend to be a relatively expensive. However, this cost may be far lower than observational studies, especially those of more involved participant ...
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"Is Ethnography A Suitable Meth." Essayworld.com. May 25, 2007. Accessed April 24, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Is-Ethnography-A-Suitable-Meth/65400.
"Is Ethnography A Suitable Meth." Essayworld.com. May 25, 2007. Accessed April 24, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Is-Ethnography-A-Suitable-Meth/65400.
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