SE300 - Ethnographic Comparison Extracting Meanings from Ethnographic Data The Role of Comparison Lecture Slides Visit Hraf at http://ehrafworldcultures.yale.edu/ehrafe/ The Ethnographic Enterprise Ethnographic research is predicated on comparison Long-held focus on the behaviour of social units as emergent from individual level phenomena - holism A resistance to deterministic explanations Reliance on tension between conformity and innovation Why Comparison? Ethnography is about describing cultures To draw conclusions we must compare cultures Comparison highlights the similarity and differences Comparison Comparing like to like Standardising features Three-way comparison We can compare simple things - tools, clothing or activities. This gives us a basis to discuss both abstract similarities and differences Human Relations Area Files: HRAF To do comparison in anthropology we need a source of information We use ethnographies In the 1930's George Peter Murdock set out to create the first ethnographic database These eventually became the HRAF Over the past 20 years the HRAF as begun to go online as e-HRAF - eHRAF World Cultures - login required Page 1 - last modified by Michael Fischer on 08/12/2009 at 09:29 SE300 - Ethnographic Comparison Using E-Hraf You search a large number of ethnographies in E-HRAF Locate sections that relate to a single issue or concept From this you build up a comparative picture of the societies relative to the issue The Ethnographic Atlas and the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample George Murdock and Douglas White produced the Standard Cross-cultural Sample based on Murdock's earlier work on the Ethnographic Atlas The purpose was to create a sample of world cultures from which valid generalisations could be made *We have a copy* at Kent - see Lecture Slides for more information George P. Murdock and Douglas R. White 1969 *Standard Cross-Cultural Sample* , Ethnology, 8:4, 329-369 Page 2 - last modified by Michael Fischer on 08/12/2009 at 09:29.