Ethnographic Case Study Research Articles

Learning, digital technologies, and sociomaterial approaches: A critical reflection from the perspective of materialist dialectics

In this article, I attempt to critically reflect on sociomaterial approaches to learning, especially as it is conducted with digital technologies. By pursuing detailed ethnographic case studies, these approaches argue for the active character of digital technologies in the constitution of learning. More specifically, digital technologies are treated in this paradigm as co-participants—along with humans—in the formation of learning practices. Despite their invaluable empirical insights, I suggest that these approaches do not adequately emphasize the transformative potential of learners and do not conceptualize learning from the perspective of human development. In addition, I propose that, apart from empirically based research, which is the preferred mode of research of sociomaterial approaches, there is also a need for categorical thinking to conceptualize the mediation of learning by digital technologies. In my critical reflection, I draw on scholars working in the traditions of cultural-historical theory and activity theory, and on materialist dialectics more generally

Virtual Ethnography of “Padang Halal Tourism”: A Case study on City Branding

The use of website and social media in government digital marketing has not yet properly known by tourist and potential investors. Mostly the information received was obtained from those who have been into the city, social media organized by private sectors, and netizens. Literally, the social media through the mouth-to-mouth marketing has become the communication channel of the city branding. This research aims at determining the social or cultural environment that influence the selection for social media, messages, and promotional activities used in establishing the brand awareness. Heretofore, the branding of Padang City was not characterized and customized, similar to other cities and regencies in West Sumatera Province. Besides that, the pattern and concept of halal tourism yet have been developed well even though Muslims were the majority of the population. The branding of Padang City has always been identified and integrated into the province, where they were included as the best city in “The best World Halal Tourism Destination“ in Halal Tourism Award 2016. Therefore, this current research applied the virtual ethnographic case study in response to various texts and discursive interpretations on city branding communication related to language approach in communal discussion. The virtual ethnographic adopted from anthropology emphasizes on the importance of researchers’ involvement with the subject being researched in order to get comprehensive understanding on the particular social and cultural environment. The method taken was participant-observation utilizing the internet, where the researchers was immersed within the life of a social and cultural groups in collecting the data, and in gaining the understanding of the groups’ members perspective. This method involves many aspects of qualitative research rather than describing, explaining, or grouping words or actions of a member in a certain community in the internet. Observation and online interaction is regarded as a cultural reflection resulting to deeper understanding. Data collection was performed by having a thorough communication with the member of a particular culture or community such as Muslims community. The communication occurred was in accordance with the needs requiring the involvement, participation, physical contact, interaction, union, relationship, collaboration, and connection among those the members in the community, instead of through websites, servers, or keyboards. In addition, searching the documents in the form of pictures, videos, audios, log books, magazines, symbols, artifacts, and other related objects with the research was also carried out, in order to enrich the data obtained. The results of this research could be used as the recommendation for the government in improving the implementation of city branding, and essentially in developing the city branding theory.

Theorizing ‘Variegated Bonding as SME Diversification Strategy’ to Extend Business from Traditional to Emergent Sectors

Few studies on diversification strategies address small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and how they differ from large firms. Although related diversifications tend to be the approach for SME diversifications, we need to know more about unrelated diversifications by SMEs. This study focuses on the process of SME unrelated diversification and conduct ethnographic case study on a family business SME from Kyrgyzstan. The inductive process study offers variegated bonding as a possible process of SME diversification. The process consists of the three steps: appetizing, baby-stepping and reconstructing identity. This study extends the extant literature on SME diversification and investigates how the organizational aspiration of identity reconstructions could lead to the focal organization’s entry to an unrelated sector and establishing connectivity between its core and emergent sector organization that eventually alters its identity.

(Foreign) Language Education and Its Impact on Equal Opportunity and Sustainability. Lessons Learned from A Bilingual German-Turkish Program at An Urban Elementary School in Germany

This article presents the results of an ethnographic case study in which the socio-cultural effects of a bilingual German-Turkish language program at an unusual elementary school in urban Hanover were examined. Not only children from families with a history of immigration from Turkey can learn Turkish in this school, but all children can. Findings indicate that valorizing a stigmatized migrant language and using it as an educational resource for all learners can lead to greater equity and social cohesion, as well as better academic performance. Based on the findings of the study, it is discussed what contribution a reorientation of (foreign) language education in the selective German school system could make to overcoming the dividing line between “belonging” and “foreign” and as a contribution to sustainable learning. The findings will furthermore be reanalyzed against the backdrop of the COV-19 pandemic.

Gendered Inequalities in Ethnic Enclaves: Labour Insertion of Bolivian Aymara Women in Northern Chilean Borderlands

This article presents an ethnographic case study on the labour insertion of 30 Bolivian Aymara women in Arica (Chile). It covers their life histories, contrasting their productive and migratory experiences. Our objective is to describe the sectors where the interviewees insert themselves in the labour market and show that their productive functions are configured in a multidimensional way: as ethnicised cultural and social capital and as a gender mandate. The findings suggest that their working activities are framed by the deployment of the multiple presence of women, which is configured as an expression of their productive and reproductive overload.

Storying Access: Citizen Journalism, Disability Justice, and the Kansas City Homeless Union

This article is an ethnographic case study of the work of two activist groups in Kansas City, Missouri. It discusses how unhoused activists with the Kansas City Homeless Union, through their 13-month on-and-off occupation of city property, worked to reframe access in ways that moved toward what disability justice activists call collective access, prioritized marginalized lived experience, and asserted their right to control over the resources that impacted their lives. This article ties these interventions explicitly to community writing work through a discussion of how citizen journalists from Independent Media Association, with whom the author has collaborated, documented and crafted narratives around the union’s work in ways that demonstrate ways community literacy work can function as rhetorical solidarity practices.

Uyghur and Tibetan university students’ English language learning in China: a spatial assemblage

ABSTRACT Informed by an increasing amount of research in understanding spatiality in language learning, this ethnographic case study investigates two ethnic minority university students’ English language learning in urban, virtual, and classroom spaces as they relocated to an interior city for higher education in southeastern China. Data consisted of the students’ informal online interactions, drawing journals, photos, and interviews. This study examines the participants’ capacity in appropriating and transforming both human and non-human objects in facilitating their English language learning and the contestations embedded in their meaning-making processes as they assembled their linguistic repertoires and materiality. This study finds that the virtual spaces are more enabling for the Uyghur student’s English language learning than his learning in urban and classroom spaces, whereas the urban space is more empowering for that of the Tibetan student. Instead of the traditional layout of classroom space, the two students became legitimate participants in the urban and virtual spaces where they actively engaged in utilizing resources for English language learning. This study indicates that spatiality needs to be seen as more central in shaping the participants’ English language learning outcomes. Implications for future research and pedagogy are provided.

Deals and value measuring in interactive health-care services

PurposeThis paper aims to investigate the role of value measuring (VM) as an integrated part of a deal introduced to govern the cross-boundary relationship of state specialist- and primary care providers in the Norwegian health sector.Design/methodology/approachDrawing on a longitudinal ethnographic case study, this study explores the role of payment for dischargeable patients (PDP), an incentive arrangement introduced as a mechanism of value appropriation intended to create stability in the relationship and support improved patient flows between care providers. The fieldwork took place over approximately 18 months, consisting of intensive participant observations, interviews and document studies.FindingsThe VM integrated in the PDP deal between the hospital and municipality, on the surface level, appears simple. The VM, however, rests on a very complex practice of information sharing where accounts on patient status, procedures and activities form the basis of the integrated VM. The deal and its VM, despite its ambitious aims, were not able to fulfill the expectations of a smooth appropriation of value through the management of monetary flows or supporting information sharing for value creation. The VM of the PDP deal aimed at bringing the parties closer together, rather created a distance where money matters became a source of tension.Originality/valueThis study investigates the interconnections of deals and VM in a public sector service context, showing aspects of deals different from that of prior studies into private sector deals.

BIM for Facilities Management: An Investigation into the Asset Information Delivery Process and the Associated Challenges

The most common problem facility managers face is information accessibility. While BIM has been posited as a potential solution to increase the quality and availability of asset information to support facilities management (FM), few studies have captured the challenging aspects of developing and delivering this information within the context of real-world projects with owner-defined information requirements. Based on three longitudinal ethnographic case studies that included a set of comprehensive and formal information requirements within the supply contracts, this research contributes to a better understanding of the BIM-enabled asset information delivery process and its challenges by (1) characterizing the process in eight main activities with examples, and (2) mapping the challenges of using BIM for FM that have been identified in the literature and establishing connections between them. The results demonstrate that even with the early involvement of owners through the development of information requirements, several challenges still prevent owners from taking full advantage of BIM. There is still a limited understanding of how BIM can effectively support existing FM activities and how it impacts current design and construction processes in practice, which compromises the definition of clear and efficient information requirements. In that sense, the support provided by industry standards and guidelines remains limited. The contextualized understanding of the proposed BIM-enabled asset information delivery process and its challenges will help owners and facility managers with the decision-making process regarding the development of their information requirements, preventing inefficiencies and unrealistic expectations.

Language policy and multilingualism in semi-peripheral higher education research: Two cases from a University in Catalonia

This study aims to contribute to the limited literature on language policy in research, where the increasing domination of English has raised concern about the displacement of other languages. The present ethnographic (multiple) case study tackles this issue from the context of Catalan higher education, whose institutions find themselves in the conundrum of being called to support local language/s and at the same time to embrace the preeminent international language: English. Multiple types of data have been collected from two university research groups, and analyzed through thematic and content analysis as well as through critical discourse analysis. Results suggest that the lack of specific strategies regarding language use in research may result in the imposition of English and in the displacement of local languages. Yet, Catalan institutions’ semi-peripheral position in the global academia, with less pressure than the center, might afford opportunities for alternative practices that might challenge dominant tendencies.

The ecosocial self, place, and well-being: An ethnographic case study with Maasai women from northern Tanzania

This article expands on “ecosocial” theories to consider the importance of the “ecosocial self” as a relevant theoretical construct for understanding and enhancing well-being among individuals whose sense of self is intimately intertwined with their ecological context or place, such as their land and livestock. This concept emerged from long-term ethnographic research with Maasai women in northern Tanzania. Fieldnotes, unstructured interviews with 71 women in a nonclinical community sample, and feedback from key informants inform this manuscript. Place-based stress on the land and livestock related to the local climate seems to be a driver of emotional distress for the female pastoralists in this study. Attending to the “ecosocial self,” or the part of a person who experiences themselves as intimately tied with their place (here, land and livestock) offers new solutions, especially in a social context where emotional distress is not interpreted as a sign of mental illness. The article concludes with recommendations about addressing mental health concerns related to place-based stress through interventions that seem to have nourished the “ecosocial self” in other contexts, such as land-based and animal-based interventions.

'Sand in the works?' Infrastructural affordances and life with dementia in the community.

The social health of people living with dementia is a more recent addition to the dementia research agenda; to date conceptions of the problem and solutions have relied on underdeveloped theorisations of sociality and social inclusion. In this article, using a material-semiotic approach to care practices and infrastructure, we use an ethnographic case study of one family of a person living with dementia using a day programme and home care supports over a period of 9months, to examine how infrastructural arrangements provide particular affordances for social relatedness for people living with dementia in the community. The aim of the analysis is to consider how the infrastructural affordances created by the organisation of care may create spatially bounded lives and limit the subject positions available for people living with dementia and their families. It is these narrowed positions of dwelling that we argue may be the necessary starting place for thinking about the social health of people living with dementia and the solutions that might be helpful for them.

Enacting aspirational rural schooling towards sustainable futures: exploring students’ ethnographic imaginations implications for place-based pedagogy

ABSTRACT Place-based pedagogy (PBP) has become an emerging strategy for improving educational relevance for low-income communities. This article investigates children's learning aspirations to motivate broader theoretical discussion about opportunities for enacting PBP for rural schooling success in Ghana. Using an ethnographic case study design, collaboration with a rural school supported data collection on children's home cultural capital shaping teachers’ pedagogy. Using PBP theorisations, thematic analysis of qualitative data found rural students’ aspirations were less diversified and heavily shaped by their immediate environment. The article concludes that inspiring higher aspirations in the rural children researched would require geographically sensitive teachers who stretch their learners’ inculcated images about their community into global opportunities. The article proposes integration of Ghanaian rural indigenous place-sensitive, apprenticeship-based, collectivist learning approaches and traditionally valued skills, through PBP, as a key re-positioning strategy to improve educational outcomes for Ghanaian rural children through greater harnessing of home cultural capital.

Undergraduate Students In Kinesiology Exploring Health Disparities

Undergraduate pre-health professional students are graduating from Kinesiology programs with little to no understanding about disproportionate health outcomes that impact the well-being of marginalized groups. Health disparities (HD) are differences in health outcomes that disproportionately impact individuals based on race and ethnicity, gender, sexuality, socioeconomic status, ability, and geographic location. Integrating HD into undergraduate academic courses proves beneficial for informing, equipping, and engaging future health and medical professionals in re-imaging equitable systems of health that minimize disparities. PURPOSE: The purpose of this ethnographic case study was to explore how 142 undergraduate (Sophomores 2%, Juniors 54%, and Seniors 45%) pre-health professionals engaged in learning about health disparities. METHODS: The health disparities curriculum consisted of four online self-paced learning modules embedded into a Kinesiology course. The instruction was designed to improve student awareness of HD, engage them in reflective writing practices and collaborative learning. Pre-post surveys, student reflections, and online discussions were triangulated to observe how students were making sense of HD topics. Drawing on constructs of Critical Consciousness, data were coded using thematic analysis. RESULTS: A small percentage (29%) of students reported learning about HD in their undergraduate courses, research, or volunteer experiences. Students overall reported an increase (75%-95%) in their understanding of the term HD and the groups most impacted by them. Three themes emerged that represented how students navigated HD learning: eye-opening experiences, lived experiences, and learning in motion. Broader themes included seeking mentorship for improving learning and implementing equitable practices. CONCLUSIONS: Disparities are linked to conscious or unconscious bias of health professionals and result in poor care and treatment. Engaging in HD learning early increases the level of consciousness and strategies for critiquing inequitable practices that have major implications for eliminating disparities.

Slow crisis in Bissau and beyond

This article takes an ethnographic look at processes of long-term and lingering crises. Building on longitudinal and transnational fieldwork with migrants from Bissau, the capital of Guinea-Bissau, it illuminates the ways that crisis may ramify across time and scale, thereby affecting everyday life, social relations and political dynamics. While the concept of ‘slow crisis’ sits uncomfortably within our common understanding of crisis as a momentary aberration and tipping point, the article clarifies how attending to the lingering and wandering effects of the phenomenon may grant us a fuller understanding of its temporality and social life. The article explores the way crisis is lived through a longitudinal study of Guinea-Bissauan migrants in Bissau, Lisbon and Paris. Via an ethnographic case study of a protracted and compound crisis, it illuminates the social deterioration, contraction and fragmentation that define such situations, and points to the common dynamics of crises as continuing critical conditions rather than singular aberrations.

The value(s) of English as global linguistic capital: a dialogue between linguistic justice and sociolinguistic approaches

Abstract Theorists of linguistic justice tend to assume that English (particularly its native varieties) has paramount and stable value as a global communicative tool. From this alleged value they identify several injustices for non-native speakers, like unequal opportunities and lower dignity, related to the instrumental and identity-related values of languages. In this article we challenge assumptions about the real-life value of English by engaging in an interdisciplinary dialogue that connects normative theories and sociolinguistic theories of value. Through the analysis of ethnographic case studies, we conclude that the value of English (and nativeness in English) as linguistic capital is highly context-dependent, to the extent that possessing native skills may have no positive effects for an English speaker. Both language-centred factors (linguistic awareness and adaptive skills) and non-language centred factors (markets and social indexicalities) determine this value. We highlight that normative approaches to languages cannot address instrumental and identity-related values separately, because identity is instrumental to communicative interactions. We conclude that multilingualism fulfils better than monolingualism (either in English or in state majority languages) the goals of linguistic justice traditionally associated with the latter. Finally, we engage in a critical reflection about the suitability and conditions of possibility of interdisciplinary research.

“Needs to Put in More Effort”: How Teacher Deficit Beliefs Frame the Moral Worth of Latinx Children and Families in School-based Discourses

ABSTRACT This article presents an ethnographic case study of how deficit beliefs shape the ways teachers call upon Latinx emergent bilinguals and families to engage in the schooling process. Informed by theories of language socialization, this study examines how one second-grade bilingual teacher called upon students and families of Mexican origin to demonstrate moral responsibility for schooling. Findings indicate how the teacher invoked a neoliberal moral discourse to critique student and parent effort and attempted to remediate the “low” literacy levels of three students by emphasizing the importance of hard work for success. In their homes, the students and families used various strategies to fulfill the teacher’s raciolinguistic expectations for the display of hard work but remained marginalized from engagement in school-based routines.

To Punish, Parent, or Palliate: Governing Urban Poverty through Institutional Failure

Studies of poverty governance typically emphasize the punitive subjugation or paternalistic disciplining of the poor. Much work combines elements of these approaches, and recent studies depict relations between institutions as premised on collaboration or burden shuffling. Despite the precarity of poor people’s existence, the role of life itself in governance is conspicuously absent in this literature. Using an ethnographic case study of a syringe exchange program serving unhoused people who inject drugs in Los Angeles, this article theorizes palliative governance to describe forms of regulation that neither punish nor parent, but simply try to keep very poor subjects alive through a series of stopgap measures. Rather than collaborate or burden shuffle, exchange workers supplement, contest, and co-opt other governing institutions. An analysis of palliative governance broadens our understanding of how institutions interact with subjects and each other, while revealing the paradoxical ways states both expose and protect bare life.

Tools in the making: the co-construction of gender, crops, and crop breeding in African agriculture

Crop breeding for development has a relatively long tradition of including the perspectives of women and men farmers. However, the lack of adoption and development impacts of improved crop varieties, particularly in African countries, has led to a growing interest in novel ways of making crop breeding more responsive to the needs, preferences, and demands of different social groups of women and men in agriculture. However, many questions remain about how best to render crop breeding gender-responsive, in terms of both methodological and institutional innovations. In this paper, I investigate how gender-responsive crop breeding is practiced and negotiated, and with what effects, through an ethnographic case study of the Gender + Tools: a set of gender-responsive decision-support tools developed by the CGIAR Gender and Breeding Initiative. Using perspectives from feminist technoscience studies, I explore how the Gender + Tools take on several performative roles through which gender, crops, and crop breeding become co-constructed: as a diagnostic and screening tool, a communication and marketing tool, and a management tool. The paper provides insights that can help support and improve gender-responsive and transformative crop breeding, while also expanding the scope of feminist technoscience studies to the underexplored topic of development-oriented crop breeding in Africa.

Inclusive socio-musical spaces for newly arrived migrant children in a Norwegian primary school: Teacher and school leader perspectives

This ethnographic case study investigates how teachers and leaders in a Norwegian primary school perceive and promote an inclusive school environment for newly arrived migrant children through music. The analysis draws on two aspects of inclusion. The first is on whose terms inclusion takes place and whether newcomers have the opportunity to transform the existing social order. The second is the boundaries of inclusive practices: inclusion and exclusion are seen as processes separated by a boundary that, once crossed, can result in exclusion despite good intentions. The case is a primary school with a dedicated introductory class for newly arrived migrant children. The data collection instruments were participant observation, interviews and field conversations over a period of 10 months. There was a participatory element to the fieldwork in connection with the school’s ongoing development work to create an inclusive environment. Three socio-musical spaces were identified. The findings suggest that inclusive music practices face obstacles at individual, organisational and discursive levels. Fields of tension are identified relating to boundaries around what cultural expressions are welcomed and represented in the school; visibility and performance of home cultures; and exclusion and self-exclusion through musical markers of belonging.