Ethnography

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What is ethnography?  To what use can ethnographic data be put?  Who are its fiercest critics?   Does ethnography have a future?  Ethnography is one of the principle methods of qualitative research with a long-established tradition of use in the social sciences. However, the literature on ethnography has become a battleground as ethnography is attacked from within and without the qualitative tradition. Post-modern critics effectively deny the possibility of any objective research, whilst globalization challenges the relevance of the local and the small scale.  In this book you will be presented with a robust defence of ethnography and its continued relevance in the social sciences. The author sets out the competing methodological bases of ethnography and details its different uses as a research method. You will find guidelines for good practice in the research process, as well as advice on the analysis, interpretation of ethnographic data.  Ethnograpy is written as a textbook with many features to help the learning process. However, its content are research led, informed by the author’s own extensive experience of undertaking ethnographic research in dangerous and sensitive locations in Northern Ireland and elsewhere. It is a lively and engaging read on an essential topic. About The Author John D. Brewer is Professor of Sociology at the Queen’s University ofBelfast. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and has been Visiting Fellow at Yale University, 1989, and Visiting Scholar at St John’s College, Oxford, 1992. He taught formerly at the University of East Anglia and the University of Natal. He has extensive experience of qualitative research on a variety of topics and in many different locations, as well as considerable experience of writing up ethnographic data. He has used oral/life history methods with former policemen in the Royal Irish Constabulary and former members of the British Union of Fascists. He has used observational methods on Royal Ulster Constabulary, documentary research on the South African Police, in-depth interview research on crime in East and West Belfast and among conservative evangelicals in Northern Ireland and conversation analysis of the talk of people with learning difficulties. Much of this has involved research on sensitive topics or in sensitive locations, and he has developed an acute awareness of the strengths and weaknesses of ethnographic data and their practical use. He has over twenty years’ experience of teaching qualitative research methods to undergraduate and postgraduate students.