ER DER NOGEN NYHEDER? Sladder som etnografisk metode

Abstract

Tao Kongsbak: Is There Any News?
 - Gossip as an Ethnographic Method
 Ethnographers have always used gossip in
 fieldwork. Malinowski was one of the first to
 point to the central importance of gossip in
 ethnographic data-collection. However, not
 many ethnographers have showed how they
 have actually and systematically used gossip
 as a method. The purpose of the article is to
 introduce gossip as an ethnographic method.
 Gossip is thus treated as a communicative
 genre, and some of the insights that can be
 generated through gossip are described: the
 social taste of the group, participants’ experience
 of intimate relations, core values of
 the group underlying the world view. This is
 followed by examples that show how to get
 involved in gossip. The article also
 comments on the widely discussed crisis of
 ethnographic authority and suggests that this
 crisis should be overcome, not by taking refuge
 in abstract theoretical concepts like „resonance"
 and „prophecy" but practically: the
 ethnographer must do more to involve himself
 with the locals and be more observant
 while he is involved. A systematic use of
 gossip in the field is one solution.