The Ethnography Atelier is devoted to the craft of qualitative research. The word craft is important because it indicates that the methods we use to collect, analyse, and write up our work cannot be reduced to templates, recipes, or *put your favorite researcher’s name here* methods. Our methods need to be transparent and fully articulated so that we can show how we went from field work to findings. They should also be appropriate to our research questions and focal phenomenon. This means that we cannot apply the same methods or off-the-shelf recipes to each research endeavour. We have to think for ourselves, respecting what has come before, about what is the best way to proceed on a given project. Doing such craft work requires discussion and thought with others engaged in the craft.
At the same time there are fundamental techniques of our craft that are needed in every project – taking field notes, developing interview protocols, conducting interviews, coding data, moving from coding to other forms of analysis. While there are extensive written resources one can consult, moving from the reading to the doing is never straightforward. It requires practice, feedback, and rework. One learns a craft by doing the work in a community of craft people.
The Ethnography Atelier facilitates open conversations and activities related to the doing of qualitative research. We are interested in exploring and pushing our craft forward, beyond recipes, templates, and christened methods. As our institutions push us to publish more and more, we want to encourage qualitative researchers to focus on doing rich empirical work with deep analyses and grounded interpretations. Rather than more and more, less and better. This is the ethos of craft.
Our seminars and workshops are moving on-line, allowing us to engage with qualitative researchers around the world. We invite you to attend our events, read our blog, and listen to our podcast. Our monthly research seminar series continues on zoom. We are kicking off an interactive workshop series – Inside the Ethnography Atelier – which covers the techniques of our craft. Please feel free to suggest topics and speakers and help us organize.
We are excited to open up the Atelier to crafts people around the world. We welcome your participation and contributions. Please follow us on twitter or check this website to keep up-to-date on our activities.
See you in the Atelier!