Challenges and solutions in ethnographic research - book overview

 This is an open access book - challenges and solutions in ethnographic research - edited by Tuuli Lähdesmäki, Eerika Koskinen-Koivisto, Viktorija L.A. Čeginskas, and Aino-Kaisa Koistinen, all from or associated with the Finnish University of Jyväskylä. 

The 2020 book is published by Taylor and Francis and 14 chapters organised into 4 sections two of which are of interest and relevance to my work. 

Before the main chapters, the editors provide the 'Introduction: Ethnography with a twist' which covers the motivations and rationale for the book. These are mainly due to the movement to more social practices, globalisation providing an ever expanding and rich tapestry of human life to be investigated; and the importance of ethics and reflexivity underpinning all research.

The background to the book is summarised, being a conference held at the university in 2019. Short overviews of each chapter are then provided.

 Section one covers 'new collaborative practices in ethnography' with 3 chapters.

The first chapter is by Johanna Turunen, Viktorija L. A. Čeginskas, Sigrid Kaasik-Krogerus, Tuuli Lähdesmäki, Katja Mäkinen titled Polyspace: creating new concepts through reflexive team ethnography. The chapter writes on a collaborative effort, derived from experiences the authors had whilst convening at a heritage site. They define the distinctive elements of polyspace as being made up of an element of suddeness or surprise; a bizarre experience; requiring social agency and interaction; and something that draws on affect, emotion and empathy. The chapter details how the concept of poly-space was developed through the sharing of fieldwork experiences and sense making through intepretive reflexivity. Of importance is the development of a collaborative ethnography and collective interpretive reflexivity. 

Following is a chapter on 'embodied adventures: an experiment in doing and writing multisensory ethnography by Eerika Koskinen-Koivisto, Tytti Lehtovaara. This chapter details and describes sensory ethnography. The challenges include the interpretation of embodied experiences, the verbal expression of things that are often difficult to describe and then to communicate these in ways which will other people understand. The chapter uses the experiences of the authors as they navigate into the group as an example.

Chapter 3 is with Matthew Cheeseman, Gautam Chakrabarti, Susanne Österlund-Pötzsch, Simon Poole, Dani Schrire, Daniella Seltzer, Matti Tainio on 'Ramblings: a walk in progress (in the minutes of the International Society of the Imaginary Perambulator). Here, the authors experiment with a study on and responses to each other's walking practices. 

The next part focuses on 'Visuality and multi-modality in ethnography'.

Chapter four by Riitta Hänninen is on 'participant-induced elicitation in digital environments'. Draws on two studies by the author on Finnish lifestyle blogging and older adults as ICT users. Traditionally, photos or used to help draw out responses from participants. The photos may be taken by the participants, the researcher or selected to ground a topic. In this chapter, blogs and 'device use' were the anchors for participant induced elicitation. The advantages and disadvantages of each are presented and discussed.

The fifth chapters 'ethical challenges of using video for qualitative research and ethnography: state of the art and guidelines' is by Marina Everri, Maxi Heitmayer, Yamin-Slotkus Paulius, Lahlou Saadi. Undertakes a brief overview of the use of video in ethnographic research and the need to review the guidelines as technology and its ubiquity and range of uses, changes the nature of video ethnography. A literature review is undertaken to review the gaps and these are then discussed. Issues requiring update include the researcher-researched rapport; the complexities of informed consent; participant's rights including anonymity, confidentiality, data ownership and release. Solutions are discussed and examples provided.

Chapter six by Plhla Maria Siim is on 'drawing and storycrafting with Estonian children'. This chapter is based on a study of cross-border mobility and its effects on family lives, lifestyles and everyday practices. Proposes storycrafting as a method to engage with and provide a voice for young children.

The next chapter 'Sharpening the pencil: A visual journey towards the outlines of drawing as an autoethnographical method is by Marika Tervahartiala. The chapter details the methodology, motivation to use the method, discusses advantages and disadvantages, and sketches and narrates examples  to illustrate the concepts.

The next two sections are good references but less relevant for the moment to my work. The third section has chapters on 'ethnography of power dynamics in challenging contexts'.

Firstly, Marie Sandberg writes on 'Retrospective ethnographies: Twisting moments of researching commemorative practices among volunteers after the refugee arrivals to Europe 2015'. Then Laura Stark with 'Ethnographic challenges to studying the poor in and from the global South'. Last chapter in this section is with Lotta Lounasmeri who write on 'Elite interviewing: The effects of power in interactions. The experience of Northern women.

The last section has four chapters on 'embodied and affective ethnography'.

Chapter 11 is by Marija Dalbello and Cathering McGowan who write on 'Memory narrations as a source for historical ethnography and the sensorial-affective experience of migration'. The following chapter is by Sofie Strandén-Backa on 'The involuntary ethnographer and an eagerness to know'. Then a chapter on 'Ethnography, arts production and performance: meaning making in and for the street' by Jessica Bradley.

The last chapter by Tom Boellstorff with 'Ethnographic twists and turns: an alternative epilogue' overviews the main themes and closes the book. 

The book has mix of articles written and presented at a conference and collaborative works which were initiated and completed post-conference. It provides good examples of the ethnographical writing genre and proposes and examples contemporary ethnography. That is ethnography that is no longer a privileged researcher observation of the culture and practices of others, but deeper immersion, collaboration and co-creation, and acknowledgement of ethnography's important contributions but tempered by it's ethical emphasis and more future looking approaches. 

Presentations - Tim Ingold, Patricia Churchland

I was in Perth for two weeks over the Christmas and New Year to catch up with family. The weather was hot - at least 30'C everyday. I was up early as Perth is 5 hours behind NZ. Comparatively cooler in the morning to work off the good food dished up each day by my mother and other rellies, with 20 - 30 kms bike rides. Thankfully, some small hills and mostly on bike trails to explore area around the Canning River.

During the afternoon, when temperatures made it too hot to be outdoors and my parents, babies, pets  etc. were having their post-lunch siesta, I caught up with a range of youtube videos on topics relevant to my research projects - i.e. trades learning and how people become trades people. Usually, I previewed the video on afternoon. Then spent another afternoon working through the details of some of the concepts presented using Google Scholar and the presenters' webpage. Then drilling down to salient concept and to write up notes etc. with another more selective video watching session. So each of the following presenters took up a good 5 - 6 afternoons.

First up , caught up with a few videos with Professor Tim Ingold who has a chair in Social Anthropology at the University of Aberdeen. There were several videos reflecting the evolution of Professor Ingold's work. One I watched through was on'Thinking through making' recorded in October 2013. Although only about half an hour, the presentation covered many of the precepts of Ingold's work, with text version covering for example in 'Toward an Ecology of Materials'. Annual Review of Anthropology' .

Then, the work of Professor Patricia Churchland from the University of California on neurophilosophy, leading to a collection of videos from Serious Science - which I will park for another occasion to view. Also a longer video on free will and self control related to her work on neuroethics.

I find videos to be a good way to better understand the writings of researchers, especially with topics requiring effort to build up a foundation in and then to work through complex concepts. Viewing the video brings into focus researchers' / writers' standpoint. Good presentations often include examples not always detailed in articles. So, videos are good supplements, especially if ever being able to watch f2f presentations from illustrious academics are out of reach.

Apprenticeship in critical ethnographical practice - Jean Lave's new book

The new book by Professor Emerita Jean Lave and Professor Thomas P. Gibson  called 'Apprenticeship in critical ethnographical practice' (2011) is a wonderful read. It traces Lave’s journey as an ethnologists. Her initial studies of apprentices have contributed to a better understanding of how learning occurs in the real world. This book details her research of Vai and Gola tailors’ apprentices in Liberia in the 1970s. Threaded through the book is the practice of ethnography, the many facets of becoming a researcher through doing field work. Usual preview via Google books.

There is a recorded presentation at Universidad los Andes in Colombia– assumptions about how people learn and how work by anthropologist and social psychologists overturns some of these assumptions and suggests other approaches - summarising some of the concepts in the book.

I first found the book at the CPIT ebook library. However, it was frustrating to try to read the book at the office due to interruptions and the usual meetings interspersed through my work day. I then accessed the book at home on my ipad but had difficulty accessing the wifi in bed. So I had a look at Amazon and found the ebook at a reasonable price (NZ$15.12) so it is now on my ipad Kindle app and I have been able to dip in and out of it over the last two weeks. Each reading brings new learning. One Kindle feature is that the book shows up sections highlighted by other readers. I turned this off at the first skim read but for the current, more in-depth read, I have created and shared my own highlights and also paid some attention to what others have highlighted. As with all ebooks, the ability to bookmark and annotate is also a great advantage.


There is much in this book to absorb and reflect on. Lave’s passion for her work shines through every page in the book. She writes of her commitment to the task of critical ethnography and how doing research through praxis, involves also changing one’s whole ways of doing, thinking and being. In so doing, the researcher is continually transforming their identity, just as the participants they are observing grow as they learn and develop. Of importance is the ‘critical’ aspect. The critical ethnography researcher needs to be mindful of the impact of their fieldwork and to use their findings to help improve opportunities for their participants.


Chapter one is very much a deliberation on how research apprenticeship has also involved the researcher is undertaking an apprenticeship in critical ethnography.


Chapter two is an overview of Lave’s original work in Liberia, when she undertook to study the mathematics learnt through ‘informal’ learning. There are vivid descriptions of the tailor’s district and the apprenticeship system as practiced 40 years ago in West Africa.


Chapter three ‘becoming a tailor’ details the ways in which tailors learn their craft and how many of the skills learnt were also about ‘being a tailor’. The beginning of learning to be a tailor, involves entry points both into the trade/apprenticeship and into learning tailoring. The emergence of the well quoted ‘legitimate peripheral participation’ conception is described and substantiated with observations of how novice tailors enter the trade and begin tailoring by firstly learning how to sew on buttons. This not only provides a 'simple' task to master but the opportunity to examine the finished pair of trousers through 'tailors' eyes and hands'.


Chapter four goes into ‘testing learning transfer’. Here Lave describes a series of experiments she carried out with tailors, to find out if ‘school based’ type mathematics or algorithms would be similar in a workplace situation. The chapter also details much of Lave’s reflection on the effectiveness of this form of research method. A must read chapter on how embedding numeracy practices needs to be based on real-world practices and not just ‘school based’ learning couched into a different format.


Chapter five titled ‘multiplying situations’ goes into Lave’s strategies to improve on the work described in the previous chapter. Having found out that work-based mathematics was vastly different from school-based approaches, she describes in this chapter, her work at unravelling the salient structures that underlie work-based and real-life practical mathematics, what Lave calls ‘mundane maths’. The example used to explain the ideas learnt are apt. It is a record of a tailor, negotiating the best price from a customer, using quick calculations to ensure that he gained a reasonable profit, while the customer drove the price down with aggressive bargaining. How did apprentices learn this skill? And could such a skill have been learnt in a school-based system?


The last chapter ‘researching apprenticeship, research as apprenticeship’ links back to the discussion in chapter 1. I can relate well to how doing research via completion of PhD is very much a research apprenticeship. This brief chapter also lays out the foundational premises for situated learning so that the transfer of learning between school and real-world application is narrowed.


The references contain a wealth of anthropological literature to explore further. Many are pre-1970s to support the work as reported in the book but there are a substantial number of newer references I am not familiar with which will need following up.