CfP - Speaking more broadly: Adapting anthropological concepts for a broader audience

Following up on our previous post, AAA in San Jose - Anthropological Concepts for Non-Anthropologists, Jennifer and I would like to take this opportunity to circulate a call for papers for our proposed AAA panel. We hope that this panel will be a launching pad for the new kind of anthropological handbook we have been imagining over the past year or so.

So, without further ado, here's our call! If you are interested in participating in this panel/ project, please get in touch with us by April 12th.

Call for Papers  |  Speaking more broadly: 

Adapting anthropological concepts for a broader audience

 

Panel for AAA 2018 Annual Meeting in San Jose, CA:

“Change in the Anthropological Imagination”

For questions or to submit an abstract for consideration, please email Jennifer Long (longjen@mcmaster.ca) and Rhiannon Mosher (rhmosher@yorku.ca) by April 12th.

In this panel, we seek to identify, contextualize and ‘translate’ anthropological concepts and constructs for a broader audience. This year's conference organizers ask anthropologists to write about holism, social change, resistance, resilience, and adaptation in the contemporary moment, and to recognize the importance of discussions about species, societies, reorganization, transformation and stasis. We invite anthropologists to take this challenge literally.

                                                                    

This CfP seeks authors who wish to break down the organizers' questions into their sum of parts in an effort to consider: how other disciplines, our applied experiences, and interdisciplinary partnerships inform our discussions. We want to know how we can tap anthropological experiences and perspectives to engage and educate a wider public? We seek to understand specifically how an anthropological vocabulary shapes and frames the field and our practices with our partners, interlocutors, and colleagues. Further, we want to better understand the ways in which anthropological understandings are understood, changed, and integrated into new contexts.

This proposed panel is a response to calls like Ryan Anderson's (2013) post (on the blog now known as Anthro{dendum}) to break the closed loop in which anthropologists often work. Anderson argues that anthropologists often end up speaking (just/ only) to one another about our work – all the while, this cacophony of anthropological insight remains locked behind closed doors. In our current sociopolitical context, and with more and more of our graduates working outside of the academy in interdisciplinary contexts, learning how to "get involved, to collaborate, to find ways to communicate and bring the ideas of anthropology to wider issues and conversations" (2013) should be the discipline's priority.

While the irony of calling for papers at the Annual Meeting on the topic of breaking open the closed loop of anthropological discussions is not lost on the panel organizers, we seek to create a resource which situates various anthropological concepts historically within our discipline, and then contextualizes these concepts in their new, renewed, and revised contexts. Importantly, each concept or term should be explained through a case study, an experience from the field, with researchers from different disciplines or through original research. It should be noted that this call is open to anthropologists in all four fields. The goal of this panel is to jump-start the draft for a text where various concepts are discussed using to be used by students, practicing and interdisciplinary colleagues.

Therefore, panel organizers seek papers that define, describe, and compare anthropological concepts used in practice, past experience, in industry (e.g. ethnography in user design or market research) or other disciplines (e.g. other social sciences, hard sciences or technology, engineering or math). Panelists should define the term in plain language, provide a brief history of its origin and use, then elucidate on the term using a case study from fieldwork, in conversation with non-anthropologists, and the workplace.

For questions or to submit an abstract for consideration, please email

Jennifer Long (longjen@mcmaster.ca) and Rhiannon Mosher (rhmosher@yorku.ca)

by April 12th.

Precarity in Canadian Academia... A Working Bibliography

Unfortunately, precarity in academia has become a well-worn cliché... not least of all for those of us living in this state of ontological insecurity.

In Canada, most university labourers -- whether tenured faculty, adjuncts, teaching, lab, or research assistants, librarians, as well as service staff -- are often protected by a labour union, yet we still face the challenges of the neoliberal university. This year, many unions in Ontario, for instance, bargained to renew our contracts. York University is currently poised on the precipice of a strike as the university admin and the contract academic labourers responsible for approximately 60% of teaching struggle to agree to a fair deal by the end of this week.

It's therefore very timely that we share anthropologist, Dr. Deidre Rose's Working Bibliography on Precarious Academic Labour in Canada.

Writing from her position as a member of what is becoming known as the precariat -- here describing adjunct, sessional, and other temporary academic labourers -- Rose invites others to help add to her years of research "on the conditions of contingent faculty." 

This annotated bibliography adds to the growing research and reflection on precarity in academia, and in anthropology, and is an important resource for thinking and teaching about the current state of academic labour.

Do you have resources or publications to add to Rose's bibliography, or our post? Follow Rose's Research Gate link to connect with her project, or tweet (@anthrolens) or email (anthrolens@gmail.com) us to add to our links below!

Quick links and further reading:

Precarity in the Canadian context:

• Dr. Deidre Rose's Working Bibliography on Precarious Academic Labour in Canada.
• The Network for Precarious Anthropologists is a closed FaceBook group started by Canadian anthropologists "in recognition that there are a growing number of Canadian anthropologists who find themselves in precarious circumstances with limited or know employment security, [as] a network for precarious anthropologists in order to facilitate solidarity and communication, and opportunities to work through, together, the common (and uncommon) issues that we face."
• The Precarity issue of CASCA's Culture Newsletter (Spring 2015) - gives a good sense of some of the issues facing universities and anthropologists in the Canadian context

Precarity in American anthropology:

• Academic Precarity in American Anthropology: A Forum - a series of open-access articles from Cultural Anthropology.

Women's Career Pathways in Academia: From Leaky Pipeline to Rube Goldberg Machine

In 2016, Aileen Fyfe, Ineke De Moortel and Sharon Ashbrook of St. Andrew's College in Scotland wrote Academic Women Now: experiences of mid-career academic women in Scotland.

In this and more recently in an opinion article for Times Higher Education magazine, author Fyfe addresses her and her colleague's recent efforts to understand women's careers in academia. They argue that the leaky pipeline - understood as a metaphor to describe the dwindling proportion of women in higher levels of seniority - is an incomplete analogy to understand these women's experiences.

Their population included women with children as well as child-free women; some are in long-term relationships, and some are not; some are maintaining long-distance relationships, and some have suffered the breakdown of their relationships; some are in their thirties and others are nearing retirement; some have had serious health problems; some have had careers outside academia; and a significant minority are currently working part time (in a surprising variety of ways).

The authors found that these women's [c]areers [did] not all flow along a single pipeline, or at the same pace. Women (and men) do not drift along, transported automatically from point A to point B by some force outside themselves: they work, they struggle, they get creative, and they improvise. And far from a single pipeline, there are clearly many different paths through academia.

As for the kinds of challenges that feature in their participants lives, the authors identified caring responsibilities, about impostor syndrome, about work-life balance and about promotion. We also noticed that “balancing” is not just a matter of “work” and “life”: our women refer to the challenges of dealing with the competing aspects of academic life, and with increasing responsibilities as the nature of the job changes over time and with seniority. 

In light of Fyfe's findings, perhaps the Rube Goldberg Machine is a better analogy to understand women's experiences within academia than those pipelines of the past.

New Advice for Grad Students page: Conferences

In October 2017, we published a series of posts on essential conferencing skills. We started with a post about how to write an effective abstract or organize a successful poster session, and from there we developed a full series of posts just in time for the AAA meetings.

Now, with the joint Canadian Anthropology Association (CASCA) and Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) annual meeting for 2018 on the horizon we have conferences on our minds again! (Check out this year's preliminary program here...)

While we do have a handy #conference tag for general navigation, we thought it might be helpful to group this series of tips on conferencing together on a dedicated page on the blog... and where better than in our Advice for Grad Students series?

Presenting our new Advice for Grad Students | Conferences page!

So, whether you are an old hand at conferences, a student-adviser, or a grad student new to the conference scene, we hope that you find these posts useful!  These posts offer tips on how to prepare for a conference, moderate and chair panels, as well as participate well in discussions and network during receptions and other conference events.

Happy conferencing!

Are you a grad student or prospective grad student wondering about job prospects, professional development strategies, writing tips, or wellness? If so, check out our pages on these topics for more advice and resources.

Ethnography & Case Study Research: Saying yes to the project

Over the past few Mondays, we have been posting on the recent case-study research project I worked on with OCWI. Working with OCWI on this short-term project was an opportunity

• to learn more about research approaches that complement ethnography (Program Evaluation and Case-Study Research), and 
• to rethink some the skills already in my research toolkit, but not in my methods vocabulary, e.g. "grey literature."

In this post, I want to reflect on one more unexpected learning opportunity that came out of this experience: what it means to say "yes" to a new project.

What did it look like to say "yes"?

Interestingly, I hadn't applied to OCWI for this research contract. In fact, I had applied to the organization a few months earlier for a different research role, and had OCWI keep my resume on file. So, when I got an email from my future supervisor at OCWI about this position, it was unexpected, and at the time I wasn't sure if I would be able to juggle more work with my already busy teaching schedule.

Even so, I felt like it was important to meet for an interview to network, learn more about the organization, and learn about the proposed project. I left for the meeting telling myself that I would probably have to turn down the opportunity, but it would be good to "show my face" and let this organization know I was interested and had important skills and experience to offer.

In the meeting, as soon as I heard what the project would be about... I was sold.

Not only was the program I was asked to write a case study on reflective of my previous research interests and areas of expertise, but it was also a chance to gain valuable work experience with this research network, and to actually do field research again -- after years of writing my dissertation, and then the time-consuming teaching duties entailed in preparing new courses year after year.

I immediately began calculating how many hours I could squeeze out of my week, and weighing whether or not I could realistically complete this work to the high standard I would want. I was up front with my soon-to-be supervisor about my availability, my enthusiasm, and interest in this project. When I left the meeting, I had all but signed the contract.

Thinking about what it means to say "yes"

Two months later, I met with my former PhD supervisor for lunch. As I told her about the project I was then deep in the middle of, she remarked how one of my strengths was my willingness to try new things, to take on new challenges and say "yes!" to opportunities outside of my comfort zone.

This comment really struck me because I hadn't considered this willingness to try new things to be an out-of-the-ordinary strength for a) an anthropologist, and b) a recent PhD grad today.

Anthropological adventurousness?

As a relatively shy person, I have always found conducting social research to be a step out of my comfort zone. Connecting with new people and asking them questions about their lives was never something that came naturally to me.

I chose to become an anthropologist because I loved what this approach to social questions could tell us, not because I love talking to strangers. Yet, now that I am an anthropologist, I know that in order to be an effective social researcher, I need to step out of my comfort zone sometimes.

Enacting (neoliberal) agency in the face of neoliberal structures?

Secondly, as a recent PhD grad in a highly precarious academic labour market, many of my conversations with colleagues over the past several years have focused on how not to get stuck in adjuncting purgatory. My approach has been to apply for interesting opportunities that seem like a good (if not perfect) fit... We are all expected to be "entrepreneurs of ourselves" in a neoliberal society, right Aihwa Ong?

I was therefore surprised to hear that it seemed that many of these same colleagues aren't doing the same. One of the great strengths of someone who, for a very long time, identified as a professional student is that I am able and willing to learn new things!

On the other hand... the more I thought about "adventurousness" as a strength, I also found myself thinking about the structures that limit the ability to say yes.

I was only able to take on this new research project because of the modicum of stability I have this academic year in teaching the same courses. Instead of dedicating 8-20 hours a week in preparing new lectures and assignments on top of my regular teaching duties, these are mostly already in place -- meaning that time can be given to exciting new research opportunities.

If this opportunity had fallen into my lap during the two previous years, I would have had to turn it down during the academic term. In working as a professor, I love the opportunity to teach anthropology to my students, but as an adjunct I work in a structure that has often limited my ability to do other kinds of "professorial" tasks (such as supported time for writing and research).

Lessons from saying "yes" to the project

Taking on this research contract has been a valuable experience, both personally and professionally. Yes, there was a bit of a learning curve to this project for me as I engaged with new research approaches and methodological vocabulary. Importantly, I didn't need to identify these problems and their solutions all on my own. A key lesson has been that being up to a new challenge doesn't mean tackling it alone.

I was hired because my supervisor/ co-researcher recognized how ethnography (and an ethnographer) could add a valuable dimension to OCWI's series of case-studies. So, I decided to approach this opportunity as an ethnographer; in addition to making sense of the community-based program at the heart of our case study, I would also make sense of the unfamiliar culture of this research network.

In approaching my co-researcher/ supervisor at OCWI as a key informant, I positioned myself to ask naive questions, check-in about my understanding of the project and directions, and draw on her local cultural expertise. For instance, she suggested methodological resources on program evaluation and case study research, facilitated introductions to key research participants in our community program, and helped orient me to key landmarks in the grey literature. Rather than getting caught up in "imposter syndrome" in an unfamiliar field, I was instead doing what I have been trained to do as an anthropologist.

So, to close out this post -- the last in this series until the research communications from this case study are published -- I would like to say "thank you!" to my supervisor/ co-researcher, Dr. Michelle Coyne, and OCWI for these enriching opportunities to think about the connections between Ethnography and Case Study Research.

Further reading:

• Advice for Grad Students | Job Market: Realities & Opportunities (anthro everywhere!)
• All posts from this series on Ethnography & Case Study Research can be found on our special series Ethnography & ... page
• Ethnography, Case Study Research, and Program Evaluation (Oh my!) (8 January 2018)
• Ethnography & Case Study Research: Applying an ethnographic approach (15 January 2018)
• Ethnography & Case Study Research: Grey Literature (22 January 2018)

Ethnography & Case-Study Research: Grey Literature

What is "grey literature"? Is this a term that you use in your work? Why does knowing this language matter?

The first time I heard the term "grey literature" I was speaking with an anthropologist who had become a public servant with the Canadian federal government. He was describing some of the tasks of his job in policy development and mentioned reviewing grey literature.

I could not recall ever using myself this term myself, or coming across it in ethnographic studies or methods handbooks. When I asked him to elaborate, he referenced all of the internal reports and white papers that provided important background for current policy issues. The term struck me as a peculiar, almost demeaning way to talk about existing documents that seemed like they were rather important in giving a researcher a holistic picture of the context under study.

Although a strange term to my ears, clearly the concept of "grey literature" was a normative term in the field of policy development and in the public service.

The next time I heard the term grey literature, it was when I was hired to develop a case-study for OCWI. As my supervisor outlined the project she envisioned, reviewing the grey literature on the program being evaluated and in locating it in its larger context would be paramount.

Again, it struck me that this term – despite being rather foreign to me – was part of the everyday language of Case Study and Program Evaluation research that I was now venturing into.

So, what is "grey literature"? 

The term seemed so foreign to me, and yet seemed to describe something so familiar or commonplace that I found myself overthinking the concept, and worrying that I was out of my depth as an ethnographer doing Case Study and Program Evaluation research.

As it turns out though, as an anthropologist, I have always worked with grey literature – I just didn't have this blanket term in my methodological vocabulary!

Grey literature encompasses all of the documents that are available, but not intended for wide distribution. Think of the term as contrasting with "black and white" literature that is commercially published (see Western University Library's informative, quick video on the topic of grey lit).

According to the International Conference on Grey Literature (GreyNet), grey literature includes the "multiple document types produced on all levels of government, academics, business, and organization in electronic and print formats not controlled by commercial publishing i.e. where publishing is not the primary activity of the producing body." As such, grey literature includes:

• government documents and websites
• white papers
• evaluations and research reports
• conference proceedings and unpublished/ working-papers
• data (e.g. census, geospatial, economic)
• practice guidelines
• patents
• theses and dissertations
• internal communications
• community-based websites, newsletters, and blogs

For some anthropologists, perhaps "grey literature" is already a prominent part of your methodological vocabulary. However, in speaking with colleagues, I have found that I am not the only anthropologist who was unfamiliar with this term, even though I am deeply aware of the importance of the kinds of documents it references.

So, to come back to the last question I posed at the beginning of this post...

Why does knowing this language matter?

Knowing this language matters because it allows us to speak about and champion our skills as social researchers to a broader public.

As I have discussed in previous posts in this series, anthropological ethnography has a lot of offer in projects centred on case studies or program evaluation (and beyond). However, in order to show that we can 'walk the walk' of these kinds of projects, and with these kinds of audiences, we first need to learn how to 'talk the talk'.

Quick links and further reading:

• International Conference on Grey Literature (GreyNet)
• Western University Library's Grey Literature Video Tutorial
• anthro everywhere!'s Special Series: Ethnography & ... page with all the posts in our Ethnography & Case Study Research series
• Ethnography, Case-Study Research, and Program Evaluation (Oh my!) (8 January 2018)
• Ethnography & Case Study Research: Applying an ethnographic approach (15 January 2018)

Ethnography & Case Study Research: Applying an ethnographic approach

Last week, I shared my recent experiences being hired as a research assistant at Ontario Centre for Workforce Innovation to conduct a case-study on a local example of innovation in workforce development. In this post, I want to continue that discussion, thinking a bit more about: what case study research is, how it intersects with ethnography, and why this matters for anthropologists.

What is Case Study Research? 

As anthropologists, we might be used to referencing case studies in our classroom. Isn't Malinowski's work among the Trobrianders an interesting case study of non-market exchange? How have Evans-Pritchard's study of the Azande or Gmelch's study of baseball magic become textbook cases for discussing systems of supposedly irrational belief? Or we might ask students to focus their examination of course issues on a specific case-study in a final essay...

This way of understanding a case-study echoes how Robert K. Yin understands the term and frames "Case Study Research" as a (qualitative and/or quantitative) methodological approach in his text Case Study Research: Design and Methods (5th edition).

Interestingly, Yin argues that a case-study approach is useful

in situations when (1) the main research questions are 'how' or 'why' questions;  (2) a researcher has little or no control over behavioral events; and (3) the focus of study is a contemporary (as opposed to entirely historical) phenomenon (Yin 2013, 3).

Case studies, writes Yin, have been popularly used by a wide range of disciplines, including anthropology. Whether conducted from the perspective of a psychologist, political scientist, social worker, nurse or community planner, Yin states that "the distinctive need for case study research arises out of the desire to understand complex social phenomena. In brief, a case study allows investigators to focus on a 'case' and retain a holistic and real-world perspective" (Yin 2013, 4).

How does Case Study research reference or intersect with Ethnography? 

So far, this understanding of when and why to apply a case study research approach seems remarkably similar to ethnographic research! And the parallels continue...

Yin frames the six sources of evidence used in case study research as documentation, archival records, interviews, direct observations, participant-observation, and physical artifacts (Yin 2013, 105-118). Hmmm....

In order to be a good case study researcher, Yin argues (2013, 73-79) that one must:

• Ask good questions - Essentially, Yin asks researchers to recognize the iterative nature of the research process and to constantly ask questions as the study develops during fieldwork, even as "substantive review" comes later. Yin even discusses grounded theory as an apt approach to case study research.
• Be a good "listener" - Yin advocates that we be active listeners and pay attention to all the social cues given during interactions with study participants. Importantly, Yin is advocating a certain amount of cultural relativism -- without using this term -- and openness to paying attention to what people do as well as what they say.
• Stay adaptive - "Few case studies will end exactly as planned. Inevitably, you will have to make minor if not major changes, ranging from the need to pursue an unexpected lead (potentially minor) to the need to identify a new 'case' for study (potentially major)" (Yin 2013, 74). If this doesn't sound like ethnographic research, I am not sure what does!
• Have a firm grasp on the issues being studied - Yin's argument here is to keep one's research question or purpose in mind throughout the research, and attend to how the data collected might shape or demand a shift in the direction of the research.
• Avoid biases - Yin urges researchers to be open to what the data shows, rather than trying to force the data to support a preconceived hypothesis. Again this echoes how anthropologists often pose exploratory how and why questions in our research.
• Conduct research ethically - Here, Yin even cites the AAA's Code of Ethics among other disciplinary and processional ethical codes.

In many ways, how anthropologists approach ethnographic research seem to mirror how Yin frames the case study approach. Yet, Yin frames ethnography as a single method that can be incorporated into case-study research.

A good place to start unpacking the placement of ethnography in his toolkit for case study research is to reflect on how ethnography is understood outside of anthropology.

Although more and more people are being hired in alt-ac careers as professional ethnographers, there is still a misunderstanding or a "watering-down" of ethnography in industry and other professional spheres. What anthropologists are apt of see as "ethnography-lite" is a relatively narrow understanding of what ethnography is, and seems to reflect how this research approach has been popularly adopted by non-anthropologists, for instance in education, nursing, and business. As Marc LeFleur (VP Insights and Co-Head Health at Idea Couture) underscores "something has been lost in this widespread adoption of ethnography outside of academia. Ethnography is on its way to now just becoming another method, simply shorthand for hanging out with people for longer than a focus group would take, another hammer in the market researcher’s toolkit."

The Case for Ethnographers...

Recognizing the overlap and shared strengths of ethnography with case study research presents an interesting opportunity for anthropologists, especially those of us looking to engage a non-academic audience. Not knowing the language of Case Study Research means that anthropologists are missing out on important opportunities to bring our holistic, rigorous, and thickly descriptive approach into social research in the public sphere.

Like ethnography, case studies are used to answer how and why type questions. We can see from Yin's text that the sources of data used for case studies are the same as those any ethnographer would consider. Similarly, the skills and approach to research Yin outlines for case study research sound a lot like my second-year lecture on ethnographic methods.

What makes case study research different from ethnography?

Depending on the type of case study undertaken, there really might not be much difference between this form of research and ethnography. In my work with OCWI, I found that my research approach as a trained ethnographer fit rather seamlessly with the goals and structure sought for this report ― with the exception of framing the research question, anchoring my analysis, and writing for a non-specialist audience.

Research Questions

Importantly, case study research questions may be preset by the organization or funder rather than by the researcher themselves.

In my work with OCWI, I was hired to develop a research report on a single, predefined case that would speak to their mandate regarding workforce innovation. This meant that during research, I had to keep the priorities and interests of my employer (and case program stakeholders) in mind. A challenge here was balancing how to stay on task, while attending to interesting threads that were less pertinent but nonetheless important to understanding the case.

For instance, in my research of the Youth Empowering Parents program, I was interested in following up on the connections and outcomes surrounding voluntarism, community belonging, and the role of the YEP program in immigrant integration. However, with OCWI's key interests around employability, it was important to consider these research threads in relation to the task at hand. YEP's interest in framing their program as a youth empowering initiative and voluntarism opportunity for low-income youth encouraged me to trace connections between youth voluntarism, community/ civic engagement, and OCWI's key interests in employability. Questions around identity and community belonging -- although fascinating -- were less important to pursue in the context of this research.

Anchoring the analysis

While my background in social theory certainly helped me to analyse my data, this report was not to make theory explicit. When I began writing my first draft, I felt a little adrift in terms of how to speak to OCWI's understanding of employability and employment outcomes. This industry-specific language was not something which which I was familiar and I felt a bit out of my depth.

By recognizing my OCWI supervisor as a valuable informant in this field, I approached her for guidance. She steered me to key documents and policies from the Ontario Ministry of Advanced Education and Skills Development (which is funding these case studies). These documents helped to give me an anchor point for considering the Program Evaluation dimension of the intended final report. Grounding my report in this literature was important for helping produce a case study that would speak to our intended audience(s).

Writing for a non-specialist audience

One of the reasons that I was hired by OCWI to develop this case study, was because my supervisor recognized the value and richness of ethnography and wanted to bring this dimension into our report. The format of my report was set by the template developed by OCWI, covering context, history, implementation, and “lessons learned.” Being able to frame the lessons learned, or impact, of the YEP program in people's everyday lives was clearly well-suited to an ethnographic approach.

While case studies might be directed at academic readers, they are also likely to be of interest or use to non-specialists like community stakeholders, policy makers, practitioners, and funders connected to the case you are studying (Yin 2013, 180). In my case study for OCWI, it was clear from the outset that the report should be accessible, not overtly theoretical, but nonetheless based on rigorous empirical evidence and analysis. Our anticipated audience would be community organizers across Ontario (and potentially beyond) interested in implementing similar workforce innovations in their own communities.

In my case, I worked in close contact with both my supervising colleague at OCWI and my key contact at YEP throughout the writing phase. In many ways, this experience reflected the professional relationships that academic anthropologists have with colleagues/ supervisors/ reviewers and their research participants, incorporating and addressing constructive criticism and concerns for representation from both parties. Sharing my early drafts with both partners helped to ensure that my report met the needs of both my employer's mandate, and the needs of our community partner who would use this report to help grow their program in different communities and gain the support of additional funders.


The experience of learning about and doing "case study research" has raised some important questions for me about the intersections of this approach with ethnography -- some of which I have tried to answer here. Next Monday, we'll continue this series by thinking about some more of the parallels between this form of research common in alt-ac spheres and ethnography through the concept of "grey literature." Stay tuned!

If you have experience with case study research as an anthropologist, please let us know! You can tweet us @anthrolens or email us anthrolens@gmail.com.

Quick links and further reading:

• Robert K. Yin's text Case Study Research: Design and Methods (5th edition)
• USC's Research Guide: Writing a Case Study
• Marc LeFleur on Reclaiming Ethnography (2017, LinkedIn)
• Ethnography, Case-Study Research, and Program Evaluation (Oh my!) (anthro everywhere! 8 January 2018)
• For all posts in this series, check our Special Series: Ethnography & ... page.

Ethnography, Case-Study Research, and Program Evaluation (Oh my!)

What is Case-Study research? What about Program Evaluation? What role can Ethnography play in these other approaches to social research?

As an anthropologist, "Program Evaluation" and "Case-Study Research" were familiar terms to me. But these were not methodological approaches or reporting styles that I had received formal training in. I had a vague idea of what both of these terms meant and how they might apply to my research. In fact, I had never thought much about what these kinds of approaches would look like combined with ethnography, or how ethnography might be used to do this kind of research... until recently.

Between September and December 2017, I had the opportunity to learn more about these research approaches in my role as a research associate with the Ontario Centre for Workforce Innovation (OCWI). OCWI was launching a new series of case-studies on programs and practices in Ontario that demonstrated an innovative approach to workforce development. Based on rigorous research, and in keeping with OCWI's mandate, a case-study should evaluate the program or practice, and based on this evidence, explain how "these practices can be transferred, scaled up, and made relevant for the broader workforce development sector." The research associate supervising these case-studies envisioned using ethnography to help ground the impacts of the case-study project or practice in the everyday lives of community stakeholders.

One of the great strengths of ethnography is the iterative nature of our approach to social research, allowing you to shape your research questions and follow up on leads that you didn't expect. So,  what does it mean to bring an ethnographic research approach and perspective into a project where the framework is very clearly defined through case-study research? How can ethnographic insights provide meaningful metrics in evaluating a program or process or practice?

As we have noted elsewhere on the blog, it is important (and expected) that anthropologists learn to speak the langauge of their research participants. For an anthropologist venturing into the realm of interdisciplinary, alt-ac research, it is also important to learn to speak the langauge of our employers and their stakeholders.

This is where I chose to start this project: by learning to speak the language of case-study research and program evaluation. As a social research professional, I quickly found that these other approaches are really more like dialects than completely different languages.

For a basic introduction to Program Evaluation, check out these Open Learning modules on Interdisciplinary Program Evaluation from Ryerson University:

• Module 1: The Basics of Program Evaluation
• Module 2: Logic Models
• Module 3: Qualitative Tools in Program Evaluation
• Module 4: Performance Management

After reviewing these different modules (described as covering about "10-15% of a a one-semester undergraduate, graduate or certificate course"), I had a much better idea of how a program evaluation project is framed. Knowing that program evaluation was a key component of this case-study project, these modules helped orient me in many ways to the task of this case-study project. I could see what ethnographic research could contribute in this type of study, better consider what kinds of questions I should pursue as the project developed, and how I would need to frame my results in my report.

Next Monday, check back for more in our "Ethnography & ..." series exploring the connections between Ethnography and Case-Study research through this project.

Quick links:

• Open Learning: Interdisciplinary Program Evaluation (Ryerson University)
• Language learning (16 June 2016, anthro everywhere!)
• Ontario Centre for Workforce Innovation (OCWI)
• anthro everywhere!'s "Ethnography & ..." series on research projects conducted by our bloggers

A look back at anthropology everywhere in 2017!

As 2017 comes rapidly to a close, here's our annual round-up of some of our favourite posts and content published this year.

Thanks to everyone who has read our over 90 new posts, and checked out our growing list of dedicated pages on things like Advice for Grad Students, our expanding list of links to how people are Applying an anthropological perspective outside of university, and our newly renamed Special Series: Ethnography & ... which now features reflections and insights from blogger Jennifer Long's new pedagogical research in post-secondary education.

Looking back, here are 10 of our own favourite posts from 2017 loosely organized around some key themes...

On ethnography and fieldwork:

• Teaching ethnography (26 January 2017)
• Fieldwork: preparing for the good, bad, and the ugly (16 March 2017)
• Promoting publications behind paywalls... or anthro everywhere! in Anthropologica (15 May 2017)

Engaging anthropology through social media:

• Blogging for research (9 January 2017)
• Why We Post: Anthropologists take on Social Media (26 June 2017)
• Anthropology Podcasting (24 August 2017)
• Fake News: Questions and Resources for Back to Class and All Year Round (7 September 2017)

And to round it out, some of our favourite topical posts from 2017:

• Special Friday Edition: The Dutch Election, Domino Effects and Wilders' Patriotic Spring (17 March 2017)
• What's in a Word? The Importance of Recognizing the Etymology of Words (27 March 2017)
• #Canada150, Indigenous nations 13,000... (3 July 2017)

Thanks for reading this year! We'll be back in 2018 with more resources, more research, and more anthropology everywhere!

What were your favourite posts from 2017? Tweet us @anthrolens

Got ideas for posts you'd like to see (or see more of) in 2018? Send us an email anthrolens@gmail.com

Collaboration between Academics and Industry: Canhoto and Quinton

Are you an academic looking for ways to collaborate with industry stakeholders (or vice versa)? Check out a (relatively...) recent blog post on LSE Impact Blog detailing Ana Isabel Canhoto and Sarah Quinton's research which provides five practical principles to make collaboration 'work'.

Why is collaboration important?
Research collaboration is deemed to accelerate the transfer of knowledge between experts and the translation of world-class research into practical applications, which has important commercial, economic and social benefits. Collaboration between academics and practitioners can also produce new knowledge, by bringing together researchers with complementary perspectives, interests, skills and knowledge bases.

Together with Dr. Paul Jackson and Sally Dibb, Canhoto and Quinton investigated the experiences of academic academic researchers and industry practitioners who had participated in successful R&D collaborative projects in the digital arena, to identify the factors that support or hinder research collaboration.

To find out more about their project, follow the link in our Quick Links section.

Quick Links:

• Research collaboration between universities and industry: Five practical principles to make it work, LSE Impact Blog (Aug 15, 2016) 
• The co-production of value in digital, university–industry R&D collaborative project, Industrial Marketing Management (July 2016) Ana Isabel Canhoto, Sarah Quinton, Paul Jackson, Sally Dibb

Sample Boilerplate Language for Ethnographic Ethics Proposals

Blogger Jennifer Long has been spending lots of time (too much time) writing ethics proposals these days. However, many university-related ethics boards have very useful tips, tricks and resources to help researchers along.

So if it's your first or fortieth kick of the ethics proposal can, check out your institutions REB home page before pulling out your hair and throwing items across the room.

Although I'm not conducting ethnography at this time, McMaster's REB has an ethnographic boiler plate template for ethnographic studies. It's a useful document with tidbits such as these for the methods section:

This project will be based on standard methods of ethnographic research in the discipline of anthropology. Researchers in cultural anthropology (ethnographers) engage in participant observation, a fieldwork method based on social relationships between individuals and the ethnographer, in which the ethnographer assumes the position of a student or apprentice who learns through participating in everyday activities with community members and observing social life.  This participant observation component of my research is essential because it will provide the broad social and cultural context for my specific research questions that deal with [INSERT YOUR RESEARCH TOPIC HERE].

Following the general methodology of participant observation, this study will involve several specific tasks.  From approximately [INSERT DATE] to [INSERT DATE] I will reside in [INSERT LOCATION(S) ] where I will participate in many aspects of community life including [INSERT DETAILS].  
Because of my [INSERT DETAILS, IF APPLICABLE], I already know many people in [INSERT NAME OF LOCALITIES] and I expect that I will have no trouble integrating into the community.  I also plan to [INSERT DETAILS]. 

Follow the link in the Quick Links to see the whole document. Many thanks to its original authors from the Anthropology program at McMaster: Dr. Badone and Rebecca Plett.

Quick Links:

• Sample Boilerplate Wording for Ethnography, Badone and Plett (McMaster Research Ethics Board) 2013