Selecting a field site for a ethnographic research

Having subjected yourself to a thorough personal review, you can now apply more objective criteria in deciding where you want to do your research. Some of those objective criteria are scholarly in nature, others purely pragmatic. The fol­lowing pointers may be useful.

1. Select a site in which the scholarly issue you are exploring is most likely to be seen in a reasonably clear fashion

You will develop a sense of the issue to be studied in a number of ways. Your research focus may be:

  • a direct assignment by your instructor;
  • a follow-up to a study conducted by a reputable researcher;
  • an exploration of an issue that is currently in the news;
  • an outgrowth of your reading of the scholarly literature – you may have iden­tified a gap in what we think we know about a particular issue;
  • the result of personal experience and your desire to gather wider information about something that affects you directly;
  • an intention to work for a social or political cause by collecting information that might support that position.

Studying what happens to the traditional culture of an immigrant community such as that of the Indians of the indenture requires participant observation in an over­seas Indian community that is neither too traditional nor already too assimilated. Trinidad, at the time I began my study, was just such a place.

Studying the effects of deinstitutionalization on adults with mental challenges required selecting an urban site in which such people were likely to congregate so as to find jobs, housing, and so forth. A rural community where only a single person with chronic mental illness lived, sheltered by a protective family, would not have been a reasonable choice.

2. Select a site that is comparable to others that have been studied by other researchers, but not one that has itself been over-studied

There is an ancient joke among anthropologists to the effect that the typical Navajo family consists of a mother, a father, three children, and an anthropologist. Humorous exaggeration aside, it is undeniably true that some people and places have been stud­ied with great frequency. Communities unfortunate enough to exist in proximity to a university campus may well feel that they have been selected as research sites for their convenience almost to the point of exploitation. There is a limit to the hospitality of even the best-intentioned people. By the same token, we should not think that every research project has to begin by reinventing the wheel. Unless you have the resources to take yourself off to the highlands of New Guinea at the drop of a hat, you are most likely going to end up doing fieldwork in a community fairly close to home that has been studied before. In that case, just try to make sure that researchers are still wel­come and that your own research interests are sufficiently different so that people don’t feel moved to exclaim, ‘Oh no! I already answered that question a dozen times!’

When I first conducted fieldwork on overseas Indians, there were a few available ethnographic reports on communities in Trinidad. But all had been con­ducted in isolated rural villages. I opted to base myself in a village that was still largely agrarian, but on one of the main roads with easy access to the sort of ‘modern’ employment (such as at a major oil refinery) that was attracting the young people of the village.

My deinstitutionalization study was inspired by research conducted in California, although I worked mainly in Florida, Tennessee, and Indiana – com­parable situations, but with their own distinctive social and political attributes.

3. Select a site with a minimum of ‘gatekeeping’ obstacles

Routine entry requirements such as visas, vaccination certificates, or letters of introduction from local worthies usually pose no problem. But sometimes there are more troublesome matters that need to be taken care of. A background check by law enforcement officials might be necessary, particularly if you want to work in a community with a notable crime problem. Some communities that are riven by factions might require you to get permission from every conceivable interest group. Communities in authoritarian, governmentally centralized political soci­eties might be unwilling to take the responsibility for allowing a researcher to enter without getting clearance from many levels of a bureaucratic hierarchy. Only you can decide when the process of gaining entry becomes too much of a hassle for you.

4. Select a site in which you will not be more of a burden than you are worth to the community

Remember that as a participant observer you may be living in the community you are studying; even if you are studying a place that allows you to go to your own home at the end of the day, you may be expected to be working (for pay or as a volunteer as the case may be) or in other ways drawing on the resources of the community. You will want to make sure that you can provide for your own needs as much as possible. People are often incredibly hospitable and willing to put themselves out for strangers. But keep in mind that nobody really appreciates a freeloader. Pay particular attention to the drawing-up of a realistic budget that takes resources of both finances and time very carefully into account. If you plan to bring your spouse and/or children to the field with you, be sure to calculate their expenses as well. If you are doing research as part of a team, consider the potential burden the community will have to bear in providing room and board to several strangers at the same time.

By the same token, make sure that you select a site in which you can adopt a role that allows for optimal participant observation. You will want to be very cautious about selecting a site in which you will be expected to be either too much of a participant or kept at arm’s length.

When I first went to Trinidad to conduct research, I was a boarder in the house of a family whose oldest son had recently moved away to work in Canada. They found it pleasant to have another young man on the premises and I found it invaluable to be part of a family group – an essential prerequisite to interacting with others in an Indian cultural context. Indians are very often identified in terms of the families with which they are affiliated.

My research among deinstitutionalized adults was facilitated by my becom­ing a classroom volunteer at a habilitation program that served ‘dually diagnosed’ clients. As such, I could come and go in a natural fashion, since I had a recog­nized role to play; but at the same time I was not officially ‘staff’, so the clients felt relatively comfortable sharing their private feelings with me.

Source: Angrosino Michael (2008), Doing Ethnographic and Observational Research, SAGE Publications Ltd; 1st edition.

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