For an introductory course at UF

1. Ethnography
ANT 2140
Rachel Wayne

2. What is Ethnography?
 Collecting cultural data
 stories (folklore, myths, history, urban legends,
personal stories)
 artifacts (art, tools, buildings, etc.)
 idioms and dialectal characteristics
 Creating a “thick description”
 more detail = less uninformed interpretation
 more detail = more research questions
 Participating in shared behaviors
 Gaining rapport with informants

3. What is an Ethnography?
 A descriptive record of a group of people.
 can be bounded by ethnicity, nationality, shared
distinctive behaviors (e.g. participation in a sport,
membership in a political party), or shared specific
beliefs (e.g. religious beliefs.
 is temporally and spatially grounded (the ethnographic
present).
 is an inductive approach that uses quantitative data
with an emic perspective.

4. What is an Ethnography?
 A scientific account of cultural behaviors.
 uses a mix of qualitative and quantitative data to
develop models of human behavior.
 may be inductive (ex. neurological model of language,
with data on situational use of language) or deductive
(ex. cross-analyzing church attendance with political
party)
 can track social networks, language use, and genetic
relations.
 generally uses a larger group of informants (10+).

5. Evaluation
 Is this video thick in its description?
 Is this video emic or etic in its approach to the
(sub)culture?
 If etic, does it give a relatively objective portrayal?
 If emic, does it allow outsiders to gain an understanding
of the (sub)culture?
 Are informants represented equally, fully, and fairly?
 Does the video ask more questions than it answers?
(Hint: It should.)

6. Videos
 En Restaurantes Hispanicos (6 min)
 Art for Our Sake (5 min)
 Gender in the Zombie Culture (8 min)
 Maienbaumfest (6 min)