A Quick and Dirty Introduction to the Spradley-McCurdy Ethnographic Interviewing Method

1. A Quick and Dirty Introduction to the Spradley-McCurdy Ethnographic Interviewing Method Cole V. Akeson GEOG5712: Research Design Professor Kenneth E. Foote 02 March 2009

2. Agenda • What is this mouthful called the Spradley-McCurdy ethnographic interviewing method? • How and when is it useful? • How does it work? A 12 step program • Caveats: When is it not useful/applicable? • Comparisons to other methods

3. What is this “S-M E I M”? • Ethnography as a non-linear process • (continual shuffling between selecting a problem, formulating hypotheses, collecting data, analysis, writing up) • Informants’ knowledge is emphasized • A search for meaning through symbols, i.e. words and verbal cues, to tacit cultural knowledge • Moreover, focusing on ethnosemantic symbols • the symbol, meaning, and relationship between symbol and referent • Quoting sociological review: “Drunks are notorious liars and manipulators. Spradley unfortunately takes the lies as facts and bases his conclusions on them” (Spradley 1979, 49). • Finally, an interviewing methodology meant to systematize methodology for novice and expert alike

4. Key ethnosemantic relationships • Domains: Connections of cultural symbols/folk terms into interrelated “domain” • Domain analysis (taxonomies): Internal structures of domains demonstrating differentiation among components • Componential analysis (paradigms): Search for differentiating attributes among symbols • Theme analysis: Relating domains in larger cultural processes

5. How and when is the method useful? • Designed for use by: • Novices and experienced academics • Students, social scientists and non-academic professionals • Allowing ethnography to bridge interdisciplinary divides • “Grounded theory” approaches • Can also be adapted to theoretically bound, structured settings • Used and adapted by social scientists, police, journalists, salespeople, etc.

6. Caveats and criticisms: When is it not useful/applicable? • Best for open-ended approaches • Less useful in shorter-term ethnographic investigations • Criticized by more humanistic ethnographers, social theory devotees • Earlier renditions critiqued as not considering positionality, etc. • Some terms en vogue during publishing of The Ethnographic Interview and The Cultural Experience are less often used today

7. A 12 step program(no, not that one) • Locating an informant • Interviewing an informant • Making an ethnographic record • Asking descriptive questions • Analyzing ethnographic interviews • Making a domain analysis • Asking structural questions • Making a taxonomic analysis • Asking contrast questions • Making a componential analysis • Discovering cultural themes • Writing an ethnography

8. A 12 step program(still not that one) • Locating an informant • Interviewing an informant • Making an ethnographic record • Asking descriptive questions • Analyzing ethnographic interviews • Making a domain analysis • Asking structural questions • Making a taxonomic analysis • Asking contrast questions • Making a componential analysis • Discovering cultural themes • Writing an ethnography

9. Making ethnographic records • Utilize both field notes and transcriptions from recordings • Condensed notes, expanded notes (i.e. transcription together with field notes), journaling • Analysis and interpretation (i.e. coding) • By hand, by computer

10. Descriptive Questions • Building rapport • “Apprehension→Exploration→Cooperation→Participation” (Spradley 1979, 79) • Avoid leading questions • Types of questions: • Grand tour: broad sweeping explanations of space, time, events, people, activities, objects • “Typical,” recent time, show a process • Mini-tour: refining explanation of smaller processes • Example • Experiences • Native-language • Direct, hypothetical, typical sentence

11. Domain analysis • Folk terms elicit important cultural symbols • These symbols are semantically interconnected in larger processes, “domains” • i.e. spatial, cause-effect, rationale, location of action, functional, sequential relationships • Next step: Determining not only presence, but meaning of relationship

12. Structural questions and taxonomies • Elicit informants’ structural relationships within domains, avoid researchers’ perceived meaning • Used concurrently, repetitively, contextually, with descriptive questions (again, non-linear process) • Types: • Verification questions • Cover term questions: Elicit meaning of term and its sub-components • Inferential included term questions • Card sorting questions • Create taxonomic relationships among terms: Relate terms hierarchically and functionally along one-dimensional relationship

13. Example: “Taxonomy”

14. Contrast questions and componential analysis • Elicit further details of relationships: comparative/contrasting uses • Types: • Contrast verification, directed contrast (list), dyadic (non-leading) contrast questions, triadic • Demonstrating multiple semantic differences (as opposed to taxonomies’ one) between folk terms, producing componential analyses or “paradigms”

15. Example: “Paradigm”

16. Themes and writing • Elicited from informants, but will be most influenced by the ethnographer • Typically multiple themes will be found in any research setting/microculture • Creating cultural inventories to draw forth themes • Looking for connections, but also gaps • Applying componential analysis on a larger scale, across data collected

17. References • Further reading: McCurdy, David W., James P. Spradley, and Dianna J. Shandy. 2005. The cultural experience: Ethnography in complex society. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press. 2nd ed. Spradley, James P. 1979. The ethnographic interview. New York: Harcourt College Publishers. Spradley, James P. and David W. McCurdy. 1972. The cultural experience: Ethnography in complex society. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press. 1st ed. • Cover image Vincent van Gogh, Green Wheat Field, 1889, Kunsthaus Zurich. http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/gogh/fields/ (accessed March 1, 2009).