Page 94 - Culture Media Language Working Papers in Cultural Studies

ETHNOGRAPHY 83

range of particular techniques to be drawn upon according to our theoretical
needs. Within its spectrum the following techniques can be specified:
participation
observation
participation as observer

observation as participant
just ‘being around’
group discussion

recorded group discussion
unfocused interview
recorded unfocused interview.

It is clearly misleading to think of these techniques as constituting one blanket
methodology. Techniques lower down this list, for example, are more likely to
be applied to a phenomenon from the past (cf. the development of ‘oral history’).
A particular strength can be gained by a more self-conscious combination of
methods, where different modes of data collection, used at different times, give
important cross-checks, as well as indicating the particular layered configuration
of important contradictions. All of these techniques are relevant to the principles
of ‘qualitative’ methodology, and each should be rigorously thought through in
its particular research context.

Conclusion

Traditional sociology, then, provides a useful starting-point. But we must submit
its methods to a rigorous screening to make explicit the denied theoretical
account and to remove the hidden tendency towards positivism. We must liberate
the whole notion of ‘methodology’ and argue, finally, for a recognition of the
reflexive relationship of researchers to their subjects.