Challenges and opportunities of doing ethnographic research with children

1. Challenges and opportunities of doing ethnographic research with children • Advantages and disadvantages • Fieldwork, emotions & diaries • Longitudinal and multi-sited ethnography Samantha Punch (s.v.punch@stir.ac.uk)

2. Research Contexts • Rural childhoods in Bolivia, 3-27yrs, ethnography and classroom-based Negotiating autonomy: home, work, school & play Ethnographic Fieldwork: July 1993 – July 1995 July - December 1996 April – July 2007

3. Food practices in residential care, 10-16 yrs and staff, multi-sited ethnography Nika Dorrer Ruth Emond Ian McIntosh

4. What is ethnography? • Style of research involving fieldwork • Ethnographer participates in the routine, daily lives of people We see the term as referring primarily to a particular method or set of methods. In its most characteristic form it involves the ethnographer participating, overtly or covertly, in people’s daily lives for an extended period of time, watching what happens, listening to what is said, asking questions - in fact, collecting whatever data are available to throw light on the issues that are the focus of the research. (Hammersely and Atkinson, 1995: 1)

5. Participant Observation • complete participant • participant-as-observer • observer-as-participant • complete observer Gold, R. (1958) ‘Roles in Sociological Field Observation,’ Social Forces, 36: 217-33. Semi-participant observation with children: Punch, S. (2001) “Multiple Methods and Research Relations with Young People in Rural Bolivia”, in Limb, M. and Dwyer, C. (eds) Qualitative Methodologies for Geographers, London: Arnold, pp.165-180.

6. Ethnographic research with children • Same or different? 1) “... research with children should not take for granted an adult/child distinction” (Christensen and James 2000: 2) 2) “... the adult researcher who wishes to research with children must confront generational issues” (Mayall 2000: 121) Punch, S. (2002) ‘Research with Children: The Same or Different from Research with Adults?’ Childhood, 9(3): 321-41.

7. Continuum: - individual children (experience/preference/competence) - type of ethnographic research - research questions - research context - younger/older children - the researcher

8. Advantages of ethnography • Build relationships • Combine informal interviewing and participant observation: learn by doing • Opportunistic and flexible

9. Depth of understanding • contextual meanings • Very rich and detailed data • Access multiple perspectives • Priviledge to experience other people’s lifestyles • Eye opener • Learning • Rewarding

10. Disadvantages of ethnography • Flexible but messy • Complex and difficult • Day to day survival • Intense Punch, S. (2004) ‘Scrambling through the Ethnographic Forest: Research Commentary’, in Lewis, V., Kellett, M., Robinson, C., Fraser, S. and Ding, S. (eds) The Reality of Research with Children and Young People, London: Sage, pp. 94-119.

11. Time-consuming • Expensive • Indepth but limited numbers of participants • Different sources of data • not easily comparable • too much data? • how analyse and write up? • Impose on participants' time and privacy • Raises many ethical dilemmas • Emotionally draining

12. Anticipate • Range of ethical issues • Potential difficulties and dilemmas • Emotional costs of doing fieldwork • Prepare for the worst Lee-Treweek and Linkogle (2000)

13. Dilemmas – planning versus practice • What kind of ethnography could you do? • How far would you go to get good data? • How far would you go to build rapport and develop field relationships? • What are your boundaries?

14. Sampling • Which fieldsite and why? • Which locations/settings? • How many children and adults? • Adult gatekeepers • Negotiating access • Levels of consent

15. Doing Fieldwork • Where to stay? • Time • ‘hanging out’ time at start • time to write up fieldnotes • time off • Rapport • signs of acceptance • some will not want to participate

16. Going Back 10 yrs On What choices and constraints shape young people’s livelihood strategies in rural Bolivia? Role of emotions in fieldwork Use of field-diaries (vs. fieldnotes) Punch, S. (2010) ‘Hidden Struggles of Fieldwork: Exploring the Role and Use of Field Diaries’, Emotion, Space and Society, Online publication complete: 4-NOV-2010. DOI information: 10.1016/j.emospa.2010.09.005. Lifecourse journeys: for researcher & participants

17. Using a field diary • Reflexivity: The need to recognise that as researchers we may influence the research context since we become part of the social world we are studying (Hammersley and Atkinson 1995) • Fear, self-doubt and feelings of failure can haunt us throughout our entire stay in the field. It is important to acknowledge these feelings. (Hume and Mulcock 2004: xxiii)

18. Reflexivity This involves reflection by ethnographers on the social processes that impinge upon and influence data. It requires a critical attitude towards data, and recognition of the influence on the research of such factors as the location of the setting, the sensitivity of the topic and the nature of the social interaction between the researcher and researched. In the absence of reflexivity, the strengths of the data are exaggerated and/or the weaknesses underemphasized. (Brewer, 2000: 191)

19. Diary extracts reflect: • Practical difficulties • Academic worries • Researcher guilt • Emotional aspects • - frustration, despair, disappointment, anger • - feelings of self-pity, failure, inadequacy • - personal challenges, unexpected costs

20. Analysing discomfort& awkwardness • Willingness to embrace a rigorous reflexive process • Intellectual productivity: gain insights and valuable data • Enhanced empathy with participants • Uncomfortable fieldwork is often very good fieldwork(Hume and Mulcock 2004: xvii)

21. Reflexivity • “… can become self-regarding, pompous indulgence in which more is learned about the fieldworker than the field” (Calvey, 2000: 57) • “What ethnographers practice and what they preach can vary significantly” (Calvey, 2000: 57)

22. Field relations • Technological advances • Opportunistic nature of fieldwork

23. Longitudinal and multi-sited ethnography • Sender and destination communities: different perspectives • Tracking over time/location • Communication opportunities • Holistic • Challenges • Expensive and time-consuming Punch, S. (Forthcoming 2012) ‘Studying Transnational Migration: A Multi-sited, Longitudinal, Ethnographic Approach,’ Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies.

24. Residential Care Homes for Children • Multi-sited: 3 residential homes • different organisational cultures • 3 blocks of 12 weeks fieldwork • Meal-time observations • Towards the end: Interviews and focus groups • Negotatiating role & boundaries for both staff and children

25. Negotiating ‘Home’, ‘Institution’ and Workplace • Food and relationships – symbolical use • Food practices can be shrouded in ambivalence and ambiguity (intention v. interpretation) • Importance of inter- and intra-generational perspectives Punch, S., McIntosh, I., Emond, R. and Dorrer, N. (2009) ‘Food and Relationships: Children’s Experiences in Residential Care’, in James, A., Kjørholt, A.T. and Tingstad, V. (Eds) Children, Food and Identity, Basingstoke: Palgrave.

26. Leaving the field • Giving something back • Paying participants? • Gifts: what is appropriate? • Practical dimension • Prepare yourself and participants • Leave enough time • Emotional dimension • Promises? • Dissemination • Communication • Going back?