This document discusses online ethnography and trace ethnography. Online ethnography allows researchers to study technologically-mediated human interactions and communications through digital traces like log files, emails, and documents. Trace ethnography combines participant observation with analysis of trace data from sociotechnical systems to understand user patterns and practices. Traces provide a wealth of data about coordination and knowledge work beyond direct observations. The document also discusses how sociotechnical practices are inferred from observations and tests which then undergo calculations and are represented in discourse and texts that shape policy.

1. Doctoral symposium
online ethnography
adult skills
e-assessment
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2. assessment technologies
• “a method of using information technology for any assessment-related
activities” (Brink & Lautenbach, 2011, p. 503)
• “e-assessment, which includes the entire assessment process, from designing
assignments to storing the results with the help of ICT” (Stödberg, 2011, p. 1)
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3. trace ethnography
What are traces?
They can be: Log files, e-mails, cronjobs, scores, reports, documents, images, videos,
updates
“combines the richness of participant-observation with the wealth of data in
logs so as to reconstruct patterns and practices of users in distributed
sociotechnical systems.” (Giger and Ribes, 2011)
Online ethnography is one way of dealing with the wide variety of
technologically-mediated communication “which makes interactions
of diverse kinds persistent, traceable and amenable to sociological
gaze” (Hine, 2011)
‘methods are never innocent and that in some measure they enact
whatever it is they describe into reality’ (Law and Urry, 2004: 403)
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4. trace ethnography
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5. local networks
The simple view
testing
body
test
test
taker
results
A less simple view
test taker
test
database/UI
software routines
testers (human)
support
communication
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6. local networks
even less simple
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7. not so local networks
tester 1
LO
DB
admin
test
taker
tester 2
tester 3
tester3
DB2
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8. policy networks
“researchers can often access traces of social practices in large document repositories, opening a
window to patterns of coordination and knowledge work that goes well beyond immediate
observations” (Østerlund 2014 et al.)
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9. conceptual narrowing
Socio-technical
practices
in
Inferences about socio-
technical practices
out
test
conceptual narrowing
human
capitalsocio-technical practices
observations, tests,
surveys
calculations
discourse, texts, policy
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10. calculable objects
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11. Dematerialization to rematerialization
“Raw materials have to be put in place – and then held in place.” Law & Singleton 2003
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12. References
Østerlund, Carsten, Sawyer, Steve, Ribes, David, Shankar, Kalpana, & Geiger, Stuart. (2014, 4-7 March). What to Do with all those Traces People Leave
behind: Computing, Culture, and (Bits of) Context? Paper presented at the iConference 2014, Berlin.
Law, John, & Urry, John. (2004). Enacting the social. Economy and Society, 33(3), 390-410. doi: 10.1080/0308514042000225716
Geiger, Stuart, & Ribes, David. (2011). Trace ethnography: Following coordination through documentary practices. Paper presented at the 44th Hawaii International Conference
on System Sciences (HICSS), Hawaii.
Hine, C. (2011). Towards ethnography of television on the internet: A mobile strategy for exploring mundane interpretive activities. Media, Culture & Society, 33(4), 567-582. doi:
10.1177/0163443711401940
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