[Air-l] ethnography and ethics

Jennifer Stromer-Galley jstromer at albany.edu
Fri May 14 05:26:05 PDT 2004


This is an insightful post, Jon. 

I'd like to take up his call to appeal to empirical grounds rather than
ethics. I see an assumption in some of the discussion that engaging in
covert ethnography gets a researcher better data than overt ethnography.
That seems to serve as a justification for why hiding one's identity is
desirable/necessary.

Someone (maybe, Nancy? There have been so many good posts, I don't quite
remember who) mentioned that hiding one's agenda with a group of people
being observed does not necessarily get better insight and information. 

I'm wondering if anyone has concrete evidence, either empirical studies
or their own personal experiences, to support or reject this assumption?


Best wishes,
~JSG


> -----Original Message-----
> From: air-l-admin at aoir.org [mailto:air-l-admin at aoir.org] On 
> Behalf Of Jonathan Marshall
> Sent: Friday, May 14, 2004 12:35 AM
> To: air-l at aoir.org
> Subject: Re: [Air-l] ethnography and ethics
> 
> 
> 
> Ok this is just random.

<snip>

> Even if we decide on human 'goods' then there is nothing 
> absolutely compelling about arguments which appeal to them.  
> Thus for instance we could appeal to Eero to announce his 
> doing research to his subjects in many ways, but he could not 
> be forced by the arguments into accepting them.  I give 
> arguments i find persuasive below, while admitting they are 
> not really persuasive to everyone.
> 
> thus I could appeal to 'fact':
> 
> For many people the internet *is* ambiguous as to whether it 
> is private or public, (so is much non-internet space for that 
> matter). Saying that one part is really public and another is 
> really private may be possible on occasions but most things 
> are not clearly marked, and cannot be marked.  There are many 
> different kinds of public, which for many will not include 
> the public of research.  Privacy and public are social 
> constructs and vague and often contradictory.  This is simply 
> a 'fact' as far as i'm concerned, and i'm a bit surprised 
> that some people don't percieve it - which opens up other 
> questions i guess.
> 
> I could appeal to 'self interest':
> 
> you are much less likely to get sued, your work is likely to 
> be more acceptable to colleagues, or your work will be 
> allowed by your university ethics committee.
> 
> I could appeal to a 'love of truth':
> 
> When research is announced, you are then able to immerse 
> yourself in the world, feel everything, *and* ask the kinds 
> of questions you would not be able to ask other than as a 
> researcher.  Likewise the more people are inclined to trust 
> you (and have tested that trust over a long period), the 
> better will be the information they give you, the more they 
> are able to criticise your work the better it will be, the 
> deeper your understanding will be.
> 

<snip>





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