Contours of Culture — Complex Ethnography and the Ethnography of Complexity

Offering scholars and researchers a critical examination of the current state of qualitative, ethnographic research, Atkinson, Delamont, and Housley (all: sociology, Cardiff U.) examine the benefits of a classic, multimodal approach to ethnography that is faithful to the complexity of everyday social life--and too often missing from contemporary research. The text continues a dialogue with contemporary interpretative sociology and ethnographic research methods that the authors have been conducting over several previous publications. Here they focus on the uses of various ethnographic methods, including discourse, social interaction, narratives, stories, places, and spaces, that can be used to capture cultural settings in their entirety. Throughout the text, the authors draw from three examples of their own field research--Atkinson's study of the Welsh National Opera, Housley's research on Welsh art and artists, and Delamont's research on the Brazilian martial art, capoeira, in the UK--to illustrate concepts. Annotation c2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Paul Atkinson is Distinguished Research Professor in sociology at Cardiff University, in Wales. Sara Delamont is a reader in sociology at Cardiff University. William Housley is a lecturer in sociology at Cardiff University.