Qualitative Debate Argument and Notes

I.                 They must prove that qualitative work is both narcissistic and unprofitable fiction.

a.      In order to argue narcissism, they need to prove intentionality on a large scale, which is near impossible.

b.      In order to argue unprofitable fiction, they must prove that qualitative work is both composed on known falsities and is not useful.

c.      I argue that all research provides temporary truths which are useful as long as they can be sites for further inquiry.

II.               Calling qualitative work fiction assumes that research can create both true and untrue products.

a.      If there are wrong types of knowledge production (qualitative work), then there must be right modes of knowledge production which provide objective truths.

b.      We know that this is not the case. In Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Kuhn explains that all scientific truth is temporary; It is incremental. Therefore, all we cannot fully attribute objective truths to any research method.

III.              Modes of knowledge production (manufacturing of facts) are inherently tied to the culture in which they arise; what is and can be true is defined by those who devise the method of knowledge production.

a.      This is an idea that arises out of Shapin and Schaffer’s Leviathan and the Air-Pump which chronicles the social influences on science during the early days of the scientific method.

b.      Robert Boyle’s explanation of empirical research is that it relies on a coalescing of belief. Research that has emerged from empiricism, whether qualitative or otherwise, still relies on this dictum.

c.      Furthermore, the way that we go about doing research predetermines what we are able to see. Following the conventions of experimental work, if multiple people are able to see it, then it becomes fact.

IV.              Facts (and thus truth) are bound entirely to the society or culture in which they are produced. If there is a culture—qualitative studies—that sees its own work as truth, then it is just as valid for that population as experiment results are to scientific communities. Therefore, qualitative work cannot be fiction; if it is observed and felt as true within a community then it is just as true as any other methodology.

Qual needs quant observations to be useful; qual cannot get us to places, make discoveries; qual is better for social justice, shouldn’t be political;

How can conflict lead to good?; how is the work not narcissistic?; studies the plight of others;

We acknowledged narcissism; what truly is the rigor of qualitative work?

Just because we believe something to be true does not make it material; we can miss data and facts because of our own failures;

-      

  What is truly profitable?

-        Rigor exists in the social processes of peer review

-        What is true?

Class Notes

Qualitative Research

12/3/2013

If a published article does not have an effect on the lives of those you’re studying, it probably isn’t worth doing.

The self is the individual in action; the self became necessary when social science moved away from methodological individualism. What we observe of people is a choice of presentation/performance. We cannot judge or assume that any presentation is the actual self. The cultural encoding of a presentation are largely visible, and it can be manipulated. Postmodernism suggests that the self is always incomplete which leads to desire and resistance. Every expression denies any other expression.

Social theory theorizes relationships, which are a fundamental unit of social life and thus an object of study. Both individuals within a relationship have rights and obligations. Action can be seen as a semiotic system. Performance is within lines of action, and it is characterized by significance, intention of the performer/performance, competence, modality, instrumentality, and effectiveness. We observe performances, and our field notes should begin to translate what the performances are (composed of individual actions).

Relational forms can take several shapes. Intimate relationships are one on one; small numbers of people with other small numbers are cross-membership relationships, and hierarchical relationships refer to the organizational structures that relate single individuals to multiple individuals. Groups include memberships, coalitions, and cliques (the latter two exist within memberships). Within a membership, there will be relational complexity. These are understood at both local and cultural levels.

It is our challenge to figure out the cultural elements in a relationship, identifying them as different from the local elements of the relationship. We need to identify the cultural obligations within relationships, and we can do this by viewing multiple instances of relationships within a culture. Every relationship has subject positions, obligations, and cultural elements.  Action can be semiotic, epistemic, aesthetic (how is it done well?), and social; we should look for the intentionality of the relationship (what do the members of the relationship intend for the relationship to be?). The terms of obligation can be ethical, economic, political, and social. We have to be able to recognize incompetence, and intentionality doesn’t make up for it.

When we analyze at the local level, we can focus on local agents (who have attached others), local practices, and local requirements of status and performance (negotiations). At the local level, we can observe performed relationships, individuals with identity, subjectivity, agency (prevents cultural performance from becoming static, freedom), and agentry (being the agent of/for something larger than yourself, being the cause of a performance or behavior), and acting agents, which are local enactors with relational others. The acting agents performs through implication, complicity (not the same as culpability), invocation, and evocation.

Enactment is the actualized local routines of the relationship. It entails performance, strategies and tactics, competence, modality, instrumentality, and effectiveness. The routine is the sign of what is being done, enactment is the actualized routine, and performance is the attempt to accomplish the routine. Local relationships also have negotiated criteria of the relationship, grace, grants, power and control, expectations, violations and repairs, structurations (the process by which we put into place resources and competencies to make something to happen; we then rehearse and maintain the structure) and sedimentations (repeated structures create sedimentations), shared experiential and communicative history. While we see two people interacting, we interpret subject positions, lines of action, cultural components, and relationships.

When doing ethnography, there are multiple levels of engagement. The lowest of which is the interview. Methodologically, participation and observation are complementary. One cannot do both at the same time. It can range from interview to significant embeddedness. The more familiar something is to you, the harder it is to observe it. Participation must also be consequential for yourself and the group, otherwise it is not significant. Observation moves through three major phrases, starting with perceptual immersion and careful attention, going through interspersing the significance for the members of what was seen/heard, and finally creating the extended record of what happened. We should use member check throughout, not necessarily for agreement, but for getting descriptions from group members.

For actually doing an ethnography, you need to identify the scene and participants. This is followed by evaluation of research potential, hanging around, gaining access, learning the ropes, strategizing participation, and producing observation.  There are significant ethical issues in ethnography. These include claims of translation and representation, constitution and creation, reflexivity and disguised self-interest, the inherent exploitation, issues of informed consent, risk to self, unintended consequences, and real harm.

We must ask ourselves what constitutes good work. How do we know that we have done good work? How is it demonstrated? What disciplines our self-interest? What is the balance between observation and participation as well as ingenuity and systematicity? How do we manage the intentionality of experience, narrative, the critical impulse, and rhetorical force? What is the role of the other? What are the markers of trustworthiness? What is the value of the work?

Class Notes

Qualitative Methods

11.26.2013

We need to get the PowerPoint for the ethnography lecture and be prepared to interrogate during the presentation.

Hammersly and Atkinson Presentation

In discussing ethics, Hammersly and Atkinson note the differences between procedural ethics (IRB) and ethics in practice. They also write about microethics, which are the ethics for everyday choices rather than ethics that address big issues. When we have issues arise, they are referred to as ethically important moments.

One of the ways to deal with certain admissions (child abuse, sexual abuse) is to make a statement of what you heard and what the consequences of that statement are, asking if they really meant to say what they did. Our choices in responding to this are reflective of our paradigms. We have to be reflexive, particularly when reporting our research.

Ethnography

Hammersly and Atkinson use a very positivistic perspective in describing ethnography, asserting that you can make true or veritable statements.

Traditionally, ethnography was the creation of guides to other cultures. This was heavily linked to colonization and the exoticizing of non-Western populations. After WWII, the interpretive turn appears in social science, which starts integrating narrative, phenomenology, existentialism, social construction, and social action theory. This shift suggests a move from us understanding them to us understanding us. We use public texts to make claims that we know about social life. At present, we have participant observation, auto-ethnography, and long-form interviews.

When deciding whether something works as an ethnographic method, we must ask about certain aspects of the work. There must be an explanatory target—there must be enough there to constitute a true ethnography. The method needs to be connected to the target using warrants, rules of evidence, and conventions of practice (calendars, recording, participation, and reflexivity). There must also be certain recognized practices, such as participant observation/member knowledge, removed observation/recordings, protocol analysis (for activities that are not particularly visual), and interviews. Only objectivist measurement and statistics are excluded as an ethnographic practice.

Social theory is what separates ethnography from the other social sciences; it theorizes the self and social relationships. This is different than what we see in psychology, which privileges methodological individualism, finding all answers within the individual. Social theory is interested in the self, which is what is produced as an expression of identity (who we want to be) and subjectivity (who we are forced to be) in performance. The self is also incomplete. Cultural memberships move individuals into congregations, and the ethnographer is interested in finding their set of understandings (local social reality). We have ways of being in the world, and these are naturalized practices beyond our control (micro-expressions). We should also pay attention to durable relationships and memberships. The self is encoded in subjectivity, located in relationships, apparent through performance, and is an acting agent. The agent is always within a domain, situated within implications and understandings, and is in an improvisational performance. These all occur within cultural domains, which include disciplines (systems of practical training), apparatuses (resources and practices of social structurations), economies (systems of valuation appropriate to the subject position and performance), and hegemonies (cultural process of complicity, implication, invocation, and evocation). Invocation involves noting your own position/self, and evocation is the same done by someone else. We can use disciplines, apparatuses, economies, and hegemonies as aspects of culture to investigate in ethnography. The incomplete self desires completion and finds it within the other, creating both desire and resistance. This means that the completion of the self in the other breeds resistance because any completion occludes becoming anything else. We resist the process of becoming.

In social theory, the relationship is the fundamental unit of social life and it is the object of study. Relationships are always between two individuals in subject positions, which are invariable culturally coded components of the self that have rights and obligations of being. We usually will highlight the rights of specific subject positions and ignore the obligations (at least for those subject positions we like or aspire to). The relationship also allows for control.

The way that social theory treats action is through seeing it as a semiotic system of performance, on the same level as language. All actions are culturally encoded, and they include behaviors and acts, which form routines, rules of enactment, and rules of association.

Class Notes

Qualitative Methods

11.19.2013

In terms of interviewing and information gathering, there is solicited and unsolicited information. There are questions of validity when you bring in equipment (cameras/recorders). However, this can be seen as a non-issue; the interview constructs a non-normal state anyway, and the camera doesn’t add anything that is necessarily more biased. Jackson uses the term ‘ethnographic sincerity’ to refer to the trust we establish between ethnographer and audience that reality is represented faithfully.

We are required to report to authorities any suggestions of child or elder abuse given by participants. It is also possible that the same is true for self-harm and suicide.

In deciding whether something is an artifact or document, we should look at how it is activated in a social context. We also need to be careful about assuming that any room is single purpose or that its artifacts are necessarily tied to the room. Often things are just around, but not used.

For the last class, we are going to each take a stand on issues about qualitative research. The proposition is that qualitative research is somewhere in between academic narcissism and unprofitable fiction. Our portfolio is due on 12/16.

Hammersly and Atkinson are fairly positivistic. Contemporary ethnography embraces a methodological holism, which is more concerned with processes of social interaction than the many individuals. While methodological individualism allows for static explanations of things like document (their existence is their own validity), methodological holism needs dynamic explanations that explain the document in use, made valid by its place in human interaction.

Our analysis of texts needs to look at facts, language/symbolism, framing, narrative structure/argument form, and discursive performance. Language always appears within framing, and narrative or argument is always some type of discursive performance. Texts are bodies of work, and sources are what we have access to. Sources are representative of the potential text. We should observe form, frame, language, narrative, and discourse when arguing that our source is indicative of the text.

Cases are sources that are evaluated for their qualities as a member of the congregation. This is the first step in coding. Units of analysis are pre-selected conceptual/formal properties of the text to be coded. We should report our units of analysis because it shows that the study is thorough. Codes identify properties, agents, actions, consequences, values, and theoretical propositions. A code is a piece of semiotic material and it establishes the interpretive demand of understanding.

Coding must reflect both breadth and depth. Breadth refers to the coverage of the material and depth refers to the layering of significance. Rhizomatic coding leads to overlapping codes, which is typically represented by the depth of coding. Through coding we can accomplish, describe, confirm, compare and contrast, change, entail, critique, and move an agenda.

Before coding, we need to acknowledge the burden of coding.  We must also understand that there are several types of work associated with different types of text, including things like digitization and work with QDA software. After this, you must assemble the needed resources, including hardware, software, services, and personnel.

When doing coding, we need to read sources several time, look for things like rhetorical force, intertextuality, and interpellation (hailing). Close reading is never the same as coding. There should be a classification of each case, and the unit of analysis needs to be established. We should avoid using a ‘shiny-thing’ approach to choosing units of analysis. Unitizing by paragraph or turn is systematic, but artificial. It is also important to collect statistics on your coding activity like the amount of time spent, the codes per unit, and the density of coding. This lets you estimate how long it will take on future projects.

In the second pass of coding—meta-coding—you codes the codes for things like convergence or divergence. The codes themselves become a text, with presences and absences. It should be emergent and theoretical.

If we are working with a large data-set, we shouldn’t be thinking of it all working toward a single coding exercise. Each level of coding can present one or two publishable papers before the coding is even finished.

If we believe in pure grounded theory, then we should be able to find the theory in the text. Coding is a process of exposing the theory within the artifact. This is different than emergent coding. Axial coding adds theory in the 2^nd level of coding, and interactive coding uses grounded codes in the case and then apply them to existing theory, aiming for a synthesis.  Two-phase coding involves first using emergent coding and then following it with theoretical coding. This is the kind most likely to get published.

When trying to get published, you need to be thorough in your analysis of your procedures and the statistics associated with your coding. The argument starts with the importance of the text, follows through with theory and literature, and uses multiple case warrants and should account for disconfirmations. We need to be careful when invoking the audience or author [of the artifact], and our conclusions need to be anchored within the text.

Class Notes

Presentation on Hammersly & Atkinson

Terms:
Naturalism - the study of what has not been influenced or manipulated; what exists in nature; can be qualitative or positivistic
Ethnography - an approach that comes from a naturalistic perspective; a practice for observation
Positivism - perspective the relies on the theory and data being independent; the material world is separate and independent

Is naturalism theory-driven? Probably not, but theory can emerge from it. Ethnographers should shy away from making things too simplistic.

For ethnography, the researcher enters with certain ideas of problems, but they don't formally shape research questions until toward the end of the process.

While the complexity of quantitative methods occurs in the experimental design, while the complexity with qualitative methods comes in the interpretation of the data.

Research questions tend to either be topical or generic. Topical questions are specific to populations or situations. Generic questions look at a specific situation in order to address a larger population.

______

In material realism, the explanation resides in the materiality of things. Reality is trustworthy, and language represents reality in a trustworthy way. This is why participant observation works. Material realism exhibits methodological individualism, determinism, and atomism. A material realist believes that explanations of behavior reside within the individual. Individuals are secure and coherent, meaning that one's identity does not shift or change. Most research is guided by cognitivism, and researchers believe that behavior can be measured and described, and it can be used to understand causes, quantities, and rates. The final product is APA writing.

Ideational empiricism contrasts with material realism in positing that explanations reside in the ideas of things. Reality is a process of continual becoming, and the idea of being in the world is a socially constructed experience. Explanations of behavior are assessed holistically, and the individual has agency. The whole of society/populations/communities are more important than the singular individuals; the individual identity is just a personal expression. Research is done on the basis of Social Action theory, which is based on the idea that action is the sign of what is being done rather than behavior (the how rather than why). Questions are addressed by studying discourses, action lines, and narratives. The final product is narrative writing.

Without a theoretical position, ethnography is not secure. It can slip into simple fictional writing.

_____

Ethnography creates multiple levels of texts, starting with site notes and progressing through field notes and narratives. Texts can be reproduced-- we can reenact behaviors and recreate situations. Action is formal, meaning that it has a form. Any kind of formal action has acceptable and unacceptable ways to perform it. Discourse is extended symbol use with real-life consequences. It encodes power relationships within a society. Action also embeds these power relationships. We must look at any situation and ask what are the rights and obligations? Where are there opportunities and expectations?

Texts must be enacted-- one cannot simply access pre-made ethnographic texts. They are observed in process by an actor/author. We must observe how the behavior coheres into a text. Text is then activated locally and culturally in interpretation; coding is one such interpretation.

Texts are constituted of facts, language/symbolic material in use, framing, narrative structure/argument form, and discursive performances. We begin with the facts of the case, looking for the central premise that makes the disparate facts cohere or justifies all other parts of the text. We have to figure out which elements in our text are rhetorical, using textual warrants. Framing establishes the cultural location of the text. Narrative structures introduces concepts into actions (actions are given meanings). They always have an ethical component.

Once you recognize that you are in a ideological situation, it allows you to assume reflexivity. It allows you to re-enter the research.

We should read more fiction.

We should also go back to our reviews of the I Quit! article and figure out why it was  rejected.

On the homepage of our websites or through an email, we should let Jim know what we've done each week.

Class Notes

Qualitative Methods 10.29.2013

We need to craft our websites into single documents with navigation and such. It should demonstrate expertise. We should decide what the objective of the portfolio is, and that should guide our work in making the portfolio. It can include our statements on our understanding and problems with the materials of the class. We should include our analyses of articles and notes from texts.

For the upcoming weeks, we should look at 14 and 15 in the Anderson text. They are about ethnography and writing.

What are the outcomes of qualitative research? Our goal is to reveal, construct, and correct. It is entirely possible to go through the steps and never come up with an argument or claim. Sometimes the data never coheres. The argument is the lowest level outcome. Coding reveals practices and patterns. It can reveal the things that are not durable (like looking at the 1943 Guidelines to Hiring Women). We can construct things, such as counter-narratives. We can also correct destructive ideas and narratives or expand and advance positive ones. The arguments central to Communication need to be re-enacted and refurbished.

When we are coding, we need to keep in mind intentionality, competence, modality, instrumentality, and effectiveness. The intentionality should be assessed on multiple levels—what parts are intentional and what are not. There is also always a level of competency. Texts do work, and that kind of work can be described as instrumentality. Finally, every text is effective to a certain level. 

Class Notes

Qualitative Methods

Analytic Review of articles

We need to ask questions such as:

• Is the problem clearly stated? 
• Is the approach appropriate to the problem? 
• Is the method adequately described so that the quality of the work can be assessed? 
• Does the analysis account for the data set (does it poach or cherrypick)? 
• Are the claims made supported by the evidence (are they self-fulfilling or contrary)? 
• Do the conclusions cohere with evidence and with the problem?

With methodology, there needs to be express systematicity; simple textual analysis is not enough. We need information on units of analysis-- how many and
what percentage?  The level of coding should be specified as well.

We should be suspicious about any instances without contrary cases. We can also assume that the author is lying-- we have to be skeptical as long as the author cannot maintain their case.

Implicative Review of articles

We need to ask questions such as:

• What value is the study for you?
• Have you learned something about the problem or the approach? The methodology?
• Has it taught you about practical processes you can emulate?
• What was the argument structure or writing style?
• Do we find value in the evidence or the way the evidence is handled?
• Does it contribute to the discipline?
• Is it innovative methodologically?
• Does it make a contribution to theory?

The half-life of communication research is about 5-years. After that, the citations rapidly drop off.

Saldana's Ch. 3 and 4

Chapter 3 of Saldana covers quite a lot of specific coding methods. Chapter 4 then concerns itself with transition between the first and second cycle of coding. 

We need to think about our ontology going into a project. It may be possible to try on other ontologies, deciding what fits best for you and your project. The theories you use are also impacted by ontology.

While we can use multiple coding schemes, we ought to decide on them before starting the work. We need  to be very certain of the theories we use.

When looking at interviews, we might want to code the questions as well-- they can expose agendas or ideas that are inserted by the interviewer.

Data does not force us to write in a particular way; science is a rhetorical exercise. In this way, we cannot really be insincere. We need to persuade a known audience, and if the audience wants numbers, we should provide numbers. It is simply an act of persuasion through the available means. There is no real difference between codes and numbers. The major difference is that most metrics measures use a priori coding, whereas qualitative work tends toward emergent coding.  Coding is a whole-body exercise; you can get tired and have definition drift.We cannot presume that our respondents are naive or unaware of our agenda.

When coding absences, we look for moments of transition. If there is a line of thought that suddenly changes to another topic, we know that there is an absence. Every single thing that is said prevents other things from being said; every presence is an absence.

Senior Center Project
We will eventually put together a statement of what we've learned from our interviews. These will be collected and given to the AARP. The project uses the EDDIE model: engage, discuss, decide, implement, and evaluate. 

Class Notes

Qualitative Research - 10.8.2013

Saldana's coding manual is much more geared toward being reference, whereas Tracy's work is concerned with an overall understanding of qualitative research. The coding manual also advocates for using methods only as long as they are useful. We should allow for the fact that some coding schemes are going to be emergent-- the first coding is never final.

The multiple interpretations that can come out in coding a text make the conflict in mixed methods apparent. If a single text can have multiple interpretations, then it can't have an objective, measurable truth.

There are two types of coding: reductionistic and rhizomatic. The rhizomatic model is emergent-- it has offshoots and breakaways. It enlarges the thing you're looking at. Reductionistic uses codes that stand for other things. It concentrates the thing you're looking at.

We need to be careful when we're coding-- we shouldn't use ad hoc abbreviations because we'll likely forget them or misinterpret them later.

We begin with the problem. The more specific we can be with our problem statement, the more directive we can be with our research. Working with NVivo, the more specific problem statement leads to early classification schemes, whereas more iterative work means that your classifications in NVivo might change or multiply.

There are source and node classifications. The source classifications can have sub-categories. It is done when you bring in the source. If we are going to classify a lot of items as the same thing, we can set that designation as a default. Source nodes are used for coding that accommodates the entire source. In other words, they are designations that apply to the whole of the source, rather than a coding that would get used within the source.

After deciding on a problem, we need to choose our texts. We need to presort these texts, then classify them in NVivo.

My most recent save file for NVivo is here.

Class Notes

In the upcoming weeks, we need to post one outside reading, one experiment/experience with NVivo/qualitative research, and a post addressing questions and concepts about qualitative research.

The assignment for this week is to write a review of I Quit, a text available in the class files. We should look at this as if we are reviewing it for a journal. It must remain confidential.

We also need to post our notes on Anderson.

AND we also need to rewrite our guesses about the wood shavings, redefining them in terms of how the wood shavings could qualify as a gift for a 50-year-old daughter. This should include a discussion of the cultural implications of gift giving. 

 We need to remember the difference between field notes and site notes. Field notes are the first level of abstraction. We're looking for archetypes within the situation-- power users are one example of a type of person we might encounter several times. Site notes should be written within an hour of the observation, and field notes should be written several days later.

Coding occurs in several cycles: primary cycle (what is present in the data) and secondary cycle (first abstraction, themes, how and why).

Tracy identifies eight major aspects of studies that help us decide if it is worthwhile: worth, rigor, sincerity, credibility, significant contribution, resonance, ethics, and meaningful coherence. Worth can include the tangible takeaways, social impact, and the answer to the "so what?" question. In order for our research to be sincere, it must be able to fail. This is somewhat akin to the falsifiability principle. For us, resonance takes the place of generalizability.

The coding that Tracy covers focuses largely on ethnographic coding. In terms of our own project, we have already framed our own work-- we know what we are looking for and how we're looking for it. Our work begins with a deep understanding of the study. This is followed by selection of texts and a close reading of the texts. From this, coding categories emerge-- underlying constructs with multiple values/codes. Categories are not themselves codes. Categories can emerge from the questions we ask. With codes established, we can figure out the unit of analysis. These can be formal features (sentences, paragraphs) or more difficult things like thoughts, ideas, and themes. Because not all texts you look at will meet the requirements you set up for a case, you must go through and validate cases before beginning coding.

The best way to deal with multiple cases in NVivo is through multiple files. Files can be in any format, though it works best with Word and text files. PDFs should be OCR optimized. The titles of our files should include as much information as possible-- date collected, location, type of data. There are three major classifications - source (these classifications go across the entire case and are known before any reading/coding of individual texts), node (classifications used across units of analysis), and relationship classifications. Every unit of analysis must have a code, even if it is unassigned; this is a show of our trustworthiness.

Class Notes 5

Qualitative Methods – 9.24.2013

What is the birthday present – it’s a symbolic present to stand for something that’s being made, like a chair or table. Either that, or he got her a wood plane (thing with which you plane wood, not a plane made of wood, though the tool could have wooden elements, I guess). Our guess should go on the website.

We need to begin engaging the concepts from class, answering the questions that were posed in the beginning of the course.

            Why do we do interpretive research at all? The focus is on the embedded meanings of action, linguistic, and/or symbolic texts. The work begins with surface expressions and moves below to the cultural structures that exist under the surface. Thick description is meant to reveal the meanings and cultural implications that draw out the surface expression. Social construction is what drove the turn to interpretive. In order to use the social constructive perspective, we must consider the requirements of the material practices. This is expressed through whatever is considered appropriate behavior. An example of this would be Julie’s observation of coffee shop behavior and being disciplined through disapproving glances for having a conversation. The truth in this material practice can be seen through latitudes of expression in action, speech, and self-presentation.

            When we look at the move from metric epistemology to interpretive epistemology, there are three defining characteristics. One of these is the security and trustworthiness of preferentiality and representation. As interpretive researchers, we must be willing to truth the answers that our participants give us, but we acknowledge that there may be more or different truths available. The metric researcher must assume that all answers are as valid as their methodology. There are different power relations between the researcher and informant. The informant has most of the power in interpretive work, whereas metric studies tend to give the researcher power over the informant. This can change depending on the particular method being used, however. We can evaluate the power dynamics by asking about the relational contract, who initiates and is responsible for the action, who has agenda control, and who determines value? Finally, the interpretivist tradition has a requirement of interpretation, whereas metric work does not usually need to be interpreted.

            One of the facets of study for interpretive researchers is space. We need to be able to distinguish between static and dynamic space. Space has intentional boundaries for action, and it is an expression of value, power relations, status, past history, appropriateness, cultural location, and other things. Space is a text. Dynamic space is also a text, and it is an action appropriated resource. We need to consider how the action appropriates the space and makes it its own.

            Field notes shouldn’t be connected—they are not the story or report of the observation. They are directed at problems, those you define as part of your research. There is an infinite number of things to focus on, and so we must choose to focus on something. Field notes are not the same as episodic narratives. We are trying to narrow the reach (the amount of things we describe) and thicken the description (get into the cultural implications). Ideally, we should implement a notational system to show time, ellipses, reconstructions (of conversations), intrusions, and commentary.

For next week, we need to go back to observe the place we went to this week. Begin the observation with an analysis of static space, followed by an analysis of dynamic space.

            Administrative improvement studies and classroom activities do not need to go through IRB. There is a protocol for public ethnographies (in public space with people who are not organizationally engaged), which is that they go to Jim and he approves it.

           

Activity: Putting together an interview guide for the Senior Center Project

We are going to take a collaborative-interactive stance at these interviews. We need to think through the potential solutions, and these are topics for the interviews.

Topics: Words/vocabulary; signs & symbols; navigation and instructions; computer/internet; family; expectations; wishes/wants; cell phones, cameras, apps, calculator/basics

We need to determine which of these topics we are able to best process and use. We can only ask about so many things, and we will tend to be more comfortable about some things over others.

We don’t need to systematize our data collection (between individuals at least).

            One of the differences between metric empiricism and interpretive empiricism is that metric is concerned with rates and interpretive is concerned with critical instances. The critical instance is the effective moment (that makes it all sensible) instead of standardized interviews. 

Class Notes 4

Qualitative Methods

9.17.2013

Tracy Chapters 1-4

            Geertz’s Balinese Cock Fight piece came out in 1973, when academia was slowly turning from fully factual description to thick description. Mead led the movement toward eschewing judgment for understanding.

            In terms of feasibility, participant observation is not particularly good for graduate students. Even for faculty, it is quite possible that it isn’t suitable until after tenure.

            Generally, the smaller the units of data are, the more quantitative it is. The larger the units, the more qualitative it is. The text is produced by the researcher in quantitative work and produced by the subject in qualitative work.

            Behavioral perspectives suggest that behavior is trial and error based on stimulus and response. It is not intrinsically meaningful. Parsons challenged this by saying that it isn’t behavior, but action. Action is a connected scheme of acts that are meaningful in terms of accomplishing a goal in a context according to rules. There is no agency in behaviorism, and it is silent in the Parsons School theory. It wasn’t really engaged until the 80s or 90s.

            Gestalt is the principle of unity out of individuation; we see many pieces as a whole. Bricolage is the acknowledgement of the many pieces that make the whole.

            Any action line of an organization is a co-production of the individuals in the organization, whether they act with complicity or not. We have to be a bit skeptical or Tracy’s discussion of disguising herself because there is no way to know the real self.

            Paradigms must answer the epistemological question, “How do we know what we know?” Our data is thoroughly inhabited by theory, and it helps us understand how we qualify truth.

We ought to challenge Tracy’s work (and all textbooks) because it is, by nature, derivative.

We also need to update our websites earlier—aim for Monday afternoon to be finished.

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We need to find efficient ways to get our work done. We may not have time to do full participant observation, but we can do things like reconnaissance observation.

This week, we need to go into a public place for an hour to 90 minutes and write up field notes. First, we have to decide how to observe. What performance are we trying to observe? All performance is some kind of a text, after all.

There is a difference between constructed texts and found texts. Constructed texts have ideational elements, which are held together by rules of construction displaying intentionality, competence, and modality. They are assemblages of semiotic potentials with interpretive instructions. These can include genre, form, grammar, syntax, semantics, style, and execution. We cannot assume that any interpretation is viable for any text. The text governs the interpretation. We must answer what the textual warrants are. A text is not free form, and it will always follow certain conventions. Every text is produced by someone, and they leave traces behind. We need to parse out these levels within the text.

Found texts are elements in the world made sensible. It is a post hoc construction, and the text receives intention, competence, and modality through the interpretation. A found text provides the realization of semiotic potential. The interpretation is the text, and only discipline is resonance. We find commonality through aggregation (assembled without purpose or intent).

We can think of a text as a cargo vehicle. The surface of engagement gives us the facts of the text. It answers “What is?” This has clear boundaries and generate the immediacy of meaning and intention. It should demonstrate competence and capacity. The capacity of a text is its ability to carry cultural significance. After this, we should assess the breadth (tropes, figures, references, intertextuality), depth (cultural work, rehearsal, affirmation), and height (value, quality, character/ethical standard of the production) of the text. What tropes, cultural work, and value are within the text?

A text is any connected or connectable set of semiotic elements (anything). Value is set by the research question, and so not all texts are equally worthwhile. Texts are activated in the demands of the interpretation, and not all interpretations are equally plausible. The great reality constructors are action and language. The semiotic system engulfs the entire scene the entire time. Meaningfulness is achieved through action.  Language always appears in action. They construct and exist within hierarchical structures (cultural, sociological, societal, membership, relational, and individual). Every text is an improvisation upon certain tacit rules. Language and action also create and are affected by markers (cultural citizenship, dasein, sociological subjectivity, societal routines, performances, relational enactments, and individual expression). We must also pay attention to supporting casts of acts, reproductions, indexes, symbols, and icons. Furthermore, we have praxeme, pheme, phoneme, and grapheme, which are the individual units of acts, indexes, symbols, and icons. Intentional expressions of action or language are governed by goals, situations, and rules.

All of these things are potentials of a text. We can use this to decide whether we have truly plumbed the depths of the text. While not every research question leads to all of these things, a close reading means you encounter all of them. We are not going to be able to do this very often.

Participant observation is all about encountering action. It takes the form of enactments (specific expression), performance (line of action), procedure (outcome directed performance), routine (any named performance), structuration (self-sufficient routine), process (outcome directed routine), activities (routines of being), and systems (interlocked activities). We tend to engage the middle of this list. The more factual information you can bring out of the observation, the more disciplined your field notes will be. The field note is a narrative, which isn’t technically different from the writing of items in a measurement device.

We need to acknowledge linguistic textual forms. We should distinguish between industrial and personal forms of texts. These can include music, visual text, visual narrative, and audio-visual narrative. As an experiment, we should go on YouTube and try to understand the video without sound. Often the sound drives the narrative. 

Class Notes 3

Qualitative Methods 9.10.2013

Each week, the website should have notes about the weekly assignments, notes on the assigned reading material, and notes following in class discussions.

We should read chapters 1-3 for next week, 4-8 for the week after, and 9-14 for the week after that. We also need to write notes for these and post them to our pages before class. After that, we start the coding book with chapters 1 and 2, then 3 and 4, and then 5 and 6.

Tracey Ch. 1-3	9/17
Tracey Ch. 4-8	9/24
Tracey Ch. 9-14	10/1
Saldana Ch. 1 and 2	10/8
Saldana Ch. 3 and 4	10/22
Saldana Ch. 5 and 6	10/29
Hammersley Ch. 1-4	11/5
Hammersley Ch. 5-7	11/12
Hammersley Ch. 8-10	11/26

Since I am only doing one presentation, I will present for one hour (with Tiffany) on outside readings on December 3^rd.

We are taking on a class project, working on developing a training program for a local organization that works on improving technological literacy with people over the age of 50. We need to work on getting data from the users by visiting senior centers where we can talk to current participants.

When doing narrative analysis, we need to be able to account for the full complexity of the text. All interpreters come to the narratives with pre-existing toolboxes. Addressing a narrative can be relatively difficult—it’s difficult to get any kind of cultural meaning. The intention of the interpretation is also a useful, but complicated tool in so much as we are given an agenda of what to do. In order to get an interpretation, we must have interpretive tools.

For next week, think about a cultural argument I’d like to mount, then find videos to support it. Provide a close reading of two videos, moving into interpretation. These need to be competent texts. This should be a shot-by-shot analysis. If this doesn’t work, then the unit of analysis should be thematic. We will start with a question or a problem. We will flesh out the problem, its implications, hooks, and sources of solutions. We are essentially building out the problem.

The research process will always start with an issue or a problem and proceed to an outcome. It moves from the question to preliminary investigation. That then is followed by either problem refinement or a literature review (or both). These then lead to a problem statement, which is accompanied by the four major types of analysis: metric empirical, interpretive empirical, critical empirical, and critical analytical. These methods are followed by an implications analysis, and finally an outcome. Reading comes into the research process late, specifically reading on a topic area. Though the literature review is placed early in the model, it often actually happens later. We should be wary of colonizing our own thinking. Only when we run up against a wall do we need to go out and do some reading. Literature reviews are rhetorical devices in the final paper—it is not a holistic overview of an entire area for the researcher. It should be efficient and directed toward the argument we’re making. In qualitative research, there is not much need to show that your conclusions are supported in the literature. The problem statement is generally about ¾ of a page long. If it isn’t an elevator speech, you need to refine it more. It needs to answer: what is it; why is it important; and how do you accomplish it? We also need to be able to write about the implications of our problem. What does it require of us? What should we be asking? The outcomes are not conclusions, but rather the potential venues of the work done.

Problem statements always begin with “What is?,” “How does?,” “Why is?,” or “What value?” Metric-empirical methods are suited for what and why questions, interpretive-empirical are suited for how and value questions, and critical-empirical are best for critical and value questions. Whenever we do mixed methods, we tend to favor one side over another. One type of method usually drives and takes primacy in the final product. We are better able to mix methods if they agree on their reliance on social construction or universal principles. Especially since advocacy fits in with these types of research, it is an ethical duty to have well defined methods. The main difference between participant ethnography and performative ethnography is that the performative ethnography is eventually performed in some way (on a stage, through video). The ethical problem of critical ethnography is asking how we know better. The only way to resolve that is to find the warrants for what we want to accomplish in the lives we are observing. 

Class Notes 2

Qualitative Methods – 9/3/2013

For next week—exchange the photo essay with your buddy and come up with an interpretation of the essay.

            There are always the interpreter, the text, and the interpretation. We must gauge to what degree we can interpret the text—what competencies do we have to deal with it? We must also ask whether the text is a competent text. In cases like ours, they very well might not be competent, and thus there are limitations to the text. Finally, we must acknowledge the framing of the interpretation. In qualitative research, we are supposed to enter texts without presumptions, but this is almost impossible. Therefore, it is better for us to acknowledge what we assume or what we aim to prove. Our write up for the photo essays should take all three of these elements into consideration.

At some point, read Umberto Eco’s Interpretation and Overinterpretation. There are three intentions: the intention of the author, the intention of the reader, and the intention of the text. But how can text have intentionality? The text intends to be competent, and it has requirements that press upon the writer and reader of the text. The writer is disciplined by the intention of the text (one cannot write just anything and have it be a memo).  The reader is also disciplined by the intention of the text; the framing of the reading is set by the intention of the text. Our photo narratives are constraining the reader and the writer by the fact that it is an assignment.

In interpretation, we must make claims. At the lowest level, we give the facts—what exactly are we seeing? The next level is composed of the cultural connections and symbolic fragments. The third level concerns the implications of the text. The argument cannot emerge until you have engaged the text and decided on the appropriate output. Ideally, coherence results from this engagement. If it does not, then either the interpreter or the text are not competent. Every honest piece of research has the potential for failure.

Interpretation example: We see a man dressed as a cowboy (chaps and cowboy hat) on a horse with someone from the army (at least in camo). The man on the horse approaches a group of cows and to herd them to the left of frame, moving from behind them (or at least, moving at them in the same direction he intends for them to go). This is apparently happening on Forest Service land, which can only support a certain number of cows per acre, so it is possible that the cows are being moved because too many have congregated in one place. We also know that this is a mountainous area, which suggests that there may be restricted land usage, which would further suggest that the man in camo in the first photo may have been instructing the man on the horse to move the cows.

Interpretation should being with an explanation of the qualifications of the interpreter. Whenever a claim is made, you must be able to attach it to the text—a textual warrant. We must assume that all of the elements that are in the text are there intentionally, purposefully. When examining the cultural connections within a text, you should pay attention to the roles of the different individuals involved, the role of the environment and context, and the cultural relationships between the disparate elements existing in the text. We must, however, remember to limit our explanations to only that which is warranted by the text. Our arguments must not be self-fulfilling. It is never the case that we will put together an interpretation in a vacuum, and so we must be able to accept that our work will have some sort of presupposed agenda. We must always be able to answer what our textual warrants are, what percentage of the text is accounted for in our interpretation, and how far away we are from the text in our interpretations.

In order to put together accounts of implications, we must be able to note intertextuality—texts within the text. We cannot take anything in the text for granted. It all has consequence until it can be dismissed. When a text has been exhausted of interpretive elements, then it is called theoretical saturation (honestly, there is no such thing). Implications are not in the text, but they are in the intentions of the interpretation. The degree to which the implications can be derived rests on the limitations of the text. When texts fail, it is honorable to mention within your eventual interpretation that you have to look hard for the specific texts you needed.

Narrative

No narrative exists without conflict. There are three fundamental types of narrative: self v other, self v nature, and self v self. Other can be any kind of outside sentience, nature is the non-sentient, and self is one’s interiority. Within the narrative, there must be characters and subjects, and their roles are used to address the cultural location of the individuals. This cultural level imbues the characters with a subjectivity. There also needs to be a setting (the facts of the location) and scene (the application of the setting to the temporality or situation). In other words, the setting is the classroom, but the scene is an evening class with a lecture occurring. This gets into the difference between static and active space. The active space is the dynamic performance occurring within the static elements of the setting. The narrative must also include action. Once moving beyond the cultural understanding of the narrative, we enter into a paradigm. The concept of a cowboy is enough to call into though the paradigm of a cowboy. The character can exist at the level of individual, the cultural subject, the subject, or the paradigm. The action can be an act or a syntagm. The motive resides in the interrelation between the character and the action. The conflict arises out of clash of motives. The conflict generally occurs along the narrative arc, beginning at the initial engagement, raising through the climax, and then down to a resolution.

We should try to find a text that is not (in any way) a narrative. We should also be using notebooks to keep track of our thoughts and notes on elements within the text. The quality of close reading is demonstrated through the ability to account for all of the text.

Start blogging about the things we read.

Continuing the theoretical discussion from last week:

We can acknowledge the self, sign, and system as integral parts of communication. The sign requires the move from sentience to interpretation, and it is the medium of communication. The self can be regarded as aggregate or congregate, independent to dependent, and it is the agent of communication. The systems are separate and embedded, and we note their creation and improvisation, and it is a method of communication. Significance is the potential of the sign to achieve meaning, whereas meaning is the sign in action. Significance is thus global, and meaning is local. Both are rule-governed, social practices of interpretation. There are no literal meanings; both significance and meaning are excessive. We tend to teach signs as lexicographic—having specific, objective meanings—when they actually are encyclopedic. Interpretation and communication are separate processes. Interpretation acts as if—it is an engagement of the will, and it creates an intentional object. Communication, then, is an exchange, which also requires intentionality. One thus cannot not communicate, because one cannot resist interpretation.

The self is a sign, an ideational object that is cued by the material body. The self is composed of identity and subjectivity. Identity includes persistent characteristics of the self, and the subjectivity includes cultural marks and the subject position. The self is sometimes understood as enacted. There is no essential self, only the line of action that emerges from the individual. The self is always actualized in the presence of the other.

The sodality system inserts us into a nexus of relationships, cultural hegemonies, and various social apparatuses. Furthermore, we enter into a system of action, of language, and of intentionality (the grasp of consciousness, the always already). We reside in a nexus of obligation which tells us how we must account for the other.

Communication is thus a set of semiotic practices that entail a relationship between self and other. It is a process, and it is performative, relational, and instrumental. There is a difference between agency and agentry—the cultural depiction of oneself. The diagentive character of exchange is seen in the call for- and answer to meaning.

Whenever we make claims about communication, we must account for all elements of the occurrence of communication: nexus of obligation, relational subject position, line of action, exchange, discursive or actional form, mediating technology, intentionality, improvisational performance, and communicative routine.