In the Field

These engaging accounts by masters of field research illustrate the synthesis of passionate involvement and objective analysis. An informative and inspiring collection for students and professional social scientists. (Cynthia Fuchs Epstein Distinguished Professor of Sociology City University of New York).

This revised, edited volume brings together personal accounts by a group of noted ethnographic researchers to examine the natural history of participant observation. An ideal supplemental text for methods courses, In The Field is designed to give students a sense of what it is actually like to conduct ethnographic research. As the selections show, field researchers must struggle to gain acceptance by the group under study but then often become deeply involved in the lives of the people and at times are forced into a reexamination of their own values. By learning how social scientists conduct research under field conditions and how they feel while they are doing it, students will be better prepared to carry out successful field research projects of their own.

Author Biography

CAROLYN D. SMITH is a writer and editorial consultant specializing in educational materials in the social sciences. She is the author of The Absentee American: Repatriates’ Perspectives on America (Praeger, 1991).

WILLIAM KORNBLUM is the author of Blue Collar Community (1976) and co-author (with Terry Williams) of Growing Up Poor (1985) and other titles.

Kornblum and Smith have collaborated in the writing and development of textbooks on sociology and social problems and are co-editors of The Healing Experience: Readings on the Social Context of Health Care (1994).