Ethnomethodology: General

Ethnomethodology: General speaking countries of Europe, conversely, the term overcoming the old split between intra- and extra- ethnology was initially adopted by VoW lkerkunde, while European fields of research in continental anthro- many university departments and programs pre- pology. viously called Volkskunde acquired new names— cultural studies, European ethnology, cultural anthro- See also: Anthropology; Boas, Franz (1858–1942); pology, among others. Their name change signified a Case Study: Methods and Analysis; Ethnography; shift towards the problem-oriented study of contem- Fieldwork in Social and Cultural Anthropology porary German, Swiss, or Austrian society informed by new developments in social theory as well as in international anthropology (Greverus 1978). In France, the ‘ethnologie contemporaine de la France’ Bibliography represents a new orientation of anthropological in- Boas F 1940 Race, Language and Culture. MacMillan, New quiry into French society with a strong ethnographic York flavor (see Cuisenier and Segalen 1986). In the post- Cuisenier J, Segalen M 1986 Ethnologie de la France. Presses socialist and postcommunist countries of Eastern Universitaires de France, Paris Europe, new orientations being established could Fabian J 1983 Time and the Other. How Anthropology Makes Its build on the fact that prior to 1989, the discipline of Object. Columbia University Press, New York Geertz C 1973 The Interpretation of Cultures. Selected Essays. ethnography had integrated scholars working within Basic Books, New York and outside of Europe. Abandoning the name eth- Gerholm T, Hannerz U 1982 Introduction: The shaping of nography that dates back to the 1929 rejection of national anthropologies. Ethnos 47(I-I): 5–35 purportedly ‘bourgeois’ ethnology by Moscow and Giordano G, Greverus I M (eds.) 1992 Anthropologizing Leningrad anthropologists, in the Czech Republic and Europe Continued. Anthropological Journal on European in Slovakia, at Polish and at Hungarian universities, to Cultures 1(2): 7–112 cite a few examples, ethnology, cultural anthropology, Giordano G, Greverus I M, Stummann F J (eds.) 1990 or combinations of both have been chosen as new Anthropologizing Europe. Anthropological Journal on Euro- designations for anthropological inquiries at home pean Cultures 1(1): 7–139 Graebner F 1911 Methode der Ethnologie. Carl Winter’s. and abroad. Also, in Southern Europe, regional Universita$ tsbuchhandlung, Heidelberg, Germany anthropologies are developing that combine research Greverus I M 1978 Kultur und Alltagswelt. Eine EinfuW hrung interests in their home countries and regions with the in Fragen der Kulturanthropologie. C H Beck, Munich, most advanced theoretical developments in inter- Germany national anthropology (for a European survey see Kaschuba W 1999 EinfuW hrung in die EuropaW ische Ethnologie. Giordano et al. 1990, Giordano and Greverus 1992). C H Beck, Munich, Germany These new directions on the European continent have Kuper A 1983 Anthropology and Anthropologists. The Modern British School. Routledge, London and New York been entering into a dialog with a Europeanist special- ization developing in American cultural anthropology Kuper A 1988 The In ention of Primiti e Society. Trans- formations of an Illusion. Routledge, London and New York and British social anthropology since the 1970s. Levi-Strauss C 1975 Anthropologie. DiogeZ ne 90: 3–30 As early as 1955, a Europe-wide conference of Marcus G E, Fischer M M J 1986 Anthropology as Cultural ethnologists and folklorists in Arnhem, Netherlands, Critique. An Experimental Moment in the Human Sciences. recommended to use the name ‘European ethnology’ University of Chicago Press, Chicago internationally for all disciplines concerned with the Moore F W (ed.) 1961 Readings in Cross-Cultural Methodology. anthropological study of European societies. This Human Relations Area Files Press, New Haven, CT suggestion was taken up by the founders of a European Radcliffe-Brown A R 1951 The comparative method in social association, the Socie! te! Internationale de Folklore et anthropology. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute d’Ethnologie, in 1964 and a Europe-wide journal 15–22 Schmidt W 1924 Werden und Wirken der VoW lkerkunde. Josef Ethnologia Europaea in 1967. Still, it is obvious that Habbel, Regensburg, Germany inconsistencies in disciplinary names will persist between and within European societies. However, at the G. Welz turn of the new millennium in many continental European societies, ethnology not only continues to be widely used as a disciplinary designation, but has been adopted and even reinvented to suggest a new direction taken in the anthropological investigation of European cultures past and present (Kaschuba 1999). Ethnomethodology: General As social and cultural anthropology are redefining themselves as the analysis of cultural complexity in a Ethnomethodology is a mode of inquiry devoted to global framework, European ethnology promises to the study of the practical methods of common sense bring this new anthropological approach to the study reasoning used by members of society in the conduct of European societies and their cultures of late of everyday life. The significance of this seemingly modernity, and might ultimately prove capable of mundane subject matter resides in the fact that 4865 Ethnomethodology: General practical reasoning is what enables societal members voluntaristic theory of action as a basic frame of to make sense of the circumstances in which they find reference, but he was also deeply influenced by the themselves, find ways of acting in relation to those phenomenological writings of Alfred Schu$ tz and circumstances, and thereby contribute to the pro- the teachings of Aaron Gurwitsch. (Sometime later, duction and maintenance of an intelligible social the ordinary language philosophy of Ludwig Wittgen- world. Ethnomethodology, as the study of such stein would become another source of inspiration.) reasoning practices, is thus concerned with the very The phenomenological enterprise directed Garfinkel’s foundations of social order. attention to certain fundamental pretheoretical prob- It should be clear from this brief definition that lems posed by Parsons’ theory of action, problems ethnomethodology is not primarily a theory of social which were not adequately addressed within the life, nor is it a methodology for the study thereof. It is Parsonian framework. What would later come to be in the first instance a discipline of inquiry devoted to a known as ‘ethnomethodology’ is in large part the distinctive order of phenomena, one that is sometimes result of Garfinkel’s sustained effort to confront these understood to be orthogonal to the concerns of problems by empirical means (see Parsons, Talcott mainstream social science. However, these phenomena (1902–79); Phenomenology in Human Science). have important theoretical, methodological, and sub- Parsons had sought to develop a theory of social stantive ramifications, and in the course of elucidating action that would solve the Hobbesian problem of them ethnomethodology has had a major impact order while retaining purposive human agency within across a range of social science disciplines. Although it its framework. At the same time, he wished to avoid originated within sociology, ethnomethodology’s the limitations and pitfalls of strictly utilitarian think- sphere of influence extends to anthropology, cognitive ing, which cannot account for the ends toward which science, communication, linguistics, psychology, and action is oriented, and which treats intrinsic rationality the philosophy of the social sciences. as the sole standard governing the selection of means. Although a few studies appeared in the late 1950s Parsons’ solution centered around the role of moral and early 1960s, the nascent approach crystallized and values in social action—he proposed that, through attracted widespread attention in 1967 with the pub- socialization, such values become internalized and lication of Harold Garfinkel’s Studies in Ethno- incorporated into the actor’s personality, where they methodology. This was a time of great intellectual guide both the selection of ends of action and the ferment in the social sciences, and ethnomethodology normative means by which they are sought. Insofar as contributed in no small way to the revolutions that such values are also institutionalized within a society challenged prevailing theoretical perspectives and and are shared by societal members, patterned activity methodological approaches. In the domain of socio- and social cohesion will be the natural result. logical theory, ethnomethodology helped end the Parsons’ theory places primary emphasis on the dominance of the structural functionalist paradigm motivational wellsprings of action, and in so doing it associated with Talcott Parsons, and led to a major has relatively little to say about how concrete actions reconceptualization of the theory of action and its are managed and coordinated in real time. Thus, as relationship to social structure. It was also an impor- Heritage (1987, p. 228) has observed, it is less a theory tant impetus behind the broad-based social con- of action per se than a theory of the dispositions that structionist movement that revolutionized theorizing give rise to action. Correspondingly, Parsons’ theory about subjects ranging from deviance to gender. In fails to give serious consideration to the knowledge methodology, ethnomethodological studies challen- and forms of reasoning

Load more