Critical Ethnography: Method, Ethics, and Performance / Edition 3

by D. Soyini Madison

Overview

What is critical ethnography? How do we use theory to interpret research data? What is performance ethnography? You can find answers to these fundamental questions in D. Soyini Madison's engaging and highly multidisciplinary Third Edition of Critical Ethnography: Methods, Ethics, and Performance.

The book presents a fresh new look at critical ethnography by emphasizing the significance of ethics and performance in the art and politics of fieldwork. The productive links between theory and method are celebrated in this title. Theoretical concepts range from queer theory, feminist theory, and critical race theory to Marxism and phenomenology. The methodological techniques range from designing and asking in-depth interview questions and developing rapport to coding and interpreting data. The various theories and methods culminate in three fictional ethnographic case studies that "enact" the interdependence between theory and method and the significance of social theory, ethics, and performance.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781483356778
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
Publication date:	03/08/2019
Edition description:	Third Edition
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

D. Soyini Madison is professor of Performance Studies and Anthropology, and served as Interim Director of the Program in African Studies at Northwestern University. She is the author of Acts of Activism: Human Rights as Radical Performance (2010, Cambridge UP) and the co-editor with Judith Hamera of the SAGE Handbook of Performance Studies (2006, SAGE). Madison lived in West Africa as a Senior Fulbright Scholar and has conducted field research over the past ten years on the performance tactics of local human rights activists in Ghana.

Table of Contents

Preface
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1 • Introduction to Critical Ethnography: Theory and Method
Defining Terms: What Is the Critical in Critical Ethnography?
Dialogue: Virtues and Challenges
The Method and Theory Nexus
Key Terms
Warm-Ups
Chapter 2 • Methods: “Do I Really Need a Method?” A Method . . . or Deep Hanging Out?
“Who Am I?” Starting Where You Are
“Who Else Has Written About My Topic?” Being a Part of an Interpretive Community
The Power of Purpose: Bracketing Your Subject
Preparing for the Field: The Research Design and Lay Summary
The Interview
Formulating Questions
Questions to Get Started: Experience, Opinions, Feelings, and the Senses
Creativity, Questions, and Three Favorites
Memory and the Oral History Interview
Rapport: How and What Is This Between Us?
Coding and Logging Data
A Biomimetics of Ethnography
Warm-Ups
Chapter 3 • Three Stories: Case Studies in Critical Ethnography
Case 1: Local Activism in West Africa
Case 2: Secrets, Sexuality, and Oral History
Case 3: Community Theatre: Conflicts and Organization
Warm-Ups
Chapter 4 • Ethics
Ethics Is . . .
Ethics, Faith, and Environmental Activism
The Question of Freedom
Maria Lugones: Contemporary Ethics, Ethnography, and Loving Perception
Summary
Warm-Ups
Chapter 5 • Methods and Application: Three Case Studies in Ethical Dilemmas
Case 1: Local Activism in West Africa
Case 2: Secrets, Sexuality, and Oral History
Case 3: Community Theatre: Conflicts and Organization
Warm-Ups
Chapter 6 • Performance and Performed Ethnography
Foundational Concepts in Performance and Social Theory
Utopian Performatives
The Performance Interventions of Dwight Conquergood
Staging Ethnography as Performed Ethnography
Autoethnography and/or Reflexive Ethnography
Autoethnography in Performance as Critical Reflections
Warm-Ups
Chapter 7 • It’s Time to Write: Writing as Performance
Getting Started: In Search of the Muse
The Anxiety of Writing: Wild Mind and Monkey Mind
Writing as Performance and Performance as Writing
Warm-Ups
Chapter 8 • The Case Studies
Case 1: Staging Cultural Performance
Case 2: Oral History and Performance
Case 3: Fieldwork and Social Drama
Warm-Ups
References
Index
About the Author

Editorial Reviews

This book is indispensable. No other book shows the essential connections between method and ethics so clearly and effectively. It is as much an essential introduction to ethnography as it is an enticing invitation to a way of being in the world with others.”

Della Pollock

D. Soyini Madison’s work is the keystone of ethical performance ethnography where all practices in the field and on the stage are grounded in enfleshed theories of embodiment. The third edition of Critical Ethnography continues this scholarly foundation by offering emergent strategies to guide us through troubling times and into spaces and places of hope and possibilities.”

Tami Spry

Critical Ethnography is, without question, the go-to guide, practically and philosophically, for anyone interested in serious discussions about ethnography's ethical, political, and epistemological implications. Madison's thoughtful and compelling book has long been central to the ways in which I work with my graduate students and undergraduates on the benefits and challenges of thinking ethnographically, and this 3rd edition makes her classic offering all the more relevant for newer audiences. I look forward to assigning it in courses!”

John L. Jackson

The latest edition of Critical Ethnography exemplifies D. Soyini Madison¹s exemplary ability to combine rigorous theorizing and principled field pragmatics. From its expansive discussions of ethics and handling difficult interviews to its deeply generative examinations of mindfulness in the field and multi-sensory storytelling using a variety of aesthetic modes, this book is an essential guide for critical interdisciplinary qualitative researchers at all levels. It is both a toolkit and an inspiration.”

Judith Hamera

This remains the book I wish I had written. It is grounded in fieldwork and theoretically inclusive from Conquergood to Turner, Spry to Schechner, Pollock to Pelias, Boal to Bakhtin, auto ethnography to critical performance ethnography. Politics, ethics, action, memory, biopolitics, performative writing, the global, inquiry as praxis, it is all here.”

Norman Denzin

"Critical Ethnography is a passionate, wise, and wonderful book – even more commanding and evocative in its second edition, which adds new research examples, emerging moments in critical autoethnographies, and perfomative writing. In Madison’s vision, doing fieldwork seeps into and stretches out the lived world that we inhabit with others, a world where our studies make a difference to do more – or less — good for participants. She tells rich and layered stories as case studies of the bodies and dialogues and situations that anchor theoretical options, ethical choices, and consequential actions. This accessible and eminently teachable text presents pragmatic advice at the same time it probes complex dilemmas in doing critical ethnography. It does not offer simple solutions and easy exits but neither does it overwhelm and paralyze. Especially, it inspires possibilities for researching, writing, and performing ethnographic knowledge that can make a better world for all. Read it if you’re new to ethnography; read it if you’re seasoned. It can make a difference. "

 

Kristen Langellier

"I would strongly recommend this book for use in any course that explores the role of critical analysis in research. For anthropology and gerontology students, this book thoughtfully discusses and teaches about trying to understand the meanings attributed by others in regard to their expertise."

Amy Paul-Ward