Book review
Organizational Ethnography: Studying the Complexities of Everyday Life
Article Type: Book Review From: Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management: An International Journal, Volume 6, Issue 1.
Sierk Ybema, Dvora Yanow, Harry Wels, and Frans KamsteegSage Publications2009
Review DOI 10.1108/17465641111130478
The purpose of this book is to highlight the advantages of doing ethnographic work in organizations while problematizing the practice of organizational ethnography. Essentially, it is argued that ethnography is an approach to examining organizations that is likely to illuminate aspects of everyday life which might be missed when using other methodological approaches. According to the authors, this book was written to appeal primarily to those doing“organizational ethnography” but in defining organizations broadly their intent was to be relevant to a variety of disciplines as well as academics and practitioners at varying levels of experience.
Overall, the book takes an interpretive and reflexive approach to ethnography and is structured in three parts. The first is concerned with the issues involved in carrying out ethnographic fieldwork and writing it up; the second with the tensions that can arise from being immersed in the field; and the third with the ethical, political and social issues associated with being close to research respondents. Though divided into these sections I did not found this particular grouping of chapters to be intuitively appealing as the titles of the sub-parts did not provide much insight into the content of the chapters. Thus, I will review the chapters a bit out of order as it seems some of the chapters develop a similar message.
Using examples from their own work the authors of Chapters 1 and 9 highlighted common dilemmas that ethnographers might experience along the way. Chapter 1 by van der Waal is an introduction to doing ethnography in which van der Waal provides the reader advice on how to get going on a new research project while highlighting common pitfalls at the start of new projects. Using examples from research completed in South Africa, van der Waal makes suggestions for how to deal with common methodological problems such as gaining access,tracing relationships and following events. Essentially, he argues that researchers need to develop a clear understanding of their theoretical perspective before getting started on a project but in doing so ensure they retain a flexible approach so that they can turn unexpected difficulties into opportunities for discovery. Chapter 9 by Fine and Shulman focuses more specifically on common myths in doing ethnography or what they refer to as “lies from the field”. In this chapter the authors' use examples from their own work to try to make explicit some of the ethical issues inherent in lies that are told in doing ethnography with the point being that researchers will always tell some lies but the more clear we are about the trade-offs we are making in(re)presenting others' reality, the more we can grow and improve as a discipline.
Chapters 2, 5 and 6 are must-reads as they offer novel insights and suggestions to common paradoxes confronted when doing ethnography. Chapter 2 by Humphreys and Watson discusses aspects of writing ethnography by highlighting the need to be a good craftsman. Essentially, the authors in this chapter used a series of examples from their own work to illustrate how narratives can fall within a spectrum of more or less true. In so doing, they demonstrated how different techniques might be used to construct a narrative that confronts a common ethical dilemma of needing to include enough details in your account to offer a persuasive and convincing message for your audience without compromising your research participants' anonymity. Chapter 5, by Ybema and Kamsteeg broaches the tricky topic of how to “distance” oneself from research when constantly confronted with the less than remarkable aspects of everyday organizational life. Again the authors use examples of published work to demonstrate how techniques such as “holding on to the mystery”. “looking for the irrational” and using irony and playfulness might help ethnographers retain their ability to make the familiar strange. Chapter 6, by Nicolini is also written in a manner that highlights a common challenge in doing ethnographic work. In this chapter,Nicolini suggests a method of data collection, zooming-in and zooming-out, which researchers can use to balance the need to attend to details while still understanding what those details mean in their larger context. Using examples from his own research, Nicolini provides suggestions for how to determine when it is time to look more or less closely at practices in order to gain an understanding of the phenomenon of interest that is both situated and relevant.
Chapter 3 is about crafting a persuasive manuscript, “textwork”, and the need to consider evaluative criteria throughout the research process. In this chapter, Schwartz-Shea and Yanow draw upon a number of established criteria for fieldwork and deskwork (i.e. analysis) to create criteria for good textwork. However, in doing so it appears that there are no boundaries for what one can or should include in the text. What could have made this chapter more helpful is if the authors had identified some strategies they have found effective in making the trade-offs that come from having to narrow down the data in writing the text without comprising their ability to persuasively convey that the research is trustworthy.
The last six chapters (Chapters 4, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12) seem to convey a quite similar message: ethnographers should participate more in the field. Chapter 11 by Sykes and Treleaven suggests that action research and ethnographic research have a lot in common. While the authors of this chapter make the case for doing“third-person action research” one cannot help but be struck by the similarity of action-research in general and calls in the other five chapters of the book. According to the authors of Chapter 11, “first-person action research” is doing research on an organization of which you are a part. This seems to be the same thing as doing an “at-home ethnography” as introduced by Alvesson in Chapter 8. Additionally, it seems to be quite similar to the Moeran's call in Chapter 7 to become an observant participator where the researcher takes on an active role in the organization. Down and Hughes' call in Chapter 4 for “co-producing”ethnographic texts seems to be very similar to “second-person action research”where participants are co-producers of the inquiry. Likewise, Beech, Hibbert,MacIntosh, and McInnes' focus in Chapter 10 on dealing with friendships in the field seems to convey the message that friends, either made in the field or before entering the field, are prime candidates to take on the role of co-producing knowledge. “Third-person action research” is seemingly related to Ghorashi and Wels' effort in Chapter 12 to persuade others to engage in or foster change. Consequently, it seems an unmentioned theme of the book is that ethnographers should learn from action researchers. Generally, I think each of these chapters provides an interesting point of view and each is likely to be useful in different situations. However, I am a bit wary that there is such a one sided push for taking on the methods used in action research without a more well-rounded look at when each of these techniques might be more or less valuable.
In sum, after reading this collection of chapters that embraces an inclusive definition of what doing ethnography comprises, I walked away with the perspective that ethnography can be many things to many people as long as the ethnographer gains firsthand experience of the organization under study and uses multiple methods to collect data. What I enjoyed most about this book was the editors' efforts to compile a collection of chapters that highlight how ethnographers must develop an “ethnographic sensibility” running through all aspects of ethnography (i.e. fieldwork, analysis and writing). Since this sensibility requires transforming tacitly known insights that are often difficult to put into words, the effort to provide examples of how others have dealt with problems in the field was both helpful and consistent with the overall theme of the book. In fact, all but three chapters (Chapters 3, 8, 11)provided powerful examples enabling the reader to further develop their own sensibility. This method of “showing” how others have dealt with problems in the field, I believe, is useful for bringing the interpretive aspect of ethnographies to the fore.
While I appreciated the book's general “ethnographic sensibility” theme, the array of resources offered in terms of ethnographic work, and the discussion of the many issues that ethnographers face in carrying out their research, I found the overall organization of the chapters confusing and at times even frustrating. Generally, I thought there was an opportunity to make a more logical and integrated argument. For example, it appeared that six of the chapters were arguing for a more “participatory” or “engaged” approaches to ethnography, and it would be helpful to readers less familiar with ethnography to have synthesized these chapters and perhaps brought out some of the similarities and differences between the approaches. For example, how does critical action research (Chapter 11) compare to co-producing ethnography(Chapter 4) and at-home ethnography (Chapter 8)? Also, while the editors do situate the book within a “not so hostile” readership, getting interpretive ethnography published in mainstream journals can be problematic and thus discourage researchers – especially junior researchers – from engaging in ethnographic work. It would therefore be helpful to offer some ideas about how to situate one's ethnographic work in relation to less sympathetic readers.
Overall, I found the book fairly interesting and useful. Since there is no set of rules, or even rules of thumb, for doing ethnographies I found the range of chapters to be a good way of showing how a number of experienced ethnographers have dealt with common problems in the field.
Maria GondoUniversity of New Mexico, Albuquerque New Mexico, USA
