Anthropologica · 1998 · 88 citations · 0 references
Social SciencesAnthropologyAnthropology Of DevelopmentCultural AnthropologyEthnographyEthnographic MethodsEthnographic ResearchParticipant ObservationEthnographic Research DesignHuman Development MeasurementSocial Inquiry
Since the 1990s, ethnographic approaches have reshaped human‑development research, with scholars noting that qualitative methods deepen insights into cognitive, emotional, and behavioral growth and the challenges of contemporary adolescence. The book aims to reassert ethnography as a valid, central method in social inquiry, addressing epistemological issues of context, meaning, and subjectivity. It reviews diverse qualitative techniques—from participant observation to hermeneutic text analysis—and applies them to developmental and social problems across the life span.
Studies of human development have taken an ethnographic turn in the 1990s. In this volume, anthropologists, psychologists and sociologists discuss how qualitative methodologies have strengthened the understanding of cognitive, emotional and behavioural development, and of the difficulties of growing up in contemporary society. Part One, informed by a post-positivist philosophy of science, argues for the validity of ethnographic knowledge. Part Two examines a range of qualitative methods, from participant observation to the hermeneutic elaboration of texts. In Part Three, ethnographic methods are applied to issues of human development across the life span and to social problems including poverty, racial and ethnic marginality, and crime. Restoring ethnographic methods to a central place in social inquiry, the 22 essays in this text should interest everyone concerned with the epistemological problems of context, meaning and subjectivity in the behavioural sciences.