Field Notes

It is common belief that evidence produced by qualitative research is bounded by the researcher's personal interpretation, and as such is subjective and not generalizable. Qualitative researchers' personal involvement could highlight hidden aspects of social life and provide insight into people's perspectives. In educational contexts, research aims to critically inform educational judgments and decisions in order to improve educational action. This study assesses the argument that qualitative research can offer no more than subjective impressions with an emphasis on structured observation as opposed to audio recordings and field notes for the purposes of observation. This discussion includes related concepts such as "point sampling", "(negative) demand characteristics" and "participants' reactivity" and reflexivity. The study concludes by arguing that the claim that qualitative research can offer no more than subjective impressions is a rhetorical device rather than a methodological position. Quantitative researchers strive to produce scientific data based on objective evaluations by avoiding any personal involvement in their evaluations and by investigating causal relationships in the widest possible populations. It is this growing interest in generalizability in the qualitative tradition that indicates the researchers' concern in making their research valid and as widely accepted as possible.

Narrative inquiry, a relatively new qualitative methodology, is the study of experience understood narratively. It is a way of thinking about, and studying, experience. Narrative inquirers think narratively about experience throughout inquiry.

This article considers the creation of visual field notes as part of the process of conducting fieldwork. By means of drawing and related activities, anthropologists immerse themselves in a field-based, generative process that engages them, simultaneously, in the acts of thinking, seeing, and doing. Insight and understanding emerge in the course of producing marks on a page that have iconic and indexical dimensions. The indexical potential of drawing(s), in particular, is noteworthy as visual signs stimulate connections between the world “out there” and issues in anthropology and other disciplines via culturally recognized signifiers. This path to understanding by visual means is never entirely predictable but nonetheless vital and creative. With theoretical inspiration drawn from the fields of anthropology, art, and education, this article is based on the experience of producing a set of visual and verbal field notes as part of a college field study trip to the Yucatan.

Field crews from The University of Texas at Austin first identified pterosaur remains from the Upper Cretaceous Javelina Formation of Big Bend National Park in 1971 and continued excavation of these animals for decades. The announcement of the giant Quetzalcoatlus northropi in 1975 by graduate student Douglas Lawson drew worldwide attention, and fossil preparators William Amaral and Robert Rainey discovered several key localities in a region informally called Pterodactyl Ridge that have been thoroughly collected and documented. The Pterodactyl Ridge sites produced hundreds of bones from surface collection and quarries through 1986, but later surface collection yielded poorer results. The majority of these elements represent an animal substantially smaller than Q. northropi, Quetzalcoatlus lawsoni Andres and Langston, 2021-historically referred to as Quetzalcoatlus sp. These and subsequent field expeditions from several institutions have reported occurrences of pterosaurs from both the Aguja and Javelina formations, but this study limits only the Javelina Formation material to pterosaurs. Quetzalcoatlus northropi is known within Big Bend National Park only from stream channel facies, and the smaller Q. lawsoni from the upper abandoned channel-lake facies at Pterodactyl Ridge. The lower abandoned channel-lake facies strata of Pterodactyl Ridge produce a third genus and species, Wellnhopterus brevirostris Andres and Langston, 2021. In addition, a smaller azhdarchid is found in the overbank floodplain facies.

In this article, I discuss the fact that doing “anthropology at home” involves the same core anthropological methodology as undertaking research abroad. This implies that while doing anthropology at home may have some advantages concerning field practicalities but is equally challenging. There are certain ethical and methodological essentials involved in every anthropological research undertaking. Through my personal experiences of conducting ethnography in Pakistan, I explain that doing anthropology at home does not make exceptions for the researcher in terms of these ethical and methodological aspects.

This article examines the online management of culturally sensitive knowledge through a discussion of a collaboration between the Museum of the Cherokee Indian and the Smithsonian Institution. It discusses the roles of the two institutions in a digital repatriation project involving an extensive body of 19th and 20th century manuscripts as well as the assumptions that informed their respective decisions regarding the online presentation of traditional cultural expressions. The case study explores some challenges involved in providing online access to culturally sensitive materials: first, by probing disparate senses of the term community, and then through a close examination of a particular class of heritage materials about which many Cherokee feel deeply ambivalent and for which notions of collective ownership are especially problematic. The Cherokee knowledge repatriation project offers a novel model for the circulation of digital heritage materials that may have wider applicability. The success of the project suggests that collaboration between tribal and non-tribal institutions may lead to more creative solutions for managing traditional cultural expressions than either alone can provide.

For many men in modern western societies it is not uncommon to have casual same-sex intercourses with a varying frequency depending on their biographical history. In this paper a research about sex acts in a public park in a small town located in northern Italy is reported: the study was performed in order to observe sex-negotiation strategies and different ways of sexual intercourse. The documentation of the participant observation data consisted of notes recorded in field notebooks. These data are records of what I experienced and learned through interaction with other people. Field notes include an account of events, how people behaved and reacted, what was said in conversation, where people were positioned in relationship to one another, their comings and goings, physical gestures, my subjective responses to what I observed, and all other details and observations necessary to make the story of the participant observation experience complete. Field notes were written discreetly during participant observation or following the activity, depending on the context and the situation. Whatever the case, notes were expanded as soon as possible before my memory of the details faded into a descriptive narrative. In this paper I propose a model for the analysis of my field notes: while commenting on the narrative component of the notes, I will show how a description of a casual sex encounter is similar to a fairy tale, and how techniques developed to parse and access fairy tales could be used to improve access to the study of cruising practices, in particular I will use a method directly derived from Vladimir J. Propp's works. This short paper has three parts: first; I expose some consideration about the possible use of narrative analysis on ethnographic field notes; next, I provide a brief introduction on Propp's fairy-tale structure analysis; and third, I offer my suggestions of how field notes about casual encounters can be similarly analyzed.

Today there are numerous technological tools available that can provide an online channel for exploring unique museum objects and stories behind them. One powerful means of demonstrating the diversity and depth of collections and associated content is to map a geographic affiliation or origin of an object, or to visualize where a significant event took place and where people lived. This roundtable will review traditional as well as more innovative means of mapping museum objects and geographic content. In the natural history collections community that involves field collecting, recording an accurate locality of a specimen has been critical for scientific study of collection data for decades. With recent advancement in informatics, professional standards of recording geographic data have evolved considerably. The trend has transformed our practice as to how we manage collection data. More recently, digital presentation of locations of objects, sites, and events on maps are no longer limited to the natural science discipline. Content associated with specific places can increase visibility with a variety of innovative mapping technology. This group will exchange ideas about various online applications and case studies on geographic data capturing and visualization, which can be beneficial to cultural and scientific institutions of all sizes.

Kesan pertama kali saya ketika tiba dan turun dari bus adalah kami menjadi pusat perhatian, lebih tepatnya dilihati orang mungkin karena kendaraan yang ditumpangi adalah dua bus besar, jumlah mahasiswa yang ikut banyak dan waktu tiba itu masih pagi dimana banyak orang memulai aktivitasnya. Bukan hanya warga-warga sekitar saya ikut melihat dari kejauhan, justru perhatian saya mulai beda ketika melihat ada beberapa orang baduy juga melihati kami dengan seksama, seperti menyambut ataukah hanya berdiri biasa saja keheranan: 'mau ngapain lagi-lagi orang kota datang kemari'.

Language revitalization benefits speakers of languages through acquisition as well as comprehension, community, and immersion. While the languages discussed originated from different continents, they share the common outlet of technology as a means of transmission. The use of technology as a resource for the propagating of dwindling languages is important because languages, generally and inherently, contain a wealth of societal and cultural information that may otherwise be taken for granted. There is to be more inquiry into the many ways technology can be expanded for the purposes of language revitalization.

Field notes from the summer 2017 field work in Siberia

Stenography of the itinerary. 1

Suddenly (and I have to fly tomorrow) I am not excited to go to “the field,” which is also “home.” The distance is never a stable measure. The distance grows. With time, it deepens. I am clinging to things: a kerchief that I have not been wearing for months, I definitely need to take it with me. All the colorful pens. All these books I have not finished. The pages of handwriting I did not have time to type; I am spending the last day before the departure trying to determine what I might be missing the next day. A futile wonder. I will miss nothing in particular and everything at once, but I probably will also be too occupied with what immediately arises in my sight to ponder over anything that I have left.

Eco-feminism, cultural study and the environment coalesce in the form of poetic cultural commentary, originally field notes.  I draw exclusively from my years in the Alaskan Arctic among the Iñupiaq Eskimo, who call themselves “the People of the Whale.”  The striking and severe natural environment, a landscape of endless ice, is central to the poetry, which richly portrays a vision of the Arctic absent from tourist travel guides, National Geographic and anthropological volumes.  These magazines vend the Far North’s beautiful austerity, including at times the physical beauty of its animal inhabitants, including humans, while disregarding human specificity and violence in the Arctic—aspects inherent to every culture.  This article remarks on the cultural tourism and ethnographic subjectivity employed in commercial travel writing, and endeavours to present a more comprehensive view of today’s Arctic environment.

Field notes area a form of environmental writing which underly ethnographic writing but are rarely published.  Typically, ethnographic “write-up” takes place when research concludes—sometimes years after the study was conducted—developed from, or written as, fieldwork journals; it therefore sustains immediacy and integrity of intention.  Such writing participates in symbolic anthropology but additionally acknowledges fieldworkers’ sense of self and play.  Instead of censoring data in order to extirpate subjectivity, singularity and/or sexuality, the ethnographer voices thoughts, feelings, and images evoked in the field as expressive writing.

These " Notes from the Field " describe one doctoral student's public visual fieldnotes practice during her data collection for her dissertation. In the creation of a public digital space for participants and the public to engage with the fieldnotes through online comments and in-person conversations, this shifts the practice of keeping the researcher's initial thoughts private and separate from the research participants. In an attempt to address a critique of her own Master's work, and the potentially exclusionary practice of private fieldnotes writing in participatory research, the piece raises questions about positionality and ethical concerns in relation to a digital archive of public visual fieldnotes as reflexive ethnographic practice. RENDRE PUBLIQUES LES NOTES DE TERRAIN VISUELLES EN TANT QUE PRATIQUE ETHNOGRAPHIQUE REFLEXIVE RÉSUMÉ. Ce texte décrit la démarche de diffusion publique de notes de terrain visuelles par une étudiante au doctorat au cours de l'étape de collecte de don-nées pour sa thèse. Celle-ci a créé un espace numérique public permettant aux participants et au public de réagir aux notes, par le biais de commentaires en ligne ou d'échanges en personne. Ce faisant, elle a modifié la pratique de garder privées et hors de portée des participants les réflexions initiales du chercheur. Cette note se veut une démarche critique de son travail de maîtrise et de la pra-tique potentielle d'exclusion que constituent les notes de terrain gardées privées dans le contexte d'un projet de recherche participative. Ce texte soulève des questions sur le positionnement du chercheur et des préoccupations éthiques en lien avec l'archivage numérique de notes de terrain visuelles en tant que pratique ethnographie réflexive.

In terms of their directness and modification strategies, this study investigated how undergraduate speakers of Turkish formulate their naturally occurring requests in an academic context, in which they request things from an academic in his office. After a 4-year data collection period, the researcher analyzed 395 of the requests (hand-recorded as immediate field notes) made to him. The findings on levels of directness revealed that the strongest tendency is towards conventionally indirect strategies, while the female tendency towards them is even clearer. The dominance of conventional indirectness is in parallel also with the degree of imposition of the requests. 'Zero marking' is what dominates the findings on internal modification strategies, while some preferences, such as unfinished sentences, could suggest language or context-specific results. In light of these descriptive findings on a part of everyday language in academia, the study could in practical terms help learners and teachers of Turkish and Turkish learners/teachers of English or any other language as well. Moreover, it could contribute to the efforts towards handling the methodological concerns in pragmatics research about the extent to which elicited data can represent what people actually say in natural conversation.

These “Notes from the Field” describe one doctoral student’s public visual fieldnotes practice during her data collection for her dissertation. In the creation of a public digital space for participants and the public to engage with the fieldnotes through online comments and in-person conversations, this shifts the practice of keeping the researcher’s initial thoughts private and separate from the research participants. In an attempt to address a critique of her own Master’s work, and the potentially exclusionary practice of private fieldnotes writing in participatory research, the piece raises questions about positionality and ethical concerns in relation to a digital archive of public visual fieldnotes as reflexive ethnographic practice.

This paper outlines some challenges for the Web Observatory vision with reference to field notes from a student exchange and research collaboration in December 2013 between the University of Southampton, Tsinghua University and KAIST. These field notes outline a methodological narrative of the practical challenges that we faced in using the Web Observatory in collaborative research. It is suggested that these challenges particularly come in the form of technical, organizational and legal issues. The paper concludes with some proposals for the future of the Web Observatory vision.

These " Notes from the Field " describe one doctoral student's public visual fieldnotes practice during her data collection for her dissertation. In the creation of a public digital space for participants and the public to engage with the fieldnotes through online comments and in-person conversations, this shifts the practice of keeping the researcher's initial thoughts private and separate from the research participants. In an attempt to address a critique of her own Master's work, and the potentially exclusionary practice of private fieldnotes writing in participatory research, the piece raises questions about positionality and ethical concerns in relation to a digital archive of public visual fieldnotes as reflexive ethnographic practice. RENDRE PUBLIQUES LES NOTES DE TERRAIN VISUELLES EN TANT QUE PRATIQUE ETHNOGRAPHIQUE REFLEXIVE RÉSUMÉ. Ce texte décrit la démarche de diffusion publique de notes de terrain visuelles par une étudiante au doctorat au cours de...

Abstract
The Russian-Siberian journey, carried out with Alexander von Humboldt and Gustav Rose in 1829 coincided with a decisive phase in Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg’s scientific career. His field diary and the drawings he made on the trip document his intensified focus on the study of microorganisms. The numerous observations on plant and animal geography show how Ehrenberg tested a combination of micro- and macro-perspectives that would shape his research on infusoria in the following decades: In addition to the task of classification at the microscope, Ehrenberg carried out worldwide comparative research on the distribution of microorganisms.

Resumen
El viaje a Rusia y Siberia de Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg en compañía de Alexander von Humboldt y Gustav Rose, realizado en 1829, coincidió con una fase decisiva en su carrera científica. Su diario y los dibujos realizados durante el viaje documentan una especial atención al estudio de los microorganismos. Las numerosas observaciones sobre la geografía de las plantas y los animales muestran cómo Ehrenberg ensayó una combinación de micro y macroperspectivas que daría forma a sus investigaciones sobre los infusorios en las décadas siguientes. Además de su labor de clasificación al microscopio, Ehrenberg llevó a cabo una investigación comparativa a nivel mundial sobre la distribución de los microorganismos.

Résumé
Le voyage en Russie et en Sibérie entrepris en 1829 avec Alexander von Humboldt et Gustav Rose coïncide avec une phase décisive de la carrière scientifique de Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg. Son carnet de voyage ainsi que les dessins réalisés par lui lors du voyage témoignent de l’intensification de son intérêt pour l’étude des microorganismes. Les nombreuses observations sur la géographie des plantes et des animaux font preuve de la façon dont Ehrenberg a testé d’adopter une combinaison de micro- et de macro-perspectives qui ont façonné ses recherches sur les infusoires dans les décennies suivantes: Outre la tâche de classification au microscope, Ehrenberg a mené des recherches comparatives mondiales sur la distribution et la dispersion des microorganismes.

For researchers doing qualitative research, interviews are a commonly used method. Data collected through interviews can be recorded through field notes, transcripts, or tape recordings. In the literature, there is a debate regarding which of these recording methods should be used. There are issues of reliability, cost (time and money), loss of data, among others. Technology plays a pivotal role in this debate. Indeed, new technologies (e.g., direct coding) are often seen as potential replacements for older technologies (e.g., transcripts), which leads to a debate that is based on an evolution narrative (from field notes, to transcripts, to working from tape recordings). This article argues that a combination narrative should be considered where combination is better than substitution. Moreover, combining the advantages of field notes, transcripts, and working from tape recordings without accumulating each method’s disadvantages is possible because of new technology. To support this...

In terms of their directness and modification strategies, this study investigated how undergraduate speakers of Turkish formulate their naturally occurring requests in an academic context, in which they request things from an academic in his office. After a 4-year data collection period, the researcher analyzed 395 of the requests (hand-recorded as immediate field notes) made to him. The findings on levels of directness revealed that the strongest tendency is towards conventionally indirect strategies, while the female tendency towards them is even clearer. The dominance of conventional indirectness is in parallel also with the degree of imposition of the requests. 'Zero marking' is what dominates the findings on internal modification strategies, while some preferences, such as unfinished sentences, could suggest language or context-specific results. In light of these descriptive findings on a part of everyday language in academia, the study could in practical terms help learners and teachers of Turkish and Turkish learners/teachers of English or any other language as well. Moreover, it could contribute to the efforts towards handling the methodological concerns in pragmatics research about the extent to which elicited data can represent what people actually say in natural conversation.

The main argument of this brief essay was to connect my practice to geography and its transformation and control. The mere impossibility of locating the field with absolute logic is due to various bipolar conditions like its geographical and historical specificity between South and Southeast Asia. The sudden drawing of borders in 1947 made it difficult to point out its distinct description in terms of identity.

This piece is an autobiographical reflection on practice. Models of professional development are reviewed based on personal experience in the field working with practicing teachers in a variety of capacities. A case is made for teacher inquiry as a model for sustained professional improvement over time that is personally meaningful and potentially transformative. The reader is invited to consider how education technology leaders can leverage the potential of connected classrooms by transforming teacher practice.