Unstructured Observation: The Rise of Ethnography Method

Observation can vary in its degree of structure – how far the researchers’ approach is pre-formed, in the sense of know­ing what they want to find out or how they plan to do it. But no research, however open-ended, lacks structure. It would be chaotic if it were. So the chapter heading is not exactly correct.

An alternative is to assign the degree of participation, conventionally divided into non-participant and participant varieties. If anything these terms are even more unsatisfac­tory. No observation is entirely non-participant if there is any contact with, or awareness by, those being observed; but it’s relative. Much of what is described as participant observa­tion is not so, in the sense that the researcher is not a nor­mal part of the group being observed, nor does she/he usually behave in a fully participant way in the group’s activities (which in some contexts may be minimal). Fully participant observation can only be carried out by an insider: someone who already belongs to the group being resear­ched. Two studies of this kind – by Burgess (1983) of a comprehensive school, and by Holdaway (1983) of a police force – are discussed later. It is sufficient for the moment to keep these limitations in mind.

 1. What is ethnography?

The Oxford English Dictionary gives a first usage of this term as 1842 but it has only come into common use since the 1970s. Before that it was comparatively rare and a classic text of the genre, Whyte’s 1943 study of street-comer gangs in Boston, doesn’t use the term at all.

So what does it mean? Quite simply ethnography began as the descriptive arm of social anthropology where the focus of the latter was on the study of ‘primitive’ societies. It aimed to describe the rules and practices of a culture. Since the 1970s it has become applied in particular to the study of sub­cultures in Western society. Some of these will be reviewed later in detail but it is worth considering briefly the moti­vation underlying this surge in research activity.

The concept of a ‘multi-cultural’ society is conventionally applied to a population of different ethnic and religious origins. But an alternative is to view the whole range of essentially distinct minority groups, about whom the majority of outsiders know little, as subjects of sub-cultural study. The range of possibilities is vast: not only anti-social football fans, the chronically unemployed, those in the ‘black’ economy or casual migrant workers; but also parti­cular communities defined by occupation or affiliation: the informal operation of a hospital, or a prison or a police force; black religious groups, West End gentlemen’s clubs, Freemasons; or ‘deviant’ groups – for example, urban gangs or users of illicit hard drugs. In all cases ethnographers seek to gain an inside perspective, perhaps covertly (see Chapter 9); one reason for this research interest being that we are either ignorant of differences or make shorthand, unin­formed judgements (adverse or otherwise) about the char­acter of these sub-cultures.

A recurrent theme in such studies is that in taking a defined focus on these minority groups we come to under­stand mainstream society better. Since, whether viewed as ‘deviant’ or not, these sub-cultures are often the subject of social or political action, the use or validity of such action is going to depend on an adequate understanding of the group in question.

What do ethnographers do?

The basic procedures are easily summarized.

• They immerse themselves in a particular social setting for an extensive period of time, depending on access to the group. This is usually a matter of months, occasionally more than that: Whyte (1993) spent three years in a ‘slum’ area of Boston researching for Street Comer Society.
• They make protracted observations of what people in that setting do and say.
• They talk to people in the group in a naturalistic way as the occasion arises.
• They may interview key informants in the group and iden­tifying these figures is part of the method: someone who will explain to the researcher those elements of social organization which are not easily viewed or self-evident.
• They seek to understand and explicate the rules govern­ing behaviour and social relations in the group and how these relate to the physical and economic context of the setting.
• They keep detailed notes of their observations which they may check out with their key informants.
• They collect any other material which supports the descriptive process or aids understanding – photographs, sketches, videos, or ‘documents* of one kind or another.

How is this different from case study research methods?

In terms of the kind of data collected it may not differ at all: both involve accumulating multiple forms of evidence on a social phenomenon of interest, of which no one variety is adequate for explanation on its own.

The difference is in focus:, ethnography is concerned with elucidating the character of a particular culture. A case study may involve an individual, or individuals, in widely different settings or institutions – such as a national organization of professionals – which is not located in a single or simple setting.

2. Gaining access

Most ethnographic studies are carried out by people who are outsiders, so for them the key problem is access. How do you gain entry, and acceptance once you’re admitted to the group? How do you get into a position where you can achieve understanding? Identifying and establishing trust with key informants is the most important factor.

In Whyte’s study the key informant was the gang leader whom he called ‘Doc’. A direct quotation conveys the character of this. At their first meeting Doc listened to what he had to say and then responded:

Well, any nights you want to see anything, I’ll take you around. I can take you to the joints – gam­bling joints – I can take you around to the street corners. Just remember that you’re my friend. That’s all they need to know. I know these places, and, if I tell them that you’re my friend, nobody will bother you. You just tell me what you want to see, and we’ll arrange it. (Whyte, 1993, p. 291.)

This extract shows just how fortunate Whyte was, which brings us to an element that does not usually figure in research methods texts: that the social researcher, particu­larly in the role of ethnographer, is heavily dependent on luck. The converse is that with the best will in the world you can find yourself excluded, treated with suspicion.

3. In it but not of it

Not all ethnographers are in the position of needing to negotiate access and acceptance. Some ethnographic research is carried out by people who are normal members of the group. Burgess was able to study a Roman Catholic comprehensive school because he was employed as a part­time teacher (but identified and legitimized as a researcher) (Burgess, 1983). Within professional groups that kind of researcher membership, though not without difficulties, is usually a privileged and relatively straightforward business.

With deviant or culturally distinct groups no such fully legitimate membership is possible; so that even if someone gains acceptance that does not imply being seen as ‘one of them’. Indeed, any attempt to be ‘one of the boys’ is likely to be perceived as false. Whyte provides an amusing example of this describing how on one occasion, in the company of the gang, he started swearing ‘trying to enter into the spirit of the small talk … [They] came to a momentary halt as they all stopped and looked at me in surprise. Doc shook his head and said: “Bill, you’re not supposed to talk like that. That doesn’t sound like you”.’ Whyte continued: ‘I learned that people did not expect me to be just like them; in fact they were interested and pleased to find me different, just so long as I took a friendly interest in them’ {op. cit., p. 304).

That last quotation expresses the stance very well and is cited to emphasize that falsifying oneself is more likely to create barriers than otherwise. There are exceptions. Patrick’s (1973) role in his study of a Glasgow gang was covert (or at least largely so); but he is not typical.

4. The lack of prior theoretical commitment

One of the most striking things about these sub-cultural ethnographic studies is their atheoretical stance. Patrick describes his research as containing ‘no new theory, no integrating thesis, no synoptic overview of juvenile or gang delinquency’ (Patrick, 1973, p. 155). He cites Merton (1957, p. 93) as calling this type of empirical research ‘post factum sociological interpretation’ where analysis and explanation take place after the observations have been made and where there is no testing of a pre-designated hypothesis. According to Merton such interpretations ‘remain at the level of plau­sibility’ (low evidential value).

Ethnographic research by its very nature is not pre­determined even as to broad direction, let alone its theo­retical orientation. Whyte (1993) describes how he was 18 months in the field before he knew where his research was going. He also challenged the utility of the conventional prior literature review – a problem he had to grapple with in getting his study accepted for a PhD. In the end he pro­duced a review as a conventional appendix but it bore no organic relation to his work.

Taylor’s 1993 literature review in her study of women drug users is conventional (being based on her PhD) but also marks out its irrelevance in the main to the work of an ethnographer studying a very specific group, at least in terms of preparation and orientation.

In Chapter 10 we return to these issues which have major implications for the real-world research process and con­stitute a challenge to conventional academic thinking.

5. ‘Thick description’

If there is a lack of a priori theoretical commitment (in advance of the evidence) that does not mean that interpretation is not one of the aims of ethnographic research. Clarifying the rules governing social behaviour and the social structure of the ‘culture’ being studied are primary aims.

But the starting point is that of meticulous and detailed description – what the American cultural anthropologist Clifford Geertz calls thick description. This term is exemplified in his 1973 book The Interpretation of Cultures. Two points he makes are that it is only by detailed description that one will see what is there: and that such description is basic to interpretation. Such interpretation can only be supported, as a theoretical argument, if the descriptive style ‘takes the reader there’. There may be disagreements about the interpretation but the substantive basis for the theorizing provides a reference point.

In reading ethnographic studies one is struck by the amount of detailed description, typically in a straightforward narrative style, often with extended quotations from indivi­duals in the group being studied; this is characteristic and somehow belies the need for elaborate ‘interpretation’. To a large extent the data are allowed to speak for themselves although it has to be noted that a process of selection is involved in what is presented. An example of this, taken from Patrick’s study of Glasgow gangs, describes the arrival of a district gang leader in a bar.

A slightly-built boy, no taller than five feet eight, was being pointed out even by some of the bar­men. He was dressed in a light-grey suit of the latest fashion, white shirt, and a red tie with a white polka dot and matching handkerchief. His long fair hair was well-groomed, parted just to the left of centre and combed down over his ears. Behind him walked a much taller boy, who looked stronger with broad shoulders and deep chest, wearing a light blue suit and a black casual. In their tour of the bar, Dick [gang leader] led the way, shaking hands with everyone and smiling;

Bob (whose name I learned later) followed behind at a respectful distance … Dick had a few words to say to all members of his gang, refused drink after drink, and accepted the deference of boys and young men much broader and taller than himself. Within twenty minutes they had toured the bar and gone. (Patrick, 1973, p. 44.)

What is immediately evident is that the effort to achieve a clear account of social relations in a specific context results in a good piece of writing. Of course, much descriptive writing in ethnography is much plainer in content: not that this detracts from its significance. Burgess (1983) devotes a section of his book to the informal groupings in the school staff-room with a schematic sketch of where their groups were clustered.

He comments:

I recognized that many of these groups were formed on the basis of the members holding similar positions in the formal organization of the school. None of these groups had an exclusive membership, that is, not all those who sat in the young women’s group were either young or female and, likewise, not all those who sat in the heads of houses group were house heads. How­ever, I have given titles to these groups on the basis of their main members and their recogni­tion by other teachers. (Burgess, 1983, p. 73.)

6. The difficulties of recording

Burgess had the great advantage of overtly (with the knowledge of colleagues) carrying out his research in a setting where making written notes, etc., was a normal activity. When you are engaged in studying gang culture (like Whyte and Patrick) then conspicuous recording may be neither practical nor, indeed (as in Patrick’s case) entirely safe. Ditton (1977), in a study of fiddling and petty theft in a bakery, had recourse to making his notes in the only private place available, and on lavatory paper. Whatever the setting, recording what you have seen and heard needs to be carried out as soon as possible. Very shorthand notes can act as prompts; a recommended procedure using these prompts is to expand them soon after in an audio recording, which then becomes another level of data for analysis. However they are made, these notes need to be made close to the time of the events while memory is still clear and vivid.

Street Comer Society, an ethnographic classic

First published in 1943, in Whyte’s lifetime this classic text ran to four editions and references here are to the 1993 4th edition. For a book of this kind to be re-issued 50 years after its original publication is some kind of testimony to its enduring worth. Of all the studies cited, it is the one which can be designated as essential reading, even if you read no other.

What Whyte did was to live in a slum area of Boston (the Italian quarter) for three years (1938-40) during which time he married and took his wife there: evidently a man of clear priorities. Coming from an advantaged background himself (with a Junior Fellowship from Harvard) he was concerned to understand the sub-culture, particularly the gang culture, of that area about which there were many judgemental opinions and related explanations, but little real knowledge of what living there and being part of that social network was actually like.

He structured his study of the district from the perspective of the gang and members of it who had their own ‘street corner’ – in effect a meeting place, hence the title. The focus is on the social structure of what Whyte called ‘Cor- nerville’ relating it to the gang culture. So such dimensions as different kinds of ‘clubs’, social mobility, politics and racketeering are all approached, and interpreted, in this way.

Whyte sought to achieve the insider perspective and comments (Whyte, 1993, p. xvi): ‘The middle-class person looks upon the slum district as a formidable mass of con­fusion, a social chaos. The insider finds in Comerville a highly organized and integrated social system (emphasis added)’. His stance could therefore be described as ‘appreciative’: but it is an appreciation based on intimate knowledge. The implications of such understanding for social action are discussed in our concluding chapter, and re-appear else­where; but one of the main lessons of studying such sub­cultures is that sound-bite judgements – for example, about drug users – do not stand up to scrutiny.

Here we concentrate on the major contribution Whyte makes to the process of carrying out ethnographic research. In the 1993 edition of his book he includes a section dealing with the evolution of Street Comer Society (Appendix A, pp. 279-373). Going beyond ethnography it is virtually an exposition of a strategy for real-world research-in-context.

He writes:

… I am convinced that the actual evaluation of research ideas does not take place in accord with the formal statements we read on research methods. The ideas grow up in part out of our immersion in the data and out of the whole pro­cess of living. Since so much of this process of analysis proceeds on the unconscious level, I am sure that we can never present a full account, {op. cit₉ p. 280.)

He goes on to describe how his interest in the topic origi­nated and developed: elements typically missing from research reports which conventionally give the explicit ‘logical’ impression of having emerged from a prior study of the research literature. He describes his initial attempts to prepare outlines of his intended research (a typical requirement for funding purposes) and comments: ‘the most impressive thing about them was their remoteness from the actual study I carried out’ (p. 285).

The approach he adopted was that of studying the social organization of the community by observing the patterns of interaction between people – what they did and said in their social relations, what rules or conventions governed their social behaviour. Because this organization was largely informal: ‘Life in Cornerville did not proceed on the basis of formal appointments’ (p. 293), he had to spend a lot of time with the group he was studying and from day to day.

The influence of Whyte’s study can hardly be over­estimated and that is because of the general lessons he provides; it is rare to find a contemporary ethnographic study where it is not included in the bibliography.

A much later criticism of his work which he discusses (pp. 370-2) is that the account is his construction of the ‘truth’. This constructivist perspective is valid to the extent that all knowledge, in the sense of interpretation and explanation including the results of scientific experiments, is a matter of choice. Whyte, with characteristic reasonableness, says that it reduces to the argument whether ‘my “truth” is better than your “truth” ’ (p. 371).

When you have read the book you can form your own judgement.

7. Urban ethnography: two studies

Here we review two studies carried out in the city of Glasgow, both of which have been cited earlier: Patrick’s 1973 account of a juvenile gang and Taylor’s 1993 study of female intra­venous drug users. Both exemplify the challenges and opportunities awaiting the urban ethnographer. In reading them you come to see the distinctive character of this kind of study: like no other in social research.

The over-powering impression – and it is a seductive one – is of the vivid reality of the material obtained. As one comes to appreciate the commitment involved, in terms of time and coverage, it is easy to understand why such data are scarce; and why society in general so little understands those sub-cultures that exist within it.

Glasgow gangs

Patrick’s study is unusual. Working as a young teacher (and looking younger than his age) in what was then known as an ‘approved school’ he struck up a friendship with one of the older boys, Tim, who invited him to ‘come and see for himself what the gangs were like on the next weekend leave (a usual arrangement at that time); an invitation that with some misgivings he took up.

He describes his investigation as:

… a descriptive account of a participant obser­vation study of one such gang between October 1966 and January 1967. In all I spent just under 120 hours in the field; and as my involvement with the gang deepened, so the hours lengthened, until towards the end of January I was in the company of the gang during one weekend from seven o’clock on Friday evening until six on Sunday morning. (Patrick, 1973, p. 9.)

His research was covert in the sense that he did not identify himself as a researcher but as a friend of Tim’s from the approved school who was there for housebreaking. Any doubts as to the ethical stance involved are removed as one reads his account of a culture so violent and dangerous that concealment was the only possible strategy; and not without its risks even then. So, although the amount of fieldwork was limited, it is remarkable that it was obtained at all. Patrick’s time in the field was curtailed because of the threat of vio­lence to him (because he’d avoided participation in a weekend gang war).

Not the least of its illuminating qualities is the perspective it offers on the institutions of society; as for example a time when he was taken into custody by the police:

The police quickly realized that I had no infor­mation to give them, and so, finally, they told me to empty my pockets. The moment I put my hands into my trouser pockets to comply with the order, I was punched in the back by one police­man and kicked from behind by another as I fell.

After a few more punches and kicks, the police withdrew and the door was locked, (p. 58)

An incidental benefit of this episode was that it validated his acceptance by the gang.

Female drug users

Taylor’s study had its own share of dangers, a concern that recurs throughout the book; in fact, no harm came to her, which was a subject of remark.

Her research was more intensive than Patrick’s; she recounts how for 15 months she spent most of her days, and many nights, participating in and observing the activities of a group of female injecting drug users in Glasgow. Since she was a married woman with children this shows exceptional dedication arising out of her high level of motivation. She observed 50 such women during this period and with 26 of them carried out in-depth unstructured interviews at the end of the project.

Taylor’s stance was ‘appreciative’ in the sense that she sought not just to observe but to understand the women’s behaviour by exploring the meaning they attached to what they did. Without promoting any notion that drug-taking was a ‘good thing’ she argued that:

… against the stereotypical view of pathetic, inadequate individuals, women drug users in this study are shown to be rational, active people making decisions based on the contingencies of their drug-using careers and their roles and status in society. Such an approach also allows the ordinariness as well as the more deviant aspects of their lives to be seen, showing that women drug users have many of the same concerns, fears and hopes as other women. (Taylor, 1993, p. 8.)

Although both studies were radically different in focus there were several common features distinctive to this kind of fieldwork research.

Sponsors and key informants

These are critical to gaining access to the group under study, as previously noted in the case of ‘Doc’ in Street Comer Society (Whyte, 1993) and Tim in Patrick’s 1973 study. They are often one and the same. The sponsor validates you and gives you entry: while the key informant answers your questions and generally keeps you briefed and aware. As in Taylor’s case this last group may comprise several people. Her sponsor was a local drug worker in the area who was known to, and trusted by, the women. He was able to introduce the first couple of contacts and accompanied her on these occasions. Making more contacts was a slow business at first but gradually, as she became known and accepted (Are you the woman who is interested in women junkies ?), so the study group expanded. But there was a nucleus of eight women who were her key informants with whom she could raise questions and seek clarification.

8. ‘Speaking for themselves’

An obvious criticism of an ethnographer (to be discussed more fully later) is that she/he is interpreting, selecting and so constructing the ‘reality’ presented. Straight but com­prehensive description of events is one strand to counter this (legitimate) objection; reporting spontaneous speech is another. Patrick (1973, p. 16) writes: ‘Whenever possible, I shall let events and characters speak for themselves’. Taylor takes an identical stance (1993, p. 7): ‘Much of the text allows the women to speak for themselves, describing from their point of view the lifestyles which have evolved round their use of illicit drugs’.

Interestingly, although Taylor and Patrick were bom and bred in Glasgow they found the rapid patter in the broad accent of the groups they were studying something of a problem (Taylor, p. 14; Patrick, p. 15) and both found it necessary to ask their informants what particular words meant and to include a glossary in their books.

In the contexts in which both of these researchers were working, on-the-spot note-making was out of the question. Taylor is particularly clear in this respect, but found that by writing up her experiences at the end of each day she could recall detail better than she expected. However, most of the direct quotation came from extended interviews with some of the women at the end of her study.

9. Risk-taking

As noted above, Patrick had to curtail his investigation because of the threat of physical violence; he certainly wit­nessed a great deal. He was a witness also in a different sense, that of seeing criminal activity in which he might be seen as complicit.

Taylor (op. cit., p. 20) had a similar concern that ‘remained with me throughout the fieldwork [which] arose from the illegal nature of much of the information I came across’. On only one occasion did she find herself in actual physical danger ‘from a mentally disturbed drug user who was stabbing people who merely spoke or even looked at him’. She did, however, take precautions, first in her choice of area to work, not giving her home address and making her telephone number ex-directory. But, as she became more confident and ‘accepted’ she took what might be regarded as risks, on occasion being alone with drug-users, male and female. Real-world research such as this does involve risks because that is what parts of our society are like.

These two studies have been outlined here mainly in terms of their procedure: the roughly generalizable lessons to be gained from them. They are strongly recommended for further reading because the detailed sense of what urban ethnography is like requires this kind of thoughtful reading – summaries and quotations are not enough.

It is first-hand experience that brings these lessons into sharp focus. The next chapter describes some current work of the author on street-begging in Glasgow.

Source: Gillham Bill (2008), Observation Techniques: Structured to Unstructured, Continuum; Illustrated edition.