From housewife to mousewive - Anthropological study on women and Internet

L, great link - thanks - the study sounds very interesting. as for your PS, I keep seeing more and more basic observation research done by non trained researchers passing for anthropology - maybe because as a methodology, it is “in” and generally perceived to be more credible? (I am not refering to this study in particular, just a general observation)

Yes, earlier this year Grant McCracken wrote somethning similar in his post Ethnography and quality control: “There are lots of people claiming to do ethnography who are, um, “self trained.” But there may be anthropologists at Demos, I don’t know (I’ve sent them a mail, though).

It’s a fair question. We described the primary research in our Broadband Britons project as ‘ethnographic’. It was done exclusively by our project partners at Ideas Bazaar, an ‘ethnographic boutique’. Their research was led by Dr Simon Roberts, and we were tremendously impressed by their work - check them out.

OK, defensive bit over. It is also true that this is a dilemma for places like Demos - lacking background in the discipline, we nevertheless find great value in just ‘deep hanging out’ with people we are trying to understand, and I’m sure it’s tempting for people to over-claim in an attempt to talk about that kind of work.

Thanks for the interest, and to Lorenz for the tip off. jc

Thanks for answering. Ideas Bazaar are well known in the anthropological blogosphere.

“deep hanging out” will be part of my vocabulary from now on…