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John Fenn

On Digital Ethnography, What do computers have to do with ethnography? (Part 1 of 3) | ... - 1 views

ethnographymatters.net/...rs-have-to-do-with-ethnography

ethnography digital

shared by John Fenn on 07 Dec 12 - No Cached
  • John Fenn on 07 Dec 12
     
    Editor's Note: While digital ethnography is an established field within ethnography, we don't often hear of ethnographers building digital tools to conduct their fieldwork. Wendy Hsu wants to change that. In the first of her three-part guest post series, she shows how ethnographers can use software, and even build their own software, to explore online communities. By drawing on examples from her own research on independent rock musicians, she shares with us how she moved from being an ethnographer of purely physical domains to an ethnographer who built software programs to gather more relevant qualitative data.
John Fenn

Rhizome | The Art of Fieldwork - 4 views

rhizome.org/...artist-ethnographer

ethnography art mimetic inquiry post read this week8 interpretation methods

shared by John Fenn on 10 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • The role of “artist in residence” on a scientific expedition is a malleable one, without clearly defined parameters, thus Ga decided that her project would be to become the ship’s archivist, attempting to capture the various facets of life aboard the Tara
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 10 Apr 12
       
      An ethnographic flavor emerges here...esp. the "facets of life" element.
  • Ga is one of a number of younger contemporary artists whose work is tied to a kind of artistic fieldwork, investigating aspects of their lives and interests by merging the apparent objectivity of documentary forms and anthropological research with a plainly subjective, flexible approach, drawing on multiple methodologies and discourses.
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 10 Apr 12
       
      use of "apparent" and "plainly" modifiers here stand out to me as rhetorical valuation of practices (anthropology vs. art)
  • her work as “performative investigations,”
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • ry, and animation, the project equally reflects Jordenö’s concern with the implications of her anthropological approach and her own shifting relationship to the subjects of her inquiry:
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 10 Apr 12
       
      something ethnographers in the anthropological tradition have been doing for some time...though mainly in print.
  • For a younger generation of artists, for whom the use of technology is natural and the Internet an inextricable part of information gathering, the ability to adopt these various strategies and roles is greatly enhanced by the accessibility of information: in an Internet age, the barriers to research begin to collapse.
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 10 Apr 12
       
      what happens with this sentence if we swap in "ethnographers" for "artists"?
  • Savanna Bradley on 30 Apr 12
     
    An admittedly vague response: http://roundtable.kein.org/files/roundtable/Foster.pdf see page 305, "...a kind of ethnographer-envy consumes artists..."
  • Savanna Bradley on 30 Apr 12
     
    This is also kind of interesting: http://www.lindalai-floatingsite.com/content/video/data/unpublished/Excitable-Speech_Cinderella/index.html ; the person putting together this site has a number of 'ethnographic' videos, which she accompanies with a section entitled "Concept/artist statement", suggesting the ethnographer as an artist...
Kelly Heckman

Periscopic Play: re-positioning "the field" in MMO studies - 9 views

I agree the argument has overtones of the emic/etic perspectives I believe in this instance there is a difference. When one leaves to study a culture in Cameroon, one can become "awed" by the cultu...

methods research MMO games ethnography read this week7 week8 article PDF

started by Kelly Heckman on 13 Apr 12 2 follow-ups, last by Kelly Heckman on 16 Apr 12
Savanna Bradley

Blogging Anthropology: Savage Minds, Zero Anthropology, and AAA Blogs - Price - 2010 - ... - 5 views

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/...pdf

digital ethnography anthropology pdf week9 read this tools

shared by Savanna Bradley on 09 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • Savanna Bradley on 09 Apr 12
     
    ABSTRACT In this review essay, the academic merits of three anthropological blogs ("Savage Minds," "Zero Anthropology" [formerly "Open Anthropology"], and the official blog of the American Anthropological Association) are considered.
  • ...4 more comments...
  • John Fenn on 16 Apr 12
     
    I'd suggest we take a closer look at this article toward the end of the term (specifically week 9), as we consider the multiple opportunities for "publishing" in the digital era; blogs have begun to end up as research tools in a number of ways, and this article will push us toward larger debates about academic communication/publishing that are raging all around...
  • Kelly Heckman on 16 Apr 12
     
    I know the owner of Savage Minds if we want to talk with him. Please let me know.
  • Mara Williams on 29 May 12
     
    Blogging affords a saoln-like place of exploration - sure. I was underwhelmed by this piece - but the context is probably helpful. The piece is a review. In that it is treating blogging seriously by performing a review in a respectable journal, I appreciate it. However, I want to poke at the edge what tools are acceptable - blogs seem respectable here. That's great, and very professional. But when I want a tool that will help me think through something, I'd rather use something that is less polished. Also a way to engage non-anthropologists - but are academic blogs engaging? Some are - I'm interested in how to create a non-boring academic blog. The end of the review gets at this problem - the author hopes the official AAA blog will use the format to spark debate and create interesting writing; but the status of it as an official blog makes that difficult. The front page is here http://blog.aaanet.org/ I would be interested in what folks think of it in light of this piece.
  • Maya Muñoz-Tobón on 29 May 12
     
    It is interesting how this article brings in the important aspect of collaboration and peer reviews, when analyzing and ethnographic work. The participation of readers and contributors in these blogs range from professional anthropologist to just interested readers, which causes an unbalance on what traditionally has been a seen as peer review work. The multi-directional and multilevel dialogue on these blogs create that malleability of the boundaries of the uses, effects and design of the ethnographic work. This act of participatory input from "multiple voices" makes the presentation of the ethnographic/anthropological work as another "subject" to be studied and analyze, it becomes an auto-reflection of the methodological design of the ethnographic work itself. Presenting the ethnographic work in a blogging format brings more levels of analyzing the data and the interpretation of this data.
  • Mara Williams on 29 May 12
     
    Here's a working academic blog, mostly on the writing process. https://lauraportwoodstacer.wordpress.com/
  • Rosalynn Rothstein on 30 May 12
     
    I appreciate the working academic blog. I might be interested in seeing two or three similar sites that are in dialogue with other another. Either people working on the same project or researchers in a similar field engaged in similar topics. This serves an obviously helpful role in garnering interested in your project.
Savanna Bradley

Ethnography at Ethnographic Research, Inc. - 4 views

www.ethnographic-research.com

ethnography website week6

shared by Savanna Bradley on 17 Apr 12 - Cached
  • Savanna Bradley on 17 Apr 12
     
    Interesting use of web... see dishwasher study? and 'Ask Melinda' section
  • ...1 more comment...
  • anonymous on 08 May 12
     
    Looks like they've moved on to window air conditioning units.
  • Savanna Bradley on 08 May 12
     
    Too bad... how about this video on Consumer Insights Through Online Ethnography - a dishwasher study instead? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95fwpVSTgDM
  • Savanna Bradley on 08 May 12
     
    Or, this person's quote-ably "ethnographic" recount of using a washing machine for the first time in college... http://davista4.wordpress.com/sequence-1/
anonymous

Tyler Horan "Ditch the Notebook: Ethnographers' Digital Toolkit" - 4 views

www.tylerhoran.com/?p=337

digital ethnography tools media week6

shared by anonymous on 23 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • anonymous on 23 Apr 12
     
    One perspective on which digital tools are most effective (and practical) for ethnographic fieldwork.
  • John Fenn on 08 May 12
     
    Pretty convincing post about the potential for using the ubiquitous smartphone and cloud-based tools in ethnographic settings...but there are some assumptions, as well as some breaks with "tradition" (a few obvious, a few not so much...). I've been using my iPhone in a few ways that parallel the systems Horan has developed, and would be happy to explore some of these tools/apps/affordances...
  • Rosalynn Rothstein on 08 May 12
     
    I agree with some of his techniques, although I still find hand written field notes to be useful. You might be more inclined to write certain things down in the field rather than speak them out loud to be recorded in front of the people you are working with. I also was interested in his section on "local currency." ("Local Currency Whether we want to admit it or not, money talks. Obviously, one should adhere to the local customs regarding the proper use of money in every situation, but spending money can gain you access to areas of life that may otherwise be closed off to you. Generosity in time and money goes a long way, so remember to bring cash to gain access to people and places that you may be unfamiliar with.") This section seems to leave out the fact that spending money in a way which is not culturally appropriate can be as detrimental in certain cases, as it is helpful in other situations.
John Fenn

Methods for Shaping Society | DMLcentral - 1 views

dmlcentral.net/...methods-shaping-society

methods digital read this week9

shared by John Fenn on 08 May 12 - No Cached
  • Research methods are routinely understood as objective techniques for getting to know the world. Yet they may be more influential and socially significant than this, particularly as more digital methods are being developed and deployed. So what, too, do digital methods do?
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 21 May 12
       
      post focused on 'digital media and learning' field, but how might these questions apply to "ethnography"?
  • However, underpinning the technicality of methods is the assumption that they are able to capture and represent the world just as it is. Methods are understood rather like a photographic device that can capture, freeze-frame and reproduce a facsimile of reality. As researchers, we can say we've done a good job if our methods have been up to the job of capturing a picture of an objective reality as it really is—or at least pretty accurately so.
  • But much the same can be said of anthropological ethnographers returning from fieldwork. Their fieldnotes, photographs, dictaphone recordings, transcripts and video data are much like the neuroscientist's CAT and PET scans. They represent a reality—a human brain, a culture, whatever—that has been recorded and made presentable enough for interpretation. But are research methods really so objective? Or do they do other things?
  • ...11 more annotations...
  • It is that our research methods may in some important ways fabricate the very things we want to observe.
  • Methods are not neutral or innocent tools but necessarily construct, shape, configure, frame and make up the social worlds they study—methods help create society.
  • in 18th and 19th century map-making and census-taking, as well as popular contemporary methods such as sample surveys and focus groups, and the emergence of new digital methods in the 21st century.
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 21 May 12
       
      implication/application for this line of inquiry re: digital ethnography (across the many manifestations we've encountered thus far...)? Also, how do methods of "analysis" figure in to this conversation?
    • Mara Williams
      Mara Williams on 29 May 12
       
      One way into this may be to carry out the author's exercise on the subject of the focus group (social, able to make choices, able to be influenced, likes sandwiches) on the subject of digital research. The piles of ideological baggage from the offline world are still in place - but what changes online? I'm really struggling with this one - maybe it's the water I'm swimming in - but I'm finding it difficult to describe (with any degree of texture) my online activity as separate from offline life.
  • Such details demonstrate the importance of recognizing the social life of methods. These are not neutral tools but politically charged instruments.
  • Methods are also social, however, because they in turn help to shape that social world—or, as it's put in the social life of methods program, methodologically speaking “what you see is what you get.”
  • Important questions are raised for research in digital media and learning by these insights. Newer forms of digital methods are now being developed and deployed that will enable researchers to make data on learning in new kinds of ways.
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 21 May 12
       
      To the point of questions/applicability around 'digital ethnography'...
  • open source social analytics are all beginning to change the ways in which learning can be tracked, recorded, visualized, patterned, documented and presented
  • Is this a big deal? If methods allow us to know more, then doesn't that mean we can intervene more effectively to improve learning? Isn't making new social worlds an admirable aim? Maybe so
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 21 May 12
       
      the ethical dilema...and not necessarily a 'new' one when it comes to ethnographic work; but what changes with the "digital"?
  • Perhaps the key point to be made about many such digital methods is that they generate transactional data without the awareness or intervention of research subjects—we are being aggregated as research data based on our transactions online without even thinking about it.
  • Digital media and learning research traces learning processes as they occur in new digital and networked spaces where they are inseparable from transactional data.
  • Yet one risk, as we have seen, is that the rise of digital methods has begun to emphasize transactional data over human participation in research
    • John Fenn
      John Fenn on 21 May 12
       
      Is this where "ethnographic" attention or impulse can fit?
    • Mara Williams
      Mara Williams on 29 May 12
       
      That seems to be the argument - though it could be clearer. Transactional material != social and human activity. Perhaps an integrated approach that combines the transactional traces with stories from "actual" humans.
  • Mara Williams on 29 May 12
     
    I really like this piece! I'm not super familiar with DML as a field, but the author's attention to the world-making capabilities (and not even capabilities - it's built in or "politically preloaded") of research methods. The post provides a clear defense against those who would argue that research is just objectively recording the world. At the same time, it doesn't slip into a poststructuralist wormhole about meaning. There's an attention to politics here that 's fruitful [Ah! but politics in general.. What are this author's projects' politics? What departmental/ disciplinary political fights shape the ground on which DML research takes place?]
flrdorothy

אשר סבידסנקי צלם | Asher Svidensky Photography - 1 views

www.svidensky.com/post.aspx

photojournalism ethics representation anthropology

shared by flrdorothy on 18 Apr 14 - No Cached
  • flrdorothy on 18 Apr 14
     
    This is the site of the photographer from the BBC News piece on "A 13-year-old eagle huntress in Mongolia." His own account is completely different from the BBC article. He is not, as BBC portrayed him, an ethnographer who stumbled onto a cultural shift in gendered activities-he is a storyteller who went looking for an unusual story, and made it happen. "I had gone looking for my eagle huntress. . .I was amazed by her comfort and ease as she began handling the grand eagle for the first time in her life." I have the same question I asked on the bookmark for the BBC article; why was it important to the BBC to represent this story as ethnography?
  • ...2 more comments...
  • Kyle McDaniel on 18 Apr 14
     
    I am not familiar with Svidensky's work so thanks for passing this along. Regarding the story of the eagle huntress: it's clear that many of the photographer's images are "posed" or, at least, were made during the "magic hour." What are the implications for this type of "portraiture?" Some of the images are supposedly "candid" (and some not), but I would question the degree to which Svidensky directed his informant's position/direction for the camera. Assuming the photographer's purpose was documentation, are there overarching ethical implications for this type of visual storytelling?
  • emknott on 23 Apr 14
     
    I think perhaps, I read it differently. In the article he uses phrases like: " I also photographed him during sunset, on horseback, proudly holding on to his golden eagle."--This reads to me like he knows that it's posed and he isn't making any excuses for it. "I tried coming up with new ways of photographing the eagle hunters." This is when he talking about previous documentation that had been done. "photography session" Again, I read this as the photos being obviously posed. But that's just out I read it. If the article had been lacking phrases like this, then I would have to question the ethical implications.
  • Kyle McDaniel on 24 Apr 14
     
    Agreed - and even without the quotes, a casual observer could tell that these images are posed. However, I think portraiture-as-documentary photography raises some intriguing methodological questions/concerns. Considering the original piece was published through a (well-respected) international media organization, my guess is that some interesting conversations occurred during editorial meetings regarding the nature of Svidensky's work. Maybe this example points to the blurring lines between traditional news photography and pictures made for ethnographic purposes?
  • emknott on 24 Apr 14
     
    Quite possibly. And if that is the case, it is certainly evident in the two contrasting articles we have here. But I also wonder if we're not watching a paradigm shift to the photo-essay style that Svidensky is making use of. With the rising popularity of sites like Buzzfeed, I wonder if--in order to bring more interest to his work--he's utilizing that same style in hopes of being more "readable" for the masses. What will be interesting, though, is if we see a similar shift to the photo-essay from the sites that push traditional news photography.
Erin Zysett

Looking out and Looking In: Ethnographic Evaluation as a Two-Way Mirror - 1 views

imaginingamerica.org/...evaluation-as-a-two-way-mirror

shared by Erin Zysett on 12 May 14 - No Cached
  • Erin Zysett on 12 May 14
     
    This is an interesting case study on how ethnographic methods are being used by arts and cultural groups to help make their case to funders. "There is growing pressure to provide concrete evidence of impact to funders and institutional and civic leaders. And yet, numbers and metrics rarely capture the complex individual transformation and collective social change at the heart of many impactful community-based arts and humanities-based endeavors. Stories and qualitative data more readily meet the challenge but are often viewed as "soft" evidence. How can we reap the valuable content- and context-rich learning that qualitative approaches to assessment afford, while enhancing the credibility of qualitative evidence toward more effective case making?"
Brant Burkey

Bringing ethnography to a multimodal investigation of early literacy in a digital age - 2 views

qrj.sagepub.com/293

ethnography literacy digital multimodal week5 spaces read this article PDF

shared by Brant Burkey on 13 Apr 12 - No Cached
  • Brant Burkey on 13 Apr 12
     
    An article by Rosie Flewitt Provides insights that the well established traditions of ethnography can bring to the more recent analytic tools of multimodality in the investigation of early literacy practices.
  • John Fenn on 16 Apr 12
     
    Looks to be an article useful for Week 5, possibly Week 7; a recent look at how to use ethnographic "traditions" in a multimodal context. Topic concerns "literacies" for three and four year olds in the "digital age".
  • John Fenn on 30 Apr 12
     
    Here's the abstract: In this article I reflect on the insights that the well established traditions of ethnography can bring to the more recent analytic tools of multimodality in the investigation of early literacy practices. First, I consider the intersection between ethnography and multimodality, their compatibility and the tensions and ambivalences that arise from their potentially conflicting epistemological framings. Drawing on ESRC-funded case studies of three and four-year-old children's experiences of literacy with printed and digital media,1 I then illustrate how an ethnographic toolkit that incorporates a social semiotic approach to multimodality can produce richly situated insights into the complexities of early literacy development in a digital age, and can inform socially and culturally sensitive theories of literacy as social practice (Street, 1984, 2008).
Brant Burkey

The Society for Visual Anthropology - 1 views

societyforvisualanthropology.org

ethnography digital media visual photography video film representation

shared by Brant Burkey on 21 Apr 12 - Cached
  • Brant Burkey on 21 Apr 12
     
    From the website: "The Society for Visual Anthropology (SVA) is a section of the American Anthropological Association. We promote the study of visual representation and media. Both research methods and teaching strategies fall within the scope of the society. SVA members are involved in all aspects of production, dissemination, and analysis of visual forms. Works in film, video, photography, and computer-based multimedia explore signification, perception, and communication-in-context, as well as a multitude of other anthropological and ethnographic themes.The Society encourages the use of media, including still photography, film, video and non-camera generated images, in the recording of ethnographic, archaeological and other anthropological genres. Members examine how aspects of culture can be pictorially/visually interpreted and expressed, and how images can be understood as artifacts of culture.
Savanna Bradley

The Location of Digital Ethnography - 3 views

www.google.com/url

ethnography digital

shared by Savanna Bradley on 01 May 12 - No Cached
  • Savanna Bradley on 01 May 12
     
    I am admittedly bad at finding links that aren't already posted here... I thought this person brought up some of the key points we have been discussing concerning where digital ethnography can take place in relation to traditional ethnographic terminology... specifically, defining a 'field site'... if this link works...
  • Maya Muñoz-Tobón on 01 May 12
     
    This is an interesting article about those domains where the ethnographic work takes place. I thought it was really interesting how the case study shows how civic engagement is enable in both "on-line" and "off-line", making me think of how we construct meanings about place and time, carrying out the conversations from on "space" to another.
John Fenn

The new digital ethnographer's toolkit: capturing the participant's lifestream | Chris ... - 1 views

www.chriskhalil.com/...ring-participant's-lifestreams

toolkit participant lifestream digital ethnography

shared by John Fenn on 29 Mar 12 - No Cached
Kyle McDaniel

Folkstreams - Ethnographic Film and Video Site - 1 views

folkstreams.net

digital ethnography research tools digital culture media video

shared by Kyle McDaniel on 13 Apr 14 - Cached
  • Kyle McDaniel on 13 Apr 14
     
    I keep intending to pass along this site - folkstreams.net - which has digitized and archived a number of "canonical" ethnographic films. You can watch them for free - check out Salamanders!
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