I continue to reflect on the word “sophistiratchet” that Gabi brought up in Tuesday’s seminar. As I remember, we discussed it in the context of Pattillo’s argument that culture in black middle class neighborhoods represents a mix of “street” and “decent” practices. First, it is compelling that the word is applicable to both men and women, while “ratchet” in its noun form is often used to refer to women. Moreover, finding the word superimposed over two pictures of President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama, the first of the couple slow dancing and the second of them clapping and snapping to music, made me consider how concepts of sophistication may be so racialized that black people with “worldly knowledge or experience” have their sophistication qualified with modifying words. However, if simultaneously being “up on the latest developments in politics and foreign affairs” and being able to dance to rap and R&B bars us from being regarded as sophisticated, I’d like to think that we can gradually redefine notions of sophistication instead of adhering to mainstream mores.
More broadly, I was struck by Professor Bobo’s point that ethnography can sample on the dependent variable, analyzing a phenomenon of interest without accounting for cases in which the phenomenon isn’t observable. As I look ahead to my senior thesis, I am thinking seriously about the methods I will use and the potential benefits and drawbacks of each one. While I think ethnography can accurately capture the lived realities of interviewees, its findings are not easily generalizable, so I am thinking about historical and statistical approaches might provide for a more persuasive argument.
Thoughtful post Jonathan!
As someone who primarily uses ethnographic methods in my own research, I almost never think of the goal as that of being generalizable necessarily. I think I’m also attuned to the ways in which categories such as “objective” and “scientific” have themselves been constructed categories that privilege certain kinds of knowledge over others. Each discipline has its own historical legacies and favored approaches (as we’ve learned through our course thus far on the formation of sociology itself as a discipline) which of course shape how we as scholars do our work and legitimate ourselves in the field.
I think questioning ethnographic methods (as well as other methodological approaches) is absolutely necessary! I spend a lot of time doing the same, but I also ask what precisely am I questioning in the method? One of the unique aspects of ethnography is that it allows (not without mediation of course) our research interlocutors to speak and to learn from them as valuable and authoritative speakers about their own context. While not generalizable in the traditional sense of the word, it is useful in terms of creating and altering theories (which then themselves can be tested in contexts outside of the researcher’s own ethnographic field).
Keep thinking on it! I’d love to discuss further.
Thoughtful post Jonathan!
As someone who primarily uses ethnographic methods in my own research, I almost never think of the goal as that of being generalizable necessarily. I think I’m also attuned to the ways in which categories such as “objective” and “scientific” have themselves been constructed categories that privilege certain kinds of knowledge over others. Each discipline has its own historical legacies and favored approaches (as we’ve learned through our course thus far on the formation of sociology itself as a discipline) which of course shape how we as scholars do our work and legitimate ourselves in the field.
I think questioning ethnographic methods (as well as other methodological approaches) is absolutely necessary! I spend a lot of time doing the same, but I also ask what precisely am I questioning in the method? One of the unique aspects of ethnography is that it allows (not without mediation of course) our research interlocutors to speak and to learn from them as valuable and authoritative speakers about their own context. While not generalizable in the traditional sense of the word, it is useful in terms of creating and altering theories (which then themselves can be tested in contexts outside of the researcher’s own ethnographic field).
Keep thinking on it! I’d love to discuss further.