Ethnomethodology

Analysis of practical management of information in a task management meeting

by Shinichiro Sakai

Co-authored with Norihisa Awamura and Nozomi Ikeya.
Accepted and will be published in the Proceedings of the Information Behaviour Conference (ISIC) 2012.

Introduction. Although many researchers have generally recognised the importance of understanding information use... more Introduction. Although many researchers have generally recognised the importance of understanding information use embedded in practices, many studies have nonetheless concentrated on the investigation of information behaviour rather than on the activities in which these behaviours appear. In this paper, an attempt is made to demonstrate a way to examine information activities as embedded in practice (practical management of information) through explicating how activities are organised as they are experienced by the participants.

Methods. We conducted fieldwork at the workplace of a group of Japanese IT hardware engineers to understand their practices. Audio and video recordings, as well as field notes and photos, were taken as part of the fieldwork.

Analysis. By taking an ethnomethodological approach, we tried to understand how the engineers went about carrying out task management on a daily basis through a morning meeting. We also examined how participants manage information through the morning meeting.

Conclusions. Some distinctive features of practical management of information have emerged from the analysis: information activities of various kinds are mutually elaborative to each other and to the overall activity, and these are developed in a contingent and ad hoc manner. All of these features are aspects of the embedded character of information activities that can be identified because the examination of practical organisation reveals the interactional, contingent development of activities.

How gamers manage aggression: Situating skills in collaborative computer games

by Ulrika Bennerstedt

co-authored with Jonas Ivarsson & Jonas Linderoth. Published in International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning.

In the discussion on what players learn from digital games, there are two major camps in clear opposition to each... more In the discussion on what players learn from digital games, there are two major camps in clear opposition to each other. As one side picks up on negative elements found in games the other side focuses on positive aspects. While the agendas differ, the basic arguments still depart from a shared logic: that engagement in game-related activities fosters the development of behaviors that are transferred to situations beyond the game itself. With an approach informed by ethnomethodology, in this paper we probe the underlying logic connected to studies that argue for such general effects of games. By focusing on proficient gamers involved in the core game activity of boss encounters in a massively multiplayer online game, we examine the fundamentals that must be learnt and mastered for succeeding in an ordinary collaborative gaming practice where aggression is portrayed. On the basis of our empirical analysis we then address the contentious links between concrete instances of play and generic effects. As expected, the results point to “aggression” as well as “collaboration” as major components in the gaming experience, but our analysis also suggests that the practices associated with these notions are locally tied to the game. Based on these results, we propose that to reverse this relationship and claim that game environments foster collaboration or aggression in general first assumes strong theoretical claims about the nature of cognition and learning, and second, risks confusing the debate with hyperbole.

Embodied Reasoning in Architectural Critique

by Jonas Ivarsson

Murphy, K. M., Ivarsson, J. & Lymer, G. Accepted for publication in Design Studies

In this paper we explore the use of analogical reasoning as means for identifying problems in architectural critique... more In this paper we explore the use of analogical reasoning as means for identifying problems in architectural critique interactions. We focus in particular on the conversational invocation of specific architectural references as comparative cases intended to expand, clarify, or challenge details in student presentations. These analogical comparisons are not merely asserted by critics, but are interactively achieved as multimodal forms of action that combine talk with other forms of embodied action. Moreover, taking into account the wider goal structures in which the comparisons are embedded, we argue that in the context of architectural education, reasoning through analogy is a key means for socializing students into certain aspects of professional architecture and testing the limits of architectural knowledge.

‘Rose’s gloss’: Considerations of natural sociology and ethnography in practice.

by Andrew Carlin

Published in Qualitative Sociology Review 2006, 2(3): 65-77.

This paper explores the nature and use of 'Rose's Gloss' for ethnographic research. Rose's Gloss is a technique -... more This paper explores the nature and use of 'Rose's Gloss' for ethnographic research. Rose's Gloss is a technique - credited to Edward Rose, late of the University of Colorado at Boulder - for eliciting information from members of society without imposing methodologically ironic categories onto members' responses. This facilitates what Rose called 'natural' (people's own) rather than 'professional' (stipulative) sociology, which is the distinctive feature of the 'Ethno-Inquiries' approach to social research that he pioneered. A pilgrimage to Jerusalem provided unexpected opportunities to document the worded nature of social life. The pilgrimage demonstrates how Rose's Gloss can be used as an ethnographic practice to pass as a competent participant in study sites.

Etnometodo-logia: uma apresentação

by Michel Binet

Uses of “understand” in science education

by Oskar Lindwall

Co-authored with Gustav Lymer, published in the Journal of Pragmatics, 2011

For this study, thirty hours of video-recorded and transcribed interaction taken from a lab course in a teacher... more For this study, thirty hours of video-recorded and transcribed interaction taken from a lab course in a teacher education program have been examined. Throughout this material, utterances such as “I don’t understand” or “do you get it” are strikingly frequent. This has motivated us to investigate the positioning, use, and interactional significance of utterances that include “get it,” “understand,” or any of their conjugations. The investigated material is presented and organized into five themes: students requesting help from other students; students requesting help from teachers; students asking other students if they understand; uses of “understand” in the closing of a task; and teachers’ uses of “understand.” While the range of uses of “understand” is wide, it is interesting to note that there are some clear distributional patterns. An overwhelming majority of the investigated uses concerns the assignment, the purpose of the lab, or the subject matter content. In addition, they are often found in the closing and opening of task-based activities and instructional sequences. One can further note that the investigated uses of “understand” are constrained by different sets of rights and obligations for students and teachers.

Instruction-in-Interaction: The Teaching and Learning of a Manual Skill

by Oskar Lindwall

Co-authored with Anna Ekström, published in Human Studies 2012

This study takes an interest in instructions and instructed actions in the context of manual skills. The analysis... more This study takes an interest in instructions and instructed actions in the context of manual skills. The analysis focuses on a video recorded episode where a teacher demonstrates how to crochet chain stitches, requests a group of students to reproduce her actions, and then repeatedly corrects the attempts of one of the students. The initial request, and the students’ responses to it, could be seen as preliminary to the series of corrective sequences that come next: the request and the following attempts make it possible for the teacher to launch instructional sequences specifically designed and addressed to the students who need further guidance. In the interaction between the teacher and the novice student, the reasoned character of the instructed actions is not explained so much as installed and tuned. The materiality of the project makes it possible for the two parties to methodically and meticulously adjust their actions in accordance with each other, and towards the gradual realization of the aimed-for results. In connection to this, a number of issues pertaining to the reproducibility and recognizability of manual skills are raised: how instructions-in-interaction orient towards the progression of the skill rather than the interaction itself; how attempts by and mistakes of the instructed party provide grounds for further instruction; and, consequently, how instructions in the form of corrections build on the instructor’s continuous assessments of the instructed actions.

(D)écrire : catégoriser, prendre des notes, écrire

by Philippe Gonzalez

« (D)écrire : catégoriser, prendre des notes, écrire », in D. Cefaï (éd.), L’engagement ethnographique, Paris, Éd. de l’EHESS, 2010, p. 107-128.

Categories, norms and inferences. Generating entertainment in a daytime talk show.

by Richard Fitzgerald

A unpublished draft paper that is taking too long to finish

Abstract.
This paper examines the way the host of a daytime television talk show generates entertainment by... more Abstract.
This paper examines the way the host of a daytime television talk show generates entertainment by creating categorial frames for the studio guests which are then used to produce moral evaluations around their actions towards each other. In doing this the paper draws upon Sacks’ (1995) work on storytelling, and in particular his discussion of categorial inferencing and category norms, as a guiding resource for the overhearing audiences. The data is taken from the UK TV daytime talk show The Jeremy Kyle Show. The show’s format is based around guests relating stories of conflict with each other over topics concerning infidelity, paternity or theft and where the culmination is usually a paternity test or lie detector test. The analytic focus of this paper is on the collaborative telling of the story prior to any test and in particular on the way the host works to overlay individual identities and events with membership categories and category based actions. The paper then examines how this work by the host then provides for the invocation of category based normative reasoning by which to produce contrasts and pass moral judgement on the guests and their actions. In detailing the hosts’ work in layering categories, devices and predicated actions over personal identity and individual actions the analysis highlights the way individual actions are made accountable for the overhearing audience through category based norms and moral frames.

Location aware mobile interactive guides: usability issues

by Patrizia Marti

Design for art and leisure

by Patrizia Marti

The environment as interface

by Patrizia Marti

Making the Link: Households and Small Business Activity In a Multi-Ethnic Context

by Tahir Abbas

Ethno-Religious Identities and Islamic Political Radicalism In the UK: A Case Study

by Tahir Abbas

This paper is a case study of the ethno-cultural identity politics that young Muslim men since the events of 9/11 and... more This paper is a case study of the ethno-cultural identity politics that young Muslim men since the events of 9/11 and 7/7 are found to be engaging with, using a life history methodology and the experiences of Moazzam Begg as a lens through which to view a wider phenomenon. It is argued that the issues, debates and policy concerns impacting on the question of Islamic political radicalism in Britain, namely inequality, integration, multiculturalism, foreign policy, the influence of Islamism and the ways in which the historical, cultural, economic and political societal context that young Muslims find themselves in today, all affect the experience of conflicting multicultural identity politics and Islamic revivalism, with one informing the other. First, the methodology is outlined. Second, the analysis explores the life history of Moazzam Begg, identifying the macro-meso-micro tensions between individual Muslim identity development in the context of global tensions and conflicts relating to the Islamic world. In conclusion, it is argued that the layers of radicalization are local, national and international in character, and this paper is an attempt to determine the nature and orientation of how these factors are at play. Furthermore, a clarion call is made to British academics, activists and policymakers to ask discerning questions and determine nuanced solutions to quite complex problems.

Muslim-on-Muslim Social Research: Knowledge, Power and Religio-cultural Identities

by Tahir Abbas

2010

This paper provides a detailed discussion of the questions relating to the role of the researcher in relation to the... more This paper provides a detailed discussion of the questions relating to the role of the researcher in relation to the researched when the researcher and the researched are both of Muslim origin. Issues relating to questions of objectivity, transparency, bias and interpretation are elaborated upon as part of the analysis of impacts and outcomes in relation to methodological process. It is argued that, ultimately, the subjective positions of researcher and researched are less important than the objective nature of the research process. The intention of this paper is to convey, to other Muslim and non-Muslim social researchers engaged in research on Islam and Muslims, how to avoid or identify the range of risks and pitfalls that may emerge in operationalising and evaluating social research in a highly charged political, cultural and social research arena.

Kampffertigkeit: Eine Soziologie praktischen Wissens

by Larissa Schindler

Interactions sociales en univers virtuels vers une recherche d’immersion émotionnelle

by María Lucila Morales-Rodríguez

María Lucila Morales-Rodriguez, Bernard Pavard, Nico Pallamin. Colloque Scientifique Approches croisées de la création de logiciels et dispositifs numériques ludo-éducatifs dans le cadre du forum Ludovia. July 7-8 2005, Saint-Lizier, France.

Pour générer un sentiment d’immersion dans une simulation avec des personnages virtuels, il est fondamental que ceux... more Pour générer un sentiment d’immersion dans une simulation avec des personnages virtuels, il est fondamental que ceux ci puissent exprimer un comportement interactionnel et émotionnel réaliste. Notre objectif est de provoquer un sentiment d’immersion sociale et culturelle chez des sujets humains en interaction dans l’univers virtuel en reproduisant des comportements corporels et gestuels dépendant de leurs états émotionnels propres. Une importance particulière a également été accordée à la dimension indexicale de l’interaction notamment à l’usage de gestes de désignation d’objets extérieurs et à la gestion du dialogue entre individus.

Modèle d'interaction sociale pour des agents conversationnels animés: application à la rééducation de patients cérébro-lésés

by María Lucila Morales-Rodríguez

Thèse de Doctorat, Institut de Recherche en Informatique de Toulouse. Université Paul Sabatier: Toulouse, France. p. 108
2007

Social interaction in virtual universe opens new horizons in the field of information technologies, and particularly,... more Social interaction in virtual universe opens new horizons in the field of information technologies, and particularly, in the use of video games for professional purposes (a.k.a. serious game). Introducing a certain level of realism in the social and emotional interactions of virtual characters makes it possible to consider many professional applications, which could have only been developed until now in the field of human-human interaction.
The main difficulty of this approach is to produce a human interaction dynamic that makes sense for the tasks and actions that must be achieved by the characters. In order to develop this kind of dynamics, we have referred to (i) the approaches of situated cognition (so as to take into account the role of the objects of the environment), and (ii) representational approaches for the production of speech acts.
We focus on the production of verbal, nonverbal and paraverbal interactions between a human and a virtual character in the context of virtual therapy. Initially, we were interested in the description of the dynamics of the visual, gesture and verbal interactions between a patient and a real therapist. This study enabled us to categorize the phases of dialogue and to elaborate a model of the dynamics of the interaction, taking into account the personality of the actors, their intentions, and their verbal and gesture behaviours.
From this model, we have elaborated a generic architecture, which is articulated around a behavioural model and a kinesics model. The behavioural model selects the speech acts and
the attitude of the character (empathic, neutral, etc). The kinesics model selects and integrates the facial, posture and gesture expressions related to the results of the behavioural model.
From a theoretical point of view, we were interested in the concept of presence in order to identify which was the nature of the relevant couplings making it possible to produce a feeling of social presence (i.e. a feeling of living a social interaction not mediated by the elements of the technical device for the human actors which animate their characters).
Finally, the device was used within the framework of a research program on the concept of mirror neurons. The assumption is that the presentation of a virtual image of its handicapped member to the patient would enable him to better recover. For this purpose,
IRMf tests associated with each experiment would allow to confirm or to invalidate the role of these mirror neurons in the process of recovery.

Modèle d'interaction sociale pour des agents conversationnels animés

by María Lucila Morales-Rodríguez

Thèse de Doctorat, Université Paul Sabatier: Toulouse, France. p. 108, 2007
French

Social interaction in virtual universe opens new horizons in the field of information technologies, and particularly,... more Social interaction in virtual universe opens new horizons in the field of information technologies, and particularly, in the use of video games for professional purposes (a.k.a. serious game). Introducing a certain level of realism in the social and emotional interactions of virtual characters makes it possible to consider many professional applications, which could have only been developed until now in the field of human-human interaction.
The main difficulty of this approach is to produce a human interaction dynamic that makes sense for the tasks and actions that must be achieved by the characters. In order to develop this kind of dynamics, we have referred to (i) the approaches of situated cognition (so as to take into account the role of the objects of the environment), and (ii) representational approaches for the production of speech acts.
We focus on the production of verbal, nonverbal and paraverbal interactions between a human and a virtual character in the context of virtual therapy. Initially, we were interested in the description of the dynamics of the visual, gesture and verbal interactions between a patient and a real therapist. This study enabled us to categorize the phases of dialogue and to elaborate a model of the dynamics of the interaction, taking into account the personality of the actors, their intentions, and their verbal and gesture behaviours.
From this model, we have elaborated a generic architecture, which is articulated around a behavioural model and a kinesics model. The behavioural model selects the speech acts and
the attitude of the character (empathic, neutral, etc). The kinesics model selects and integrates the facial, posture and gesture expressions related to the results of the behavioural model.
From a theoretical point of view, we were interested in the concept of presence in order to identify which was the nature of the relevant couplings making it possible to produce a feeling of social presence (i.e. a feeling of living a social interaction not mediated by the elements of the technical device for the human actors which animate their characters).
Finally, the device was used within the framework of a research program on the concept of mirror neurons. The assumption is that the presentation of a virtual image of its handicapped member to the patient would enable him to better recover. For this purpose,
IRMf tests associated with each experiment would allow to confirm or to invalidate the role of these mirror neurons in the process of recovery.

" Talk, Power and Professionals: Partial Repeats as' Challenges' in the Psychiatric Interview"

by Wayne Mellinger