Making Connections
When I conducted my first interview, I was mainly concerned about making sure to get all of my questions answered. My second concern was with taking note of high points that related to literature review and previous research.
I’d be lying if I told you I thought about my interviews as existing and relate beyond this format. I thought all the interviews I had lined up would go this way: the interviewee answers the questions I need to know, and those answers relate to previous research. However, an interview I recently conducted left me with an epiphany that seemed rather obvious after the fact.
As I moved through the interview, I started to notice that answers this interviewee was giving related back to things that previous interviewees had said, both directly and indirectly. For me, this was the moment that shined a light on what it means to conduct an ethnographic study. Coupled with observations, and previous research done on the topic, I was able to see how the pieces fit together and inform one another.
Instead of seeing it as linear:
This is how person A’s procrastination methods relate to prior research, how person B relates, and how person C relates. In this participant observation, I noticed this behavior which was discussed in this study. Person A, B, C, and those in the observation are all separate from each and do not co-mingle.
It’s more of a complex, interwoven tale:
Person A and B share this habit because of this, which was exemplified in this participant observation. On the other hand, participant C is more likely to do this, which is apparently quite common according to this study. A, B, C, and those observed all inform and rely on each other.
In other words, I saw an ethnography as being approached the same as any other research paper: you have a distinct point that needs to be grounded in the research of those who came before you; of those who are more wise or informed. But that isn’t the case, it’s grounded in real people, and their customs, and why they do the things they do. Ethnography is about relating people’s stories to frame a larger point.
It seemed obvious in the ethnographies we read, because they were conducted and written so masterfully. Yet, I had a hard time transferring that idea over into my own work. It wasn’t until I actually participated in the field work, and started talking to people, watching them, and getting to know them, that I realized how inherently interconnected human stories are to research.
It also helped to understand and conceptualize where prose fits into writing ethnography; what purpose vignettes serve and how weave them into research and the larger argument.
In other words, this moment in that interview gave me vision and pulled together the entire concept of an ethnography.
