The New Language of Qualitative Method

by Gubrium, Jaber F.; Holstein, James A.

• ISBN13: 9780195099942
• ISBN10: 019509994X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1997-03-13
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

In recent years scholars and researchers in all disciplines have moved away from traditional quantitative methods of research to more qualitative methods which emphasize questions of meaning and interpretation. Considering research methodologies as a set of idioms, The New Language of Qualitative Method examines alternate vocabularies for conveying social reality. It offers a new theoretical view which reintegrates the traditional emphasis on the whats of social life with a contemporary understanding of the hows and whys. The text considers the basic presumptions, objectives, and research questions of four major research traditions: naturalism, ethnomethodology, emotionalism, and postmodernism. Using illustrations from classic texts, it shows how each idiom supplies a unique perspective on empirical reality. The text then examines the risks and rewards of each approach, offering a vision of a renewed language of inquiry that accommodates both traditional and contemporary concerns. Striving for balance, the authors not only contend with issues from alternate perspectives, but provide a basis for rapprochement between research traditions that have often remained isolated from each other. They also demonstrate how each approach may be used for research on family, aging, deviance and social problems, and organizations and institutions. Written in an accessible and engaging style, The New Language of Qualitative Method can be adopted in courses across the social sciences, and may also be used by a broad spectrum of qualitative researchers.

Table of Contents

Preface	vii
Introduction
Method Talk	3	(16)
Varieties of Method Talk
Common Threads
Leading Questions
PART I: IDIOMS OF QUALITATIVE INQUIRY
Naturalism	19	(19)
``Being There''
``Their Worlds''
``Their Own Stories''
A Tradition of Guidelines
Ethnomethodology	38	(19)
The Roots of Ethnomethodology
Bracketing Social Realities
Ethnomethodological Description
The Talk of How
Emotionalism	57	(18)
The Tone of Emotionalist Method Talk
A Field of Emotion
Creative Interviewing
The Emotional Fieldworker
Reenacting Emotionality
Postmodernism	75	(22)
Expressions of Postmodernism
Studying Cinematic Society
Psychoanalytic Reading
Confronting the Crisis of Representation
Postmodernistic Representation
PART II: RENEWING THE LANGUAGE
Analytic Choices	97	(26)
Where Do We Go from Here?
At the Lived Border of Reality and Representation
Enduring Risks
What Are the Options?
Choosing an Analytic Vocabulary
Analyzing Interpretive Practice
The ``Artful'' Side of Interpretive Practice	123	(38)
Conversational Structure and Interactional Competencies
Constitutive Description
Narrative Practice
Conditions of Interpretation	161	(34)
Goffman as a Point of Departure
Contingencies of Circumstance
Interpretive Resources
Local Culture
Institutional Sites/Sights of Local Culture
The Comparative Ethnography of Interpretive Practice
Explanation and Deprivatization	195	(20)
Emerging Explanatory Footings
Deprivatization and Interpretation
Diversity and Deprivatization
Reflexively Reasserting the Common Threads
Notes	215	(10)
References	225	(14)
Name Index	239	(4)
Subject Index	243