We see that javascript is disabled or not supported by your browser - javascript is needed for important actions on the site. Read more

What's New - Home - Login

Member $avings: $81,751,507.49 | Books Available: 730,470 | Members Online: 182

Swap Used Books - Buy New Books at Great Prices!

How To Swap Books Sign Up Search submenu

PBS Market (New Books)

Gift Buying Guide

Book Browser Advanced Search Books Posted Today Member Book Reviews Award Winning Books NYT Best Sellers Amazon Best Sellers Most Traveled Copies Club Wish List

Discussion Forums Book Lists

Club Lists My Book Lists My Watched Lists Create a List

Blog Donations

School Donation Program In Memory of... Military Donation Program Friends of PBS

Box-O-Books Maps The Eclectic Pen Fun Stuff

20 Questions Sudoku Bookmark Creator

Top 100

Requests Posts Swappers Referrers Reviewers

Pulse of PBS Spread The Word

Invite Friends Bookmarks Facebook Page Facebook App More Ways...

Photo Gallery Recipes Club Tag Cloud Member Testimonials

Help Center submenu

How To Swap Books Browse Help Docs Ask the Librarian PBS Member Icons Live Help

Kiosk

PBS Market (New Books) Go Shopping Buy Credits Buy PBS Money Upgrade Membership Gift Certificates Transfer Credits

Need Help?

Search - Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes (Chicago Guides to Writing, Editing, and Publishing)

Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes - Chicago Guides to Writing, Editing, and Publishing
Author: Robert M. Emerson, Rachel I. Fretz, Linda L. Shaw

In this companion volume John van Maanen's Tales of the Field, three scholars reveal how the ethnographer turns direct experience and observation into written fieldnotes upon which an ethnography is based. — Drawing on years of teaching and field research experience, the authors develop a series of guidelines, suggestions, and practical ad... more »vice about how to write useful fieldnotes in a variety of settings, both cultural and institutional. Using actual unfinished, "working" notes as examples, they illustrate options for composing, reviewing, and working fieldnotes into finished texts. They discuss different organizational and descriptive strategies, including evocation of sensory detail, synthesis of complete scenes, the value of partial versus omniscient perspectives, and of first person versus third person accounts. Of particular interest is the author's discussion of notetaking as a mindset. They show how transforming direct observations into vivid descriptions results not simply from good memory but more crucially from learning to envision scenes as written. A good ethnographer, they demonstrate, must learn to remember dialogue and movement like an actor, to see colors and shapes like a painter, and to sense moods and rhythms like a poet.

The authors also emphasize the ethnographer's core interest in presenting the perceptions and meanings which the people studied attach to their own actions. They demonstrate the subtle ways that writers can make the voices of people heard in the texts they produce. Finally, they analyze the "processing" of fieldnotes--the practice of coding notes to identify themes and methods for selecting and weaving together fieldnote excerpts to write a polished ethnography.

This book, however, is more than a "how-to" manual. The authors examine writing fieldnotes as an interactive and interpretive process in which the researcher's own commitments and relationships with those in the field inevitably shape the character and content of those fieldnotes. They explore the conscious and unconscious writing choices that produce fieldnote accounts. And they show how the character and content of these fieldnotes inevitably influence the arguments and analyses the ethnographer can make in the final ethnographic tale.

This book shows that note-taking is a craft that can be taught. Along with Tales of the Field and George Marcus and Michael Fisher's Anthropology as Cultural Criticism, Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes is an essential tool for students and social scientists alike.

ISBN-13: 9780226206813
ISBN-10: 0226206815
Publication Date: 8/15/1995
Pages: 272
Rating:

Currently 3.4/5 Stars.

3.4 stars, based on 5 ratings

Publisher: University Of Chicago Press
Book Type: Paperback
Other Versions: Hardcover
Reviews: Member | Amazon | Write a Review

Read All 1 Book Reviews of "Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes Chicago Guides to Writing Editing and Publishing"

Please Log in to Rate these Book Reviews

Jigna P. reviewed Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes (Chicago Guides to Writing, Editing, and Publishing) on 1/17/2006 + 13 more book reviews

great book that goes over ethnographies with many very interesting examples.

Share/Like this Review?

Read All Book Reviews of "Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes Chicago Guides to Writing Editing and Publishing"

Genres:

Reference >> Words, Language & Grammar >> Rhetoric
Nonfiction >> Education >> General
Nonfiction >> Education >> Pedagogy
Nonfiction >> Social Sciences >> Anthropology >> Cultural

Back to the Top ↑

Search - Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes (Chicago Guides to Writing, Editing, and Publishing)

Please Log in to Rate these Book Reviews

Loading...