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• What Is Ethnography? | Definition, Guide & Examples

What Is Ethnography? | Definition, Guide & Examples

Published on March 13, 2020 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on June 22, 2023.

Ethnography is a type of qualitative research that involves immersing yourself in a particular community or organization to observe their behavior and interactions up close. The word “ethnography” also refers to the written report of the research that the ethnographer produces afterwards.

Ethnography is a flexible research method that allows you to gain a deep understanding of a group’s shared culture, conventions, and social dynamics. However, it also involves some practical and ethical challenges.

Table of contents

What is ethnography used for, different approaches to ethnographic research, gaining access to a community, working with informants, observing the group and taking field notes, writing up an ethnography, other interesting articles.

Ethnographic research originated in the field of anthropology, and it often involved an anthropologist living with an isolated tribal community for an extended period of time in order to understand their culture.

This type of research could sometimes last for years. For example, Colin M. Turnbull lived with the Mbuti people for three years in order to write the classic ethnography The Forest People .

Today, ethnography is a common approach in various social science fields, not just anthropology. It is used not only to study distant or unfamiliar cultures, but also to study specific communities within the researcher’s own society.

For example, ethnographic research (sometimes called participant observation ) has been used to investigate  football fans , call center workers , and police officers .

Advantages of ethnography

The main advantage of ethnography is that it gives the researcher direct access to the culture and practices of a group. It is a useful approach for learning first-hand about the behavior and interactions of people within a particular context.

By becoming immersed in a social environment, you may have access to more authentic information and spontaneously observe dynamics that you could not have found out about simply by asking.

Ethnography is also an open and flexible method. Rather than aiming to verify a general theory or test a hypothesis , it aims to offer a rich narrative account of a specific culture, allowing you to explore many different aspects of the group and setting.

Disadvantages of ethnography

Ethnography is a time-consuming method. In order to embed yourself in the setting and gather enough observations to build up a representative picture, you can expect to spend at least a few weeks, but more likely several months. This long-term immersion can be challenging, and requires careful planning.

Ethnographic research can run the risk of observer bias . Writing an ethnography involves subjective interpretation, and it can be difficult to maintain the necessary distance to analyze a group that you are embedded in.

There are often also ethical considerations to take into account: for example, about how your role is disclosed to members of the group, or about observing and reporting sensitive information.

Should you use ethnography in your research?

If you’re a student who wants to use ethnographic research in your thesis or dissertation , it’s worth asking yourself whether it’s the right approach:

• Could the information you need be collected in another way (e.g. a survey , interviews)?
• How difficult will it be to gain access to the community you want to study?
• How exactly will you conduct your research, and over what timespan?
• What ethical issues might arise?

If you do decide to do ethnography, it’s generally best to choose a relatively small and easily accessible group, to ensure that the research is feasible within a limited timeframe.

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There are a few key distinctions in ethnography which help to inform the researcher’s approach: open vs. closed settings, overt vs. covert ethnography, and active vs. passive observation. Each approach has its own advantages and disadvantages.

Open vs. closed settings

The setting of your ethnography—the environment in which you will observe your chosen community in action—may be open or closed.

An open or public setting is one with no formal barriers to entry. For example, you might consider a community of people living in a certain neighborhood, or the fans of a particular baseball team.

• Gaining initial access to open groups is not too difficult…
• …but it may be harder to become immersed in a less clearly defined group.

A closed or private setting is harder to access. This may be for example a business, a school, or a cult.

• A closed group’s boundaries are clearly defined and the ethnographer can become fully immersed in the setting…
• …but gaining access is tougher; the ethnographer may have to negotiate their way in or acquire some role in the organization.

Overt vs. covert ethnography

Most ethnography is overt . In an overt approach, the ethnographer openly states their intentions and acknowledges their role as a researcher to the members of the group being studied.

• Overt ethnography is typically preferred for ethical reasons, as participants can provide informed consent…
• …but people may behave differently with the awareness that they are being studied.

Sometimes ethnography can be covert . This means that the researcher does not tell participants about their research, and comes up with some other pretense for being there.

• Covert ethnography allows access to environments where the group would not welcome a researcher…
• …but hiding the researcher’s role can be considered deceptive and thus unethical.

Active vs. passive observation

Different levels of immersion in the community may be appropriate in different contexts. The ethnographer may be a more active or passive participant depending on the demands of their research and the nature of the setting.

An active role involves trying to fully integrate, carrying out tasks and participating in activities like any other member of the community.

• Active participation may encourage the group to feel more comfortable with the ethnographer’s presence…
• …but runs the risk of disrupting the regular functioning of the community.

A passive role is one in which the ethnographer stands back from the activities of others, behaving as a more distant observer and not involving themselves in the community’s activities.

• Passive observation allows more space for careful observation and note-taking…
• …but group members may behave unnaturally due to feeling they are being observed by an outsider.

While ethnographers usually have a preference, they also have to be flexible about their level of participation. For example, access to the community might depend upon engaging in certain activities, or there might be certain practices in which outsiders cannot participate.

An important consideration for ethnographers is the question of access. The difficulty of gaining access to the setting of a particular ethnography varies greatly:

• To gain access to the fans of a particular sports team, you might start by simply attending the team’s games and speaking with the fans.
• To access the employees of a particular business, you might contact the management and ask for permission to perform a study there.
• Alternatively, you might perform a covert ethnography of a community or organization you are already personally involved in or employed by.

Flexibility is important here too: where it’s impossible to access the desired setting, the ethnographer must consider alternatives that could provide comparable information.

For example, if you had the idea of observing the staff within a particular finance company but could not get permission, you might look into other companies of the same kind as alternatives. Ethnography is a sensitive research method, and it may take multiple attempts to find a feasible approach.

All ethnographies involve the use of informants . These are people involved in the group in question who function as the researcher’s primary points of contact, facilitating access and assisting their understanding of the group.

This might be someone in a high position at an organization allowing you access to their employees, or a member of a community sponsoring your entry into that community and giving advice on how to fit in.

However,  i f you come to rely too much on a single informant, you may be influenced by their perspective on the community, which might be unrepresentative of the group as a whole.

In addition, an informant may not provide the kind of spontaneous information which is most useful to ethnographers, instead trying to show what they believe you want to see. For this reason, it’s good to have a variety of contacts within the group.

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The core of ethnography is observation of the group from the inside. Field notes are taken to record these observations while immersed in the setting; they form the basis of the final written ethnography. They are usually written by hand, but other solutions such as voice recordings can be useful alternatives.

Field notes record any and all important data: phenomena observed, conversations had, preliminary analysis. For example, if you’re researching how service staff interact with customers, you should write down anything you notice about these interactions—body language, phrases used repeatedly, differences and similarities between staff, customer reactions.

Don’t be afraid to also note down things you notice that fall outside the pre-formulated scope of your research; anything may prove relevant, and it’s better to have extra notes you might discard later than to end up with missing data.

Field notes should be as detailed and clear as possible. It’s important to take time to go over your notes, expand on them with further detail, and keep them organized (including information such as dates and locations).

After observations are concluded, there’s still the task of writing them up into an ethnography. This entails going through the field notes and formulating a convincing account of the behaviors and dynamics observed.

The structure of an ethnography

An ethnography can take many different forms: It may be an article, a thesis, or an entire book, for example.

Ethnographies often do not follow the standard structure of a scientific paper, though like most academic texts, they should have an introduction and conclusion. For example, this paper begins by describing the historical background of the research, then focuses on various themes in turn before concluding.

An ethnography may still use a more traditional structure, however, especially when used in combination with other research methods. For example, this paper follows the standard structure for empirical research: introduction, methods, results, discussion, and conclusion.

The content of an ethnography

The goal of a written ethnography is to provide a rich, authoritative account of the social setting in which you were embedded—to convince the reader that your observations and interpretations are representative of reality.

Ethnography tends to take a less impersonal approach than other research methods. Due to the embedded nature of the work, an ethnography often necessarily involves discussion of your personal experiences and feelings during the research.

Ethnography is not limited to making observations; it also attempts to explain the phenomena observed in a structured, narrative way. For this, you may draw on theory, but also on your direct experience and intuitions, which may well contradict the assumptions that you brought into the research.

If you want to know more about statistics , methodology , or research bias , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

• Normal distribution
• Degrees of freedom
• Null hypothesis
• Discourse analysis
• Control groups
• Mixed methods research
• Non-probability sampling
• Quantitative research
• Ecological validity

Research bias

• Rosenthal effect
• Implicit bias
• Cognitive bias
• Selection bias
• Negativity bias
• Status quo bias

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Home — Essay Samples — Arts & Culture — Ethnography

Essays on Ethnography

Ethnographic essay topics and outline examples, essay title 1: unveiling cultural realities: an ethnographic study of [specific culture].

Thesis Statement: This ethnographic research paper provides an in-depth exploration of [specific culture], aiming to reveal the cultural practices, beliefs, social structures, and everyday life experiences of its members, while also shedding light on the impact of globalization and modernization.

• Introduction
• Research Context: Overview of [specific culture] and Its Significance
• Research Methods: Participant Observation, Interviews, and Data Collection
• Cultural Practices and Traditions: Rituals, Customs, and Social Norms
• Community and Social Structure: Family, Hierarchy, and Social Roles
• Impact of Globalization: Changes, Challenges, and Adaptations
• Conclusion: Insights Gained and the Cultural Richness of [specific culture]

Essay Title 2: Urban Ethnography: Exploring the Dynamics of [Specific Urban Community]

Thesis Statement: This ethnographic study focuses on [specific urban community], examining the urban environment, social interactions, community networks, and the challenges and opportunities that residents encounter in their daily lives.

• Research Context: Introduction to [specific urban community] and Its Demographics
• Research Methods: Immersive Fieldwork, Surveys, and Ethnographic Data
• Urban Landscape: Architecture, Public Spaces, and Neighborhood Characteristics
• Community Bonds: Social Cohesion, Networks, and Support Systems
• Challenges of Urban Life: Poverty, Gentrification, and Access to Resources
• Aspirations and Resilience: Stories of Residents and Their Urban Experience
• Conclusion: Understanding [specific urban community] and the Complex Urban Fabric

Essay Title 3: Ethnography of [Specific Subculture]: Navigating Identities, Belonging, and Expression

Thesis Statement: This ethnographic research paper explores the world of [specific subculture], shedding light on the subcultural identity, values, rituals, and modes of expression, while also examining the subculture's relationship with mainstream culture and the challenges it faces.

• Subcultural Context: Introduction to [specific subculture] and Its Significance
• Research Methods: Immersion, Interviews, and Documenting Subcultural Practices
• Subcultural Identity: Shared Beliefs, Symbols, and Modes of Expression
• Subculture vs. Mainstream Culture: Tensions, Resistance, and Integration
• Subcultural Challenges: Stereotypes, Stigmatization, and Legal Issues
• Subcultural Resilience: Community Building, Artistic Expression, and Social Change
• Conclusion: Embracing the Diversity of [specific subculture] and Its Impact on Society

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Ethnography (from Greek ἔθνος ethnos "folk, people, nation" and γράφω grapho "I write") is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures.

Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject of the study. Ethnographers mainly use qualitative methods, though they may also employ quantitative data. The typical ethnography is a holistic study and so includes a brief history, and an analysis of the terrain, the climate, and the habitat.

Gerhard Friedrich Müller developed the concept of ethnography as a separate discipline whilst participating in the Second Kamchatka Expedition (1733–43) as a professor of history and geography. Whilst involved in the expedition, he differentiated Völker-Beschreibung as a distinct area of study. This became known as "ethnography," following the introduction of the Greek neologism ethnographia by Johann Friedrich Schöpperlin.

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89 Ethnographic Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

🏆 best ethnographic topic ideas & essay examples, 📌 interesting topics to write about ethnographic, 👍 good essay topics on ethnographic, ❓ ethnographic research questions.

Ethnographic essays are an excellent way to show your understanding of the science and the relationships that form a particular development or situation. You have to display your knowledge of anthropology and how it influences a particular population group based on a variety of circumstances.

There are many factors that can affect a group of people, including their geographic location, climate, relationships with other groups, numbers, and more. As such, compiling them to form a logical conclusion can be an overwhelming task.

The complex relationships between different variables may appear relevant when they are not and vice versa. However, there are several tips that will let you write an outstanding essay.

You should try to determine the root causes behind the formation of a particular culture or phenomenon and work outwards from them. For example, overpopulation does not generally occur without a definite reason, as human populations tend to regulate themselves.

Once you identify that it is present, search for causes such as immigration, poverty, or sudden removal of a threat. After you identify the reason, you can mention it in your essay before overpopulation and use the two to develop a logical argument.

In doing so, you will establish a link and introduce a structure to your essay. The relationships may even provide you with ethnographic essay ideas that you may explore in detail.

Here are some tips for your writing process:

• Write a clear and concise thesis that will describe the topic of your essay and include it at the end of the introduction. It will help the reader understand what you are discussing early on and evaluate your arguments.
• Try to focus on one specific option among different ethnographic essay topics and have every point you make support it. The goal of the essay is to defend ideas, and deviations into unrelated matters serve as distractions. The reader will not appreciate a deviation from the subject matter into unknown territory.
• Separate the body of your essay into sections with concise and descriptive titles. A structure that divides the paper by topics makes navigation easier in case the reader wants to revisit your essay later.
• Remember that you are writing about ethnography, the study of cultures. While it may be tempting to concentrate on the circumstances of a specific group, your goal is to explain its practices and traditions. As such, you have to provide concrete examples of how a behavior emerged to suit the population’s needs.
• Make sure to cite relevant scholarly research whenever you want to make a statement of fact. Today’s science is founded on the achievements of past researchers, and their findings should not be taken as universal truths.

These considerations will help you improve your essay while you write it, reducing the workload and letting you achieve better results. The paper you will produce by following the tips will be easy to read and comprehend and show your understanding of the topic.

It will also demonstrate that you have studied the relevant sources and obtained accurate data for the formation of your conclusions.

However, you may struggle to write an essay from nothing using just these suggestions, as they require that you have some notion of the ideas you will discuss. For inspiration, visit IvyPanda to find ethnographic essay examples and other useful paper samples!

• Ethnographic and Phenomenological Approaches to Research Ethnographic research is an approach to data collection and analysis that aims at evaluating and categorizing human experiences through the lens of the participants’ cultural and ethnic backgrounds.
• Ethnographic Research Methods Participant observation can be defined as a qualitative method in ethnology research that is used by researchers in the areas of cultural anthropology in which the researcher in given the opportunity to get a close […]
• Ethnographic Field Notes from Starbucks The two large supermarkets, the large pharmacy, the three playgrounds, the community garden, the eclectic shopping and night life of South Street itself, the mural art of Isaiah Zagar, and other attractions, all pull a […]
• A Critical Review of Ethnographic Analysis The difference between these two techniques is transparent: in the case of open observation, the group of respondents knows that the researcher is conducting an analysis and is aware of its goals, whereas covert observation […]
• Ethnographic Design: Types The investigator is required to define the characteristics of the society under study. Abalos, argues that “critical ethnographic studies are a type of ethnographic research in which the author is interested in advocating for the […]
• Barker’s Ethnographic Exposé: Revealing Structural Violence Against the Marshallese Barker’s study of the Marshallese people and their victimization by the U.S.government is an outstanding demonstration of how ethnographic research and writing should be conducted.
• Ethnographic Design: Characteristics According to Abalos, “ethnography is the in depth study of naturally occurring behavior within a culture or a social group; it seeks to understand the relationship between culture and behavior, with culture referring to beliefs, […]
• Clement Restaurant: Ethnographic Description The ethnographic analysis will be added with a demographic review of the region in order to identify whether the business success is stipulated by the ethnographic background of the restaurants, or the population that is […]
• Ethnographic Prospects in Teaching and Learning Such a controversial view on the approaches taken in the research complies with the changeability of the social life at the moment.
• Ethnographic Interview of the Costa Rican People The analysis of the social environment is the important aspect of realizing the cultural background and the social problems of the clients.
• Tourism Management as an Ethnographic Theme Thus, as it is stated in some of the interview, tourists generally expect the attitude of obeisance towards them, and the workers of the tourism sphere feel themselves as the obedient servants.
• Hong Kong Street Food in Ethnographic Studies Bronislaw Malinowski is often cited as one of the first practitioners of this method during his research of the people of Papua New Guinea.
• Mayan Culture in Ethnographic Interpretation The Mayan elders were charged with the responsibility of safeguarding the traditions of the people and overseeing all the cultural practices.
• The Kurds Culture: An Ethnographic Study The most popular of the two dialects is the Kurmanji, it is the language of communication for most of the Kurds today.
• Mesoamerican Ethnographic Interpretation The civilization of these people faced strong influences from the people in the non-Maya cultures which include the Olmecs of Mexico and the Izapa cultures of people who lived in the Pacific coast.
• Mayan Ethnographic Interpretation: Traditions and Rituals According to The Mayan culture, the human body was viewed as a combination of the body and the souls. This means that the blood could communicate to the inner and the outer environment of the […]
• Navajo Ethnographic and Ethnological Studies The story is preserved in myths and is recounted in the ceremony known as ‘blessing way’ which is the foundation of the Navajo way of life.
• Kmart Department Stores: Ethnographic Study During the meeting, much attention was paid to the particular features of communication between the meeting participants in order to understand the aspects of the environment, characteristics of individuals, their interactions, and the presented culture.
• Ethnographic State in India He stated that their ignorance of the customs and beliefs of the Indian people had a hit against the British and that this had resulted to a distant loss of administrative power to British government.
• Cheyenne Indians History and Culture Furthermore, it was to emphasize the unique powers and the superiority of the chief priests and the prophets in the community.
• The Significance of Ethnographic Observation Thus, Arthur concentrates on the role of women in the use of lithics and the role of females in the development of Prehistoric communities, whereas Sillitoe and Hardy study the use of stone tools and […]
• Ethnographic Research: Coming of Age in Samoa Considering Margaret Mead’s ethnography, Coming of Age in Samoa, it is possible to say that dwelling upon that society she paid much attention to religion, education, upbringing and relation to each other within a family, […]
• Ethnographic reflection Mixing the scientific and humanistic approaches and implementing the anthropological framework and the concept of the bio-cultural triad for covering various sides of life of Beaver community, Brody uses dialogic procedures for depicting and explaining […]
• Twin Oaks Intentional Community Ethnographic Analysis It was through field work that the community was noted as one of the intentional communities. One of the main lessons learnt was their effort to bring gender equality in the community.
• Understanding the Science of Ethnographic Through Oneirology
• An Overview of the Dream State and the Concept of Human Ethnographic
• Understanding the Unconcious Ethnographic
• The Beauty Of Ethnographic: How Dreams Drive The Individual
• The Skeptical Ethnographic Argument of Rene Descartes, and the Priori and the Posteriori
• Ethnographic And Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
• An Overview of the Controversy of Ethnographics, a Cognitive Activity During Sleep
• Animal Ethnographic And Substantiation A Connection To Humanity
• The Psychological Theories Of The Function Of Ethnographic
• The Ethnographic and Traditional Aboriginal Spirituality
• Sleeping and Ethnographic and Theories of Sleep
• Ethnographic Is Known As The Journey Your Mind
• The Centrality of the Ethnographic and Its Importance for Aboriginal Spirituality
• The Benefits Of Lucid Ethnographic
• Procrastination and Day Ethnographic
• Comparing and Contrasting Psychological Theories of Ethnographic
• Ethnographic as a Significant Process in Human Life Experience
• The Use of Illusion Argument, Ethnographic Argument, and Evil Genius Argument by Descartes
• Varieties of Lucid Ethnographic Experience, by Stephen Laberge
• Day Ethnographic in the Middle of the Summer Heat
• Ethnographic Various Amount Of People Experiences Different Effects
• Dreams, Ethnographic and Phases of Sleep
• Freud’s Theory of Ethnographic and Repression
• Synchroncities in the History of Paranormal Ethnographic
• Dreams and Ethnographic Nightmares in Children
• Gender And Ethnographic in Mapuche Shamanistic Practices
• Phenomenology of Ethnographic
• Descartes’ Meditations: Ethnographic and Evil Demon Arguments
• How Is the Power of Dreams and Ethnographic in the Novel of Mice and Men
• Difference Between Astral Projection And Lucid Ethnographic
• The Significance of Land to the Ethnographic for Aboriginal People and the Impact of the Land Rights Movement
• The Importance of Ethnographic and Sleeping
• Ethnographics Can Bring Misery in the Great Gatsby By F. Scott
• Exploring Causes of Sleep Difficulty and Ethnographic Problems
• The Importance of Ethnographic and the Sub-Conscious
• What Are the Problems and Constraints of Making Films on Ethnographics?
• What Importance May the Sex of the Anthropologist Have on the Ethnographic Process?
• What Does Ethnography Mean?
• What Is an Ethnographic Example?
• What Is Considered Ethnographic?
• What Is Ethnography Used For?
• What Is the Difference Between Ethnography and Anthropology?
• Why Is Ethnography Critical in Research?
• What Is Ethnography in Sociology?
• What Is Ethnography in Social Research?
• What Kind of Research Is Ethnography?
• What Is a Synonym for Ethnography?
• Is Ethnography a Research Design?
• How Do You Use Ethnography in a Sentence?
• When Did Ethnology Appear?
• How Does Ethnography Work in Real Life?
• What Are the Critical Characteristics of Ethnography?
• What Is the Difference Between Phenomenology and Ethnography?
• Who Was the First Ethnographer?
• Who Is the Father of Ethnography?
• How Do Ethnologists Study Culture?
• What Is the Difference Between Archaeology and Ethnography?
• What Is the Ethnological Argument?
• Is Ethnography a Theory?
• What Is the Weakness of Ethnography?
• What Is the Difference Between Ethnography and Qualitative Research?
• What Are the Problems With Traditional Ethnographic Film-Making?
• What Is the Relationship Between Students and Teachers in Ethnographic?
• What Are the Pros and Cons of Ethnographic Reflexivity?
• What Are the Defining Activities and Principles of Ethnographic Research?
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

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6- Drafting Your Ethnographic Essay

Chapter 6 provides a step-by-step process for developing, writing, and revising your ethnographic research essay.

Finding a Focus, Choosing a Controlling Idea for Your Research

The first step in finding a focus is to read through all of your fieldnotes two times. As you read, notice when and where you become particularly interested in what you have written. Circle, mark or note these passages in some way. Write a brief summary of each idea/passage on a separate sheet. After you identify what interests you most, move on to search for patterns that will lead you to focus.  You can follow the step-by step-process below as a path to create a kind of umbrella or guiding focus statement for your essay:

• Read through the list you compiled from your fieldnotes and identify which parts of your fieldnotes interest and engage you most. Look at the larger arc. Are most of your points taken from your thoughts and feelings or are you more interested in the analysis observation?
• Search for patterns in your list, and make a new list of those patterns. Keep an eye out for things that strike you as meaningful and interesting and that happen again and again.  As you explore patterns, also look for things connected to those patterns.  Find patterns within patterns. how do you connect ideas with language?  Do you seem to repeatedly use the same phrases?  When and with respect to what observations?  This may help identify relevant patters of observation.
• From your list of patterns and connections, select the ONE larger idea/pattern that interests you most. You know you’re on to something if you find a pattern and can see how it connects to other observations you’ve made during your research and /or to what other scholars or writers have said.
• Take that one interesting idea/pattern and develop an “umbrella” statement or a broad focus statement. You can start, for drafting purposes, with something as simple as “In this paper, I will…(discuss, explore, explain, analyze, etc.).”  Here you are articulating the big idea for your essay. You can always return to the statement to make is more sophisticated in the context of a focus paragraph later,
• Expand that statement by breaking the pattern that you are focusing on into any number of supporting observations. Follow your initial broad or umbrella focus statement with that break down. “First, I will….Second…Third….” with each of those statements specifying the supporting material. These first, second, and third statements provide the framework for the body sections of your research essay.

As you examine patterns you find in your own comprehensive observation list and look for an idea, theme, or metaphor to connect them, keep in mind the ways in which a focus moves from observations to a more developed discussion of the ideas you note.  As you connect the dots of your pattern, you may begin to understand where your essay could “land,” which implications become most compelling to you, and which elements for discussion could make clear the complexity of reality and truth.  When you identify some of these more powerful elements, take the time to write about any connections you see between those patterns or expand on any unfinished thoughts. From this list, you need to choose the idea/pattern that interests you most, that you think you can really write about, and that you can support with other observations from your notes. You have found your focus!

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• 1a- Connecting to Ethnographic Writing
• 1b- Identifying with Ethnographic Writing
• 1c- Rhetorical Strate­gies for Ethnographic Writing
• 2a- Writerly Ethos
• 2b- Under­stand­ing Pla­gia­rism
• 2c- Eth­i­cal Conun­drums in Com­munity Research
• 3a- Examining Culture as Text
• 3b- Selecting a Research Site
• 3c- Access to Your Research Site
• 3d- Rhetorical Strategies for Research Proposals
• 4a- Rhetorical Strategies for Writing Observations
• 4b- Considering Types of Fieldnotes
• 4c- Expanding and Revising Fieldnotes and Observations
• 5a- Searching for Sources: Keywords, Databases, Catalogs, and Shelves
• 5b- Ethical Considerations when Conducting Research of Secondary Sources
• 5c- Impact of Technology on Conducting Research of Secondary Sources
• 5d- Sorting Sources and Eating Books
• 5e- Popular Culture Source Material
• 5f- Summarizing Sources
• 5g- Building an Annotated Bibliography
• 6a- Introducing your Research
• 6b- Presenting the Methodology and Focus
• 6c- Selecting Examples and Evidence
• 6d- Selecting Effective Secondary Source Evidence
• 6e- Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Documenting Source Material
• 6f- Concluding in a Meaningful Way
• 6g- Reviewing and Revising Your Essay
• Supplemental Modules
• How to Use this Textbook
• Teaching with EC
• How to Become a Contributing Author

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How to Write an Ethnography Essay or Research Paper

How to Write an Ethnography Essay

Ethnographic writing is very common in colleges and universities. It involves ethnographic essays, research papers, and assignments. These papers are written at different levels in colleges and universities.

Therefore, as a student you have to be well versed on how these papers are written for you to score good grades.

If you have been looking for a guide on how to handle ethnographic essays look no further because this article provides you with all information you need to know about ethnographic writing and different topics that you can use to practice.

What is an Ethnography Essay or Paper?

An ethnographic essay is a piece of writing that focuses on a subculture, culture, or group. The emphasis and focus is usually on observation, field notes, and observations.

The understanding that any ethnographic paper seeks is the way people think and live their everyday life. Therefore, spending time with people is necessary for the writer to determine how people live and what they are interested in.

An ethnographic essay should have an introduction, literature review, methodology, data analysis, and conclusion.

How to Write an Ethnography Essay?

The following are important tips that one should consider when writing an ethnographic essay :

1. Research on Existing Studies on the Topic

By researching on the existing knowledge, you will be able to know areas of the topic that have already been explored and identify areas that need additional new knowledge.

Also, you are able to identify questions about the topic that have been left unanswered and the gaps that still exists. Additionally, you will be able to write your work confidently without the danger of duplicating the work of other people.

2. Research on the Topic or Focus Group

The purpose of researching on the topic or focus group is to test your hypothesis. For example, you can answer some research questions, try various methods of collecting data and record observations in real time. You can also learn about the ethics of the focus group.

This helps refine the topic and familiarize with the context of what you will write about. Also, you may get insight on any obstacle that you may have overlooked.

3. Use both Primary and Secondary Data when Conducting Research

When researching you should collect data through observation in real time, interviews, and focus groups. These are first hand sources of information that are authentic.

Also, you should use published studies and articles which present you with the ideas of how others have conducted ethnographic research.

4. Develop a Thesis Statement

While conducting your research, formulate a thesis statement which will be the main argument of the paper. It should describe what you are exploring in your research.

It is the main idea of your paper and not necessarily the questions that the topic poses.

It should be straight to the point and brief with no jargon to help the reader understand what your ethnography paper is all about

5. Use Retrospective or Prospective Study Design

Retrospective design involves the study of the past while prospective design involves data collection about an event that is ongoing.

The design you use depends on whether you want to pick up memories from people about an event of the past or if you want to find out something that is actually transpiring.

6. Take Notes during the Ethnographic Study

Taking notes will help clarify the observations made, provide audit trail for your research and look for patterns in data. Participants’ notes helps record observation in the real time that they happened and prevents the efforts of try to remember what was observed later.

Also through notes preconceived notions are avoided and relevant thoughts for your analysis captured.

7. Write the Introduction

The introduction of an ethnographic essay should provide the background information about the issue being written about.

A good ethnographic introduction should include a thesis statement that presents an argument and a proper investigation on why the topic is important to investigate.

Here you set the tone for the entire paper. Therefore, the introduction should be catchy to motivate the reader to continue reading.

8. Write the Background Information

This is where the information that gives the reader the context of what your ethnography paper is all about is written. The information included here should be relevant to your hypothesis or argument.

Geographical place where the research took place should also be included. Also, the literature review which consists of what has been written previously about the topic should be included.

Additionally, provide an explanation of how your research contributes to the understanding of the topic.

9. Write the Methodology

This is where you include how you as the ethnographer collected information and data. You can also include the limitations as well as the biases in the data process.

Data collection entails how you observed the data, the exact data you observed and how you recorded it.

10. Write the Findings

These include the actual representation of your research which is data, quotes, keywords and illustrations. To do this you can choose a method of presentation which can be charts, tables, diagrams, and photographs.

Everything that is included in this part should be clear and concise for the reader to get the relevant facts of your research.

Everything that does not relate to your arguments directly should not be included in this part because it is unnecessary.

To keep it as simple as possible think of it as a presentation for non-specialists in your field of specialization.

11. Conclude your Ethnography

This is where you provide the summary for your paper. For any conclusion of an ethnography to be good it must include the argument that is presented on the thesis statement.

Also, it should provide the context of how your research fits into the larger researches already conducted about the topic. The language used to write it should be understandable by non-specialists. It should be clear and direct with no jargon.

Ethnography Essay Example Topics

• Access the different career paths among children from rich families and poor families.
• Outline the link that is seen as obvious between drug trafficking and violence experienced in South American Countries
• In details, discuss the effectiveness of parenting practices used by African American parents to socialize their children
• Analyse the perception of success and failure in low and middle class families compare to high social class families.
• What policies can departments dealing with the welfare of children put in place to ensure that the rate of juvenile delinquency in America has achieved a significant drop. 
• How religions especially Hinduism and Islam have influenced the perception of gender socialization
• The effects of continued terrorism acts on migration and what that means for the tourism sector of affected countries
• The plight of the homeless people in America and the rise of insecurity in urban centres
• The discrimination of the minority races in America and its effects in the rise of incarceration rates in involved communities
• The acceptance and opposition of euthanasia in Brazil and the effects it has on the population over time
• How the increased adaptation of modern lifestyles of the western culture in Africa have impacted the traditional ways of African communities
• The process of immigrants adapting to life in America and how it leads to the struggle to fit in
• The toil for the American dream and its influence on criminality among the majority of African Americans
• The rise of globalization and its impact on the economy of majority of African countries
• The increased rate of drug abuse in Tertiary institutions and its effects on the quality of graduates

With over 10 years in academia and academic assistance, Alicia Smart is the epitome of excellence in the writing industry. She is our chief editor and in charge of the writing department at Grade Bees.

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Ethnography is a research approach used to understand people’s behavior and make sense of it. It’s about observing people in their natural environment and then reporting on what you’ve seen.

Ethnography Essay Examples: What Is Ethnography?

Ethnography is an investigation method that focuses on the people affected by the study’s subject. It’s used in many fields, including psychology, education, and anthropology.

The main goal of ethnography is to understand the cultural aspects of a group of people — how they behave, think, and interact with each other. To do this, researchers interview community members and observe their behavior in real-life settings. They also take notes on what they see and hear while watching.

Ethnography essay examples can help organizations or businesses better understand their customers. For example, if you’re trying to understand why customers are leaving your store without buying anything (or why they’re not buying as much as they could), you may conduct an ethnographic study at your store. You’d want to ask customers why they came into the store in the first place and what they hoped would happen when they got there; then, you’d like them to describe how they felt about their shopping experience overall — what made it good or bad for them?

How to Do an Essay on Ethnography in Social Studies

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The Autoethnography: Ten Examples

Instructions, choosing a topic.

For our final project for the class, you will be asked to select a subculture that you have currently chosen to be a part of or one that you will choose to connect yourself to and to investigate this subculture in a larger research paper called an autoethnography.

For this immediate assignment, I would like you to identify two subcultures that you are currently a part of and that you would find interesting to research. For each of the subcultures you identify, I would like you to give a brief description (three to four lines or more if necessary) that gives an overview of what the subculture is and your position in the subculture (how long you’ve been a part of it and how you feel about it).

From these two options, you will be choosing a topic for your final research paper. We will be sharing these ideas with the entire class. Please be as specific as possible. Your topics must fulfill the following criteria:

You must be able to do background and preliminary research on your topics. In other words, written and visual material must be readily available for analysis.

Topics must be local and accessible.

There must be a place, field site, or event space for the topic that you will be able to visit at least twice during the semester.

There must be at least two people you can interview who have different roles relevant to the topic.

Topics must be new and cannot overlap with research topics in any other course work.

Interviewing

The purpose of the interview is to help you gain insight into the perspective of another member of your subculture. This can be valuable on a number of levels and for a number of reasons. It can help you understand the subculture more as an outsider, offer additional information you can use to examine your own positionality, and provide interesting narrative content for the final project.

As you plan for your interview, consider what information you would like to get out of the interview, and write out your questions accordingly.

For this assignment, write up a minimum of ten questions you plan to ask your interviewee. Make sure the questions are in an order that is logical. This will allow you to know what you intend to get out of an interview and enable you to adapt when an interviewee inadvertently answers more than one question at a time or shares information you would like to ask about in greater depth.

Make sure you ask leading questions rather than questions that can be answered with one-word responses. It is helpful to incorporate phrases such as these into your interview questions: “Tell me a story about the time…”; “Can you explain in detail when…”; “Describe your favorite memory about . . “; “At length, describe….”

This kind of questioning will help your interviewee to feel comfortable and willing to share more information about which you can then ask follow-up questions.

Interviews can be conducted in various ways: through online chats, via telephone or in person. Each method has its own plusses and minuses, so be aware that they will yield different products.

In-person interviews are usually the most productive in that they allow you to take notes on the interviewee’s manner, dress and composure in addition to getting your verbal answers. The benefit on online interviews conducted in writing is that they are already written up for you, and the task of writing up in-person interviews is time-consuming. You will miss out on observation details, however, in any form that is not face-to-face.

Please bring to class at least one set of questions with a brief description of whom you will be interviewing, what you already know about that person and what you would like to learn from her or him. Ultimately, you will be picking two people to interview and writing questions for each interview.

Observations

When we engage in autoethnographic writing, it is important to try to re-create the spaces we are visiting—in other words, to explore the field sites where we are spending our time.

As part of our larger assignment, you need to identify a field site that will be relevant for your subculture. This can be a location where it meets, a place where history, event or memory is held.

For this assignment, I want you to walk into a space or event related to your subculture and spend at least twenty minutes there. You will be engaging in a stream-of-consciousness freewrite, making notes on everything you experience with your five senses. As in earlier assignments, I will then ask you to create a narrative from the details you have noted.

Rely on all five of your senses to convey not just what the space looks like but what it feels like. Sight, smell, touch, sight, sound are all important to consider as we try to re-create an environment we are experiencing for an outsider. Do not edit! Just write for the entire twenty minutes in the space without picking up your pen or pencil or relinquishing your keyboard, and see what you come up with!

As you did with earlier assignments, you should write the narrative version of your notes as close to the time of observation as possible.

Putting It All Together

When trying to incorporate your research into a final paper, it is important to realize that you will not be using all of it. As in our essays earlier in the semester, you will be drawing on important pieces of it to make your larger arguments (parts of the observation, pieces of the interview, etc.). You should not try to use all of the information you gathered in the final paper. Any kind of personal and qualitative writing is about making choices and creating narratives and subtext while maintaining your own voice as a participant-observer.

The most important thing to do is to find common threads in your research, identify your main themes and use the information you have gathered, combined with your own narrative understanding or experience, to create your final piece.

Your final paper will end up being roughly six to ten pages long, given the amount of data you have collected. It is important to ask questions as you go through this final drafting process, so please feel free to contact me at any point about concerns and ideas.

When transcribing interviews, please include only your questions and the full responses that will appear as quotes or paraphrases in your final paper. Since transcribing is time-consuming, this will be the most efficient use of your time. I ask you to attach these documents as well as the observations you completed to the final paper.

You will be asked to present your findings and read a brief piece of your project on the last day of class.

Student Samples

These essays went through multiple drafts at each point. Observations, interviews, and the final draft were all peer and instructor reviewed.

Adriana explores Anarchism in New York.

Tyana explores the group Student Activists Ending Dating Abuse (SAEDA).

Hannah explores the world of computer programmers.

Heather explores the world of Bronies.

Jillian explores modern artistic taxidermy.

Emma explores a religious institution for the first time.

William explores the world of Manhattan Drag.

Joomi explores National Novel Writing Month.

Justine explores the world of Manhattan-based metal band Steel Paradise.

Neziah Doe explores science culture on YouTube.

Teaching Autoethnography: Personal Writing in the Classroom Copyright © by Melissa Tombro is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Ethnography Essays

Essay on ethnography, alex blanchette’s porkopolis vs ralph laurence’s torture letters, popular essay topics.

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Autoethnography: 10 Examples & Definition

Autoethnography is a research method that combines ethnography and autobiography. It involves studying oneself by using research methods and theory to reflect on personal narratives.

The combination of ethnography and autobiography means the researcher writes field notes, reflective notes, biographies, and reflections on one’s self over a period of time.

Then, the researcher applies research theories and methods – such as thematic analysis, the use of critical theory, poststructural theory, discourse analysis, and so on – to reflect upon one’s own experiences.

The researcher can then develop theories, analyses, hypotheses, and reflections that shed light on the human experience.

Autoethnography Definition

Autoethnographic research can help elucidate information and knowledge about the human experience through thick description of a person’s lived experiences.

After data collection (through field notes and autobiography), the researcher applies theory to explore how the personal narrative fits within the broader social, cultural, political, and historical context .

Some simple definitions include:

• “Autoethnography entails the investigation of the researcher’s own experience by means of analysis of a personal narrative or reflection” (Mentz et al., 2010)
• “Autoethnography places the self – the researcher – at the centre of research about himself/herself in a social context” (Cohen et al., 2018)

With these definitions, we can look at the premises of ethnography proposed by Adams, Ellis, and Jones (2017):

• Provide alternatives to taken-for-granted cultural scripts: Autoethnography, especially from critical theorists, feminists, and queer theorists, attempts to disrupt cultural scripts made by cultural outsiders about them.
• Articulate insider knowledge of cultural experience: The researcher/participant is a cultural insider in a way that outsider ethnographers cannot be, allowing for deeper analysis.
• Show how researchers are implicated by their conclusions: The approach attempts to undermine the assumptions that researchers can be separated and arm’s length from their data.
• Describe experiences that cannot be captured through traditional research: By digging deep into the emotional life of the researcher/participant, the research can reveal data that is extremely difficult to access through other qualitative methods like interviews or observation .
• Create texts that are accessible to larger audiences: The descriptive style of autoethnography makes it a vastly different reading experience to traditional academic research, allowing the research to be readable by a wider range of people.

Subjectivity in Autoethnography

Autoethnography often struggles to be accepted as a viable research methodology due to its extreme embrace of subjectivity.

Traditionally, researchers were taught to attempt to achieve objectivity and an arm’s-length stance from the research subject.

However, the second half of the 20 th Century saw a change in the ways subjectivity was seen by several research traditions in the humanities and social sciences. These included the postmodernists , poststructuralists , and critical theorists .

Among these researchers, researcher subjectivity was increasingly seen as inevitable. All research – no matter how ostensibly objective – was seen as filtered through the lens of human bias.

As a result, subjectivity came to be acknowledged rather than minimized.

Autoethnography is in a way a natural extension of this rejection of objectivity. Researchers came to turn inward and explore their own biases, approaches, and mindsets. It was only a matter of time before they came to study themselves .

Autoethnography Strengths and Weaknesses

Autoethnography is certainly a controversial research method. Below are some arguments for and against it:

Autoethnography Examples

1. critical theory in prestigious academic environments (sadi & ergas, 2022).

This study explores the experiences of the researcher-participant as they navigate studying critical theory during their time in graduate school.

The autoethnographer is a Middle-Eastern scholar whose reflections demonstrate how critical theory, despite its goal to empower people from marginalized backgrounds, can have the opposite effect in real life. The researcher went through experiences where they felt marginalized and alone.

As a result, the author became disillusioned with critical theory as a way to break down injustices. They felt academic writing was itself an exclusionary practice.

However, the author suggests that by using their critical thinking and selecting useful concepts from critical theory (while also questioning some of its assumptions), critical theory may have some redeeming qualities.

Citation: Sadi, M. N., & Ergas, O. (2022). Critical theory in prestigious academic environments: a first-generation student’s chronicle.  Critical Studies in Education , 1-16. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/17508487.2022.2071958

2. A day in the life of an NHS Nurse (Osben, 2019)

This study presents a vignette about a day in the life of an NHS nurse (who, of course, is also the researcher), then reflects upon the positionality of the researcher in the workplace.

The author’s critical analysis of their own vignette aims to apply academic concepts to analyze their own situation.

The academic research that is used to analyze the vignette allows the researcher to exercise reflexivity, with the researcher concluding: “Scrutinising my practice and situating it within a wider contextual backdrop has compelled me to significantly increase my level of scrutiny into the driving forces that influence my practice.”

Citation: Osben, J. (2019). A day in the life of a NHS nurse in 21st Century Britain: An auto-ethnography. The Journal of Autoethnography for Health & Social Care . 1(1). doi: https://autoethnography.co.uk/contents/

3. Finding My Front Porch (Whitworth, 2023)

This study uses a personal essay and personal poetry to demonstrate how regional identity is an overlooked aspect of intersectionality.

The study focuses on the intersections of queer identity and Southern identity in the USA.

By mixing-in thick descriptions of personal experiences and scholarly analysis, the study provides case study evidence for the critical theory idea of intesectionality.

Whereas intersectionality tends to explore identity factors like race, gender, sexuality, and social class, this study argues that regional identities need to be similarly considered as fundamental aspects of the development of a “messy” intersectional sense of self.

Citation: Whitworth, C. (2023). Finding My Front Porch: An Autoethnography of Queer Southern Intersections. Journal of Autoethnography, 4 (1): 102–123. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/joae.2023.4.1.102

4. Torpified by Gaming (Kout, 2023)

In this text, the author reflects on their own use of video games as a learning experience. They apply the concept of torpification to explain three epiphanies they experienced.

The author argues that his autoethnographic study unveils new ways of understanding the value of video gaming for learning.

The author reflects on how game-based learning tends to be simple digitization of multiple-choice questions. However, his own experiences of gaming demonstrate how he has been awed morally and epistemologically by gaming.

He reveals several epiphanies he experiences, including that of questioning his own spirituality while reflecting on his gaming experiences.

Citation: Kout, Y. (2023). Torpified by Gaming: Three Ways Video Games Electrified Me into Consciousness.  Journal of Autoethnography ,  4 (1), 139-155. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/joae.2023.4.1.139

5. Finding our Muchness (Thiel, 2016)

Thiel (2016) explores her experiences as a working-class woman in the working-class space of academia. Her ethnography employs the concept of “muchness”, loosely transcribed to a sense of an authentic self.

The study uses photography, personal reflection, storytelling, and quotes from movies that she finds meaningful to reflect on her situatedness in higher education. She finds herself stuck between trying to stay true to her working-class self while fitting into a middle-class institution.

The study’s value is in verbalizing the ways universities attempt to push out working-class values and identities to make more space for middle-class values. Through the reflection and application of research into class bias to analyze her own reflections, the author may move readers to be more inclusive of working-class identities in the halls of universities.

Citation: Thiel, J. J. (2016). Working-class women in academic spaces: Finding our muchness.  Gender and Education ,  28 (5), 662-673. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2015.1091918

6. Why is this so Hard? (Zavattaro, 2020)

This study explores the relationships between coaches and athletes through an autoethnography approach. The sport in the study was rowing.

Data collection methods for this study included a training diary, emails, and vignettes about personal memories of a six-month interaction between coach and rower.

The study focuses on conflict between the coach and the athlete and reflects on the miscommunication that occurs around what is perceived to be good coaching and teaching.

The authors conclude by highlighting that recognising the presence of a power imbalance during coaching, highlighting that autoethnography can help both the coach and athlete work through this power imbalance to achieve more effective communication.

Citation: Zavattaro, S. M. (2021). Why Is This So Hard?: An Autoethnography of Qualitative Interviewing.  Public Performance & Management Review ,  44 (5), 1052-1074. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/15309576.2020.1734035

7. The Poetics of Tourist Experience (Noy, 2007)

Reflecting on a poem he wrote in 1994, Noy (2007) conducts an autoethnography of his experiences on a family trip to Mexico.

The purpose of the study is to shed light on the importance of deep, thick analysis for explaining the emotions, contradictions, and human experiences of travel.

The author explains how autoethnographic research helps to add more depth of understanding to the meanings behind tourism than the dominant paradigm of positivist tourism research can achieve.

Citation: Noy, C. (2008). The poetics of tourist experience: An autoethnography of a family trip to Eilat1.  Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change ,  5 (3), 141-157. doi: https://doi.org/10.2167/jtcc085.0

8. An autoethnography of a (reluctant) teacher leader (Knapp, 2017)

This study involves a year-long data collection period where a teacher-leader kept notes on their experiences and feelings of moving into a leadership position in a school.

The value of this study is in its rich description of the development of a leadership identity, demonstrating the role of trial-and-error in coming to find an effective leadership identity.

Reading this study demonstrated the idea from Adams, Ellis, and Jones (2017) that autoethnography makes research highly-accessible to a non-academic audience. The story that the piece leads the reader through helps to compellingly demonstrate the value of the ‘lead by example’ identity that the author found was effective in her life.

Citation: Knapp, M. C. (2017). An autoethnography of a (reluctant) teacher leader.  The Journal of Mathematical Behavior ,  46 , 251-266. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmathb.2017.02.004

9. I can see you (Vasconcelos, 2011)

This study, whose complete title is “I Can See You”: An Autoethnography of My Teacher-Student Self , demonstrates the value of autoethnography in helping to create a reflective practitioner identity.

 The author explores their narratives of their experiences becoming a proficient teacher. But what is most elucidating is that autoethnography is extremely useful for personal self-reflection and coming to know oneself more effectively.

Like action research , this study demonstrates personal value in autoethnography for improving practice, but leaves open the question of whether the study held much value for progressing academic knowledge.

Citation: de Souza Vasconcelos, E. F. (2011). ” I can see you”: an autoethnography of my teacher-student self.  The Qualitative Report ,  16 (2), 415.

10. Writing Professor as Adult Learner (Henning, 2012)

This autoethnography explores personal stories and reflections of a professor who goes through an online learning process.

The value I find in this study is that it is strongly embedded in the research literature. It does not only present a personal reflection on their data, but also integrates adult learning theories to reflect on how online learning might need to be reactive to the needs of adult learners.

Citation: Henning, T. B. (2012). Writing professor as adult learner: An autoethnography of online professional development.  Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks ,  16 (2), 9-26.

Autoethnography is a controversial research methodology. It has struggled to gain recognition as a valid research method in many scholarly fields, while gaining some traction in cultural studies, gender studies, anthropology, and literary studies fields.

While it does not replace the highly-valuable quantitative research and large-scale qualitative studies that help progress social understandings and scientific knowledge, it does help to dig far deeper into human experiences than many other studies possibly can.

Adams, T. E., Ellis, C., & Jones, S. H. (2017). Autoethnography.  The international encyclopedia of communication research methods , 1-11. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118901731.iecrm0011

Cohen, Manion & Morrison (2018). Research methods in education . London: Routledge.

Edwards, J. (2021). Ethical autoethnography: Is it possible?.  International Journal of Qualitative Methods ,  20 , 1609406921995306.

Mentz, E., Olivier, J., Bailey, R., Bosch, C., Kruger, C., Kruger, D., … & Van der Westhuizen, C. (2020).  Self-directed multimodal learning in higher education  (p. 468). AOSIS.

Pretorius, L., & Cutri, J. (2019). Autoethnography: Researching personal experiences.  Wellbeing in doctoral education: Insights and guidance from the student experience , 27-34.

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

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