Ethnography and Qualitative Research Methods: A bibliography for composition and rhetoric


Rebecca Moore Howard
The Writing Program
Syracuse University



Please note: I'm increasingly using CiteULike and del.icio.us for my bibliographic work. (On both sites you'll need to click on tags of interest.) Browse what's on this page and then check out CiteULike, del.icio.us, CompPile, and the MLA International Bibliography (requires SU ID) for more. A list of all the static bibliographies that I've put online is here.


Please email suggestions, corrections, or additions.


Last updated 18 November 2006

Agar, Michael H.  "Ethnographic Evidence."  Urban Life 12 (April 1983):  32-48.

Agar, Michael H.  Speaking of Ethnography.  Sage University paper series on Qualitative Research Methods, Vol. 2.  Beverly Hills, CA:  Sage, 1986.

Agar, Michael H.  The Professional Stranger.  New York:  Academic, 1980.

Agar, Michael H.  "Toward an Ethnographic Language."  American Anthropologist 84 (December 1982):  779-795.

Anderson, Jon W.  "Poetics and Politics in Ethnographic Texts:  A View from the Colonial Ethnography of Afghanistan."  Writing the Social Text:  Poetics and Politics in Social Science Discourse.  Ed. Richard Harvey Brown.  New York:  Aldine de Gruyter, 1992.  91-116.

Athanases, Steven Z., and Shirley Brice Heath.  "Ethnography in the Study of the Teaching and Learning of English."  Research in the Teaching of English 29.3 (October 1995):  263-287. 

Atlas.ti

Ball, S.J.  "Initial Encounters in the Classroom and the Process of Establishment."  Pupil Strategies.  Ed. P. Woods.  London:  Croom Helm, 1980.

Barnard, Ian. "Anti-Ethnography?" Composition Studies 34.1 (Spring 2006): 95-108.

Bishop, Wendy.  Ethnographic Writing Research:  Writing It Down, Writing It Up, and Reading It.  Portsmouth, NH:  BoyntonCook, 1999. 

Blair, Ann. "Note Taking as an Art of Transmission." Critical Inquiry 31.1 (Fall 2004): 85-107.

Boon, James A.  "The Reticulated Corpus of Claude LŽvi-Strauss." The Philosophy of Discourse.  Ed. Chip Sills and George H. Jensen.  Vol. 2.  Portsmouth, NH:  Boynton/Cook, 1992.  21-43. 

Brooke, Robert, and John Hendricks.  Audience Expectations and Teacher Demands.  Carbondale and Edwardsville:  Southern Ill UP, 1989.

Brown, J. and D. Canter. "The Uses of Explanation in the Research Interview."  The Research Interview:  Uses and Approaches.  Ed. M. Brenner, J. Brown, and D. Canter.  New York: Academic P, 1985.  217-245.

Brown, R. L., Jr.,  and C.G. Herndl.  "An Ethnographic Study of Corporate Writing: Job Status as Reflected in Written Text."  Functional Approaches to Writing: Research Perspectives.  Ed. B. Couture.  Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1986.  11-28.

Brown, Stephen Gilbert, and Sidney I. Dobrin, eds.  Ethnography Unbound:  From Theory Shock to Critical Praxis.  Albany:  SUNY P, 2004. 

Brown, Stephen Gilbert.  "New Writers of the Cultural Sage:  The Ethnographic-Self Reconfigured."  JAC 24.1 (2004):  207-228. 

Bruyn, S.T.  The Human Perspective:  The Methodology of Participant Observation.  Englewood Cliffs, NJ:  Prentice-Hall, 1966.

Bulmer, M., ed.  Social Research Ethics:  An Examination of the Merits of Covert Participant Observation.  London:  Macmillan, 1982. 

Calkins, Lucy McCormick.  "Forming Research Communities among Naturalistic Researchers."  Perspectives on Research and Scholarship in Composition.  Ed. Ben W. McClelland, et al.  New York:  MLA, 1985.  125-44.

Canter, D., J. Brown, and L. Groat. "A Multiple Sorting Procedure for Studying Conceptual Systems." The Research Interview:  Uses and Approaches.  Ed. M. Brenner, J. Brown, and D. Canter.  New York: Academic P, 1985.  79-114.

Cazden, Courtney B.  Classroom Discourse:  The Language of Teaching and Learning.  Portsmouth NH:  Heinemann, 1988.

Cazden, C.B., V.P. John, and Dell Hymes, eds.  Functions of Language in the Classroom.  NY:  Teachers College P, 1972.

Chafe, W.L., ed.  The Pear Stories:  Cognitive, Cultural and Linguistic Aspects of Narrative Production.  Norwood, NJ:  Ablex, 1980.

Chiseri-Strater, Elizabeth.  Academic Literacies:  The Public and Private Discourse of University Students.  Boynton/Cook, 1991. 

Cicourel, A.V.  Basic and Normative Rules in the Negotiation of Status and Role. Studies in Social Interaction.  Ed. D. Sudnow.  NY:  The Free P, 1972.  229-58.

Cintron, Ralph.  Angels' Town:  Chero Ways, Gang Life, and Rhetorics of the Everyday.  Boston:  Beacon, 1997. 

Clifford, J. and Marcus, G. E. (Eds.).  (1986).  Writing Culture.  Berkeley, CA: U of California P.

Clifford, J.  (1980).  Fieldwork, Reciprocity, and the Making of Ethnographic Texts: The Example of Maurice Leenhardt.  Man, 15, 518-532.

Clifford, James.  The Predicament of Culture:  Twentieth-Century Ethnography,, Literature, and Art.  Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.  1988. 

Crawford, Ilene.  "Playing in Traffic:  A Timely Metaphor for Postmodern Ethnography and Composition Pedagogy."  Composition Studies 33.2 (Fall 2005):  11-24. 

Creswell, John W. Educational Research: Planning, Conducting, and Evaluating Quantitative and Qualitative Research. 2nd ed. Prentice Hall, 2004.

Cross, Geoffrey A.  "A Bakhtinian Exploration of Factors Affecting the Collaborative Writing of an Executive Letter of an Annual Report."  Research in the Teaching of English 24 (May 1990)173-204.

Daiker, Donald A., and Max Morenberg, eds.  The Writing Teacher as Researcher:  Essays in the Theory and Practice of Class-Based Research.  Portsmouth, NH:  Boynton/Cook, 1990.

Danielewicz, J., and Wallace Chafe.  "How 'Normal' Speaking Leads to 'Erroneous' Punctuating."  The Acquisition of Written Language:  Response and Revision.  Ed. S.W. Freedman.  Norwood, NJ:  Ablex, 1985.

Davis, B.G., M. Scriven, and S. Thomas.  The Evaluation of Composition Instruction.  Inverness, CA:  Edgepress, 1981.

Diesing, P.  Patterns of Discovery in the Social Sciences.  NY:  Adline, 1971.

Doheny-Farina, S. "A Case Study of One Adult Writing in Academic and Nonacademic Discourse Communities."  Worlds of Writing:  Teaching and Learning in Discourse Communities of Work.  Ed. Carolyn B. Matalene.  New York: Random House, 1989.  17-42.

Doheny-Farina, S. "Creating a Text/Creating a Company:  The Role of a Text in the Rise and Decline of a New Organization."  Textual Dynamics of the Professions: Historical and Contemporary Studies of Writing in Professional Communities.  Ed. Charles Bazerman and J. Paradis.  Madison, WI: U of Wisconsin P, 1991.  306-335.

Doheny-Farina, S., and Lee Odell. "Ethnographic Research on Writing: Assumptions and Methodology."  Writing in Nonacademic Settings.  Ed. Lee Odell and Dixie Goswami.  London, England: Guilford P, 1985.  503-534.

Doheny-Farina, S.  "Writing in an Emerging Organization:  An Ethnographic Study."  Written Communication 3.2 (1986):  158-85.

Dwyer, Kevin.  Moroccan Dialogues:  Anthropology in Question.  Baltimore:  Johns Hopkins UP, 1982. 

Emerson, Robert M., Rachel I. Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw.  Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes.  U Chicago P, 1995. 

Erickson, F.  "Qualitative Methods in Research on Teaching."  Handbook of Research and Teaching.  Ed. M.C. Wittrock.  3rd ed.  NY:  Macmillan, 1986.  119-61.

Faigley, L.  (1985).  Nonacademic Writing: The Social Perspective.  Writing in Nonacademic Settings. L. Odell and D. Goswami (Eds.).  London, England:  The Guilford P, 231-248.

Freedman, Sarah Warshauer, and A.M. Katz.  "Pedagogical Interaction During the Composing Process:  The Writing Conference."  Writing in Real Time:  Modeling Production Processes.  Ed. Ann Matsuhashi.  Norwood, NJ:  Ablex, 1987.  58-80.

Freeman, E.B., et al.  "Writing Instruction:  New Insights from Ethnographic Research."  Journal of Research and Development in Education 19 (1986):  10-15.

Garfinkel, H.  (1967).  Studies in Ethnomethodology.  Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Geertz, Clifford.  Local Knowledge.  New York:  Basic, 1983. 

Geertz, Clifford.  The Interpretation of Cultures.  New York:  Basic, 1973. 

George, A. L.  (1959).  Quantiative and Qualitative Approaches to Content Analysis.  NY, NY: Rand.

Gere, Anne Ruggles, and R.D. Abbott.  "Talking about Writing:  The Language of Writing Groups."  Research in the Teaching of English 19 (1985):  362-85.

Goetz, J.P., and M.D. LeCompte.  Ethnography and Qualitative Design in Educational Research.  Orlando, FL:  Academic, 1984. 

Golden-Biddle, Karen, and Karen D. Locke. Composing Qualitative Research: Crafting Theoretical Points from Qualitative Research. Sage, 1997.

Griffen, P., and H. Mehan.  "Sense and Ritual in Classroom Discourse."  Conversational Routine:  Explorations in Standardized Communication Situations and Prepartterned Speech.  Ed. F. Coulmas.  The Hague:  Mouton, 1981.  187-213.

Hammersley, Martyn.  Classroom Ethnography:  Empirical and Methodological Essays.  Philadelphia:  Open UP, 1990.

Hammersley, Martyn, and Paul Atkinson.  Ethnography: Principles in Practice.  2nd ed.  New York:  Tavistock, 1995.

Hammersley, Martyn.  The Ethnography of Schooling:  Methodological Issues.  Driffield:  Nafferton, 1983.

Hammersley, Martyn.  Reading Ethnographic Research:  A Critical Guide.  New York:  Longman, 1998.

Heath, Shirley Brice.  Ways with Words:  Language, Life and Work in Communities and Classrooms.  Cambridge:  Cambridge UP, 1983.

Herndl, Carl G.  "Writing Ethnography:  Representation, Rhetoric, and Institutional Practices."  College English 53.3 (March 1991):  320-32.

Herrington, Anne. "Writing in Academic Settings: A Study of the Contexts for Writing in Two Chemical Engineering Courses."  Research in the Teaching of English 19.4 (1985):  331-361.

Herzfeld, Michael.  "Textual Form and Social Formation in Evans-Pritchard and Levi-Strauss."  Writing the Social Text:  Poetics and Politics in Social Science Discourse.  Ed. Richard Harvey Brown.  New York:  Aldine de Gruyter, 1992.  53-72.

Hesford, Wendy. "Global Turns and Cautions in Rhetoric and Composition Studies." PMLA 121.3 (May 2006): 787-801.

Himley, Margaret.  "Facing (Up To)  'The Stranger' in Community Service Learning."  College Composition and Communication 55.3 (February 2004):  416-438. 

Horner, Bruce.  "Critical Ethnography, Ethics, and Work:  Rearticulating Labor."  JAC 22.3 (2002). 

Hymes, Dell.  "Competence and Performance in Linguistic Theory. Language Acquisition:  Models and Methods.  Ed. R. Huxley and E. Ingram.  NY:  Academic P, 1971.  3-28.

Hymes, Dell.  Foundations in Sociolinguistics:  An Ethnographic Approach.  Philadelphia:  U of Penn P, 1974.

Hymes, Dell.  "In Vain I Tried to Tell You":  Essays in Native American Ethnopoetics.  Philadelphia:  U of Pennsylvania P, 1981.

Hymes, Dell.  Language in Education:  Ethnolinguistic Essays.  Washington, D.C.:  Center for Applied Linguistics, 1980.

Hymes, Dell.  "The Ethnography of Speaking."  Anthropology and Human Behavior.  Ed. T. Gladwin and W. Sturdevant.  Washington, D.C.:  Anthropological Society of Washington D.C., 1962.

Janda, Mary Ann.  "Collaboration in a Traditional Classroom Environment."  Written Communication 7 (July 1990):  291-315.

Jick, T.D.  "Mixing Qualitative and Quantitative Methods:  Triangulation in Action."  Administrative Science Quarterly 24 (1979):  602-611.

Johnstone, Anne.  Uses for Journal-Keeping:  An Ethnography of Writing in a University Science Class.  Ed. Barbara Johnstone and Valerie Balester.  Stamford, CT:  Ablex, 1994. 

Kahn, Seth.  "Ethnographic Writing as Grassroots Democratic Action."  Composition Studies 31.1 (Spring 2003):  63-82. 

Kantor, Kenneth J.  "Classroom Contexts and the Development of Writing Intuitions:  An Ethnographic Case Study."  New Directions in Composition Research.  Ed.  Richard Beach and Lillian S. Bridwell.  New York:  Guilford, 1984:  72-94.

Kantor, Kenneth J., et al.  "Research in Context:  Ethnographic Studies in English Education."  Research in the Teaching of English 15 (1981):  293-309.

Lancy, David F. Qualitative Research in Education: An Introduction to the Major Traditions. Longman, 1993.

Latour, Bruno, and Steve Woolgar.  Laboratory Life: The Social Construction of Scientific Facts.  1979.  2nd ed.  Princeton UP, 1986.

Lauer, Janice M., and J. William Asher.  Composition Research:  Empirical Designs.  New York:  Oxford UP, 1988.

LeCompte, M.D., and J.P. Goetz.  "Problems of Reliability and Validity in Ethnographic Research."  Review of Educational Research 52 (1982):  31-60.

Lerner, Neal.  "Insider as Outsider:  Participant Observation as Writing Center Research."  Writing Center Research:  Extending the Conversation.  Ed. Paula Gillespie, Alice Gillam, Lady Falls Brown, and Byron Stay. Mahwah, NJ:  Lawrence Erlbaum, 2002.  53-72. 

Lu, Min-Zhan, and Bruce Horner.  "The Problematic of Experience:  Redefining Critical Work in Ethnography and Pedagogy." College English 60.3 (March 1998):  257-77.  Rpt. The Writing Teacher's Sourcebook.  Ed. Edward P.J. Corbett, Nancy Myers, and Gary Tate.  4th ed.  New York:  Oxford UP, 2000.  36-53. 

Lutz, Frank W.  "EthnographyŃThe Holistic Approach to Understanding Schooling."  Ethnography and Language in Educational Settings.  Ed. Judith L. Green, et al.  Norwood, NJ:  Ablex, 1981, 51-63.

Lynch, M.  (1982).  Art and Artifacts in Laboratory Science: A Study of Shop Work and Shop Talk in a Research Laboratory.  London, England: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Mathiot, Madeleine, ed.  Ethnolinguistics:  Boas, Sapir and Whorf Revisited.  New York:  Mouton de Gruyter, 1979.

Maxwell, Joseph A. Qualitative Research Designs: An Interactive Approach. Sage.

Miles, M.B., and A.M. Huberman.  Qualitative Data Analysis.  Beverly Hills, CA:  Sage, 1984.

Miller, Richard E. As if Learning Mattered: Reforming Higher Education. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP, 1998.

Moerman, Michael.  Talking Culture:  Ethnography and Conversation Analysis.  U Penn P, 1987. 

Mohr, M.M., and M.S. MacLean.  Working Together:  A Guide for Teacher-Researchers.  Urbana, IL:  NCTE, 1987.

Mortensen, Peter, and Gesa E. Kirsch, eds.  Ethics and Representation in Qualitative Studies of Literacy.  Urbana, IL:  NCTE, 1996.

Mosenthal, P., L. Tamor, and S. Walmsley, eds.  Research in Writing:  Principles and Methods.  NY:  Longman, 1983.

Mostyn, B.  "The Content Analysis of Qualitative Research Data: A Dynamic Approach." The Research Interview:  Uses and Approaches.  Ed. M. Brenner, J. Brown, and D. Canter.  New York: Academic P, 1985.  115-145.

Myers, G. Writing Biology: Texts in the Social Construction of Scientific Knowledge. Madison: U Wisconsin P, 1990.

Myers, G. "Stories and Styles in Two Molecular Biology Review Articles."  Textual Dynamics of the Professions: Historical and Contemporary Studies of Writing in Professional Communities.  Ed. Charles Bazerman and J. Paradis.  Madison:  U Wisconsin P, 1991.  45-75.

Myers, Miles.  The Teacher-Researcher:  How to Study Writing in the Classroom.  Urbana, IL:  NCTE, 1985.

Nystrand, Martin, and John Duffy, eds. Towards a Rhetoric of Everyday Life: New Directions in Research on Writing, Text, and Discourse. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2003.

Nystrand, M., ed.  What Writers Know:  The Language and Structure of Written Discourse.  NY:  Academic, 1982.

Odell, Lee.  "Beyond the Text: Relationships between Writing and Social Context."  Writing in Nonacademic Settings.  Ed. Lee Odell and Dixie Goswami. London: Guilford P, 1985.  249-280.

Odell, Lee, Dixie Goswami, and Anne Herrington.  "The Discourse-Based Interview: A Procedure for Exploring the Tacit Knowledge of Writers in Nonacademic Settings."  Research on Writing: Principles and Methods.  Ed. P. Mosenthal, L. Tamor, and S. Walmsley.  New York: Longman, 1983.  221-235.

Odell, Lee, and Dixie Goswami.  "Writing in a Non-Academic Setting."  Research in the Teaching of English 16 (1982):  201-23.

Olson, Gary A.  "The Social Scientist as Author:  Clifford Geertz on Ethnography and Social Construction."  Journal of Advanced Composition 11.2 (Fall 1991):  245-68.

Patton, M.Q.  Qualitative Evaluation Methods.  Beverly Hills, CA:  Sage, 1980.

Pearce, W. B., and V. Chen. "Ethnography as Sermonic:  The Rhetorics of Clifford Geertz and James Clifford."  Rhetoric in the Human Sciences.  Ed. H. W. Simons.  London, England: Sage, 1989.  119-132. 

Potter, J. and M. Mulkay. "Scientists' Interview Talk:  Interviews as a Technique for Revealing Participants' Interpretative Practices."  The Research Interview: Uses and Approaches.  Ed. M. Brenner, J. Brown, and D. Canter.  New York: Academic P, 1985.  247-271.

Pratt, Mary Louise. 

Rymer, J.  (1988). Scientific Composing Processes: How Eminent Scientists Write Journal Articles.  Writing in Academic Disciplines:  Advances in Writing Research, Vol. 2.  D. A. Jolliffe (Ed.).  Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 211-250.

Schatzman, L., and A.L. Strauss.  Field Research:  Strategies for a Natural Sociology.  Englewood Cliffs, NJ:  Prentice-Hall, 1973.

Seliger, H.W., and M.H. Long.  "What Is Classroom-Oriented Research?"  Classroom Oriented Research in Second Language Acquisition.  Ed. H.W. Seliger and M.H. Long.  Rowley, MA:  Newbury House, 1983.  v-ix.

Silverman, David, and Brian Torode.  The Material Word:  Some Theories of Language and Its Limits.  Boston:  Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1980.

Smith, Dorothy E. Institutional Ethnography: A Sociology for People. AltaMira, 2005.

Smith, Dorothy E., ed. Institutional Ethnography as Practice. Rowman & Littlefield, 2006.

Soven, Margot.  "Ethnography and the Teaching of Composition."  Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Conference on College Composition and Communication (30th, Minneapolis MN, April 5-7, 1979).  ERIC ED 178 913. 

Sperling, Melanie.  "I Want to Talk to Each of You:  Collaboration and the Teacher-Student Writing Conference."  Research in the Teaching of English 24 (October 1990):  279-321.

Spilka, R.  (1988).  Studying Writer-Reader Interactions in the Workplace.  The Technical Writing Teacher, 15 (3), 208-221.

Spindler, G.D., ed.  Doing the Ethnography of Schooling:  Educational Anthropology in Action. New York:  Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1982.

Spradley, James P. The Ethnographic Interview.  New York:  Holt, 1979.

Tobin, Lad.  "Reading Students, Reading Ourselves:  Revising the Teacher's Role in the Writing Class."  College English 53 (1991):  333-48.

Tyler, Stephen A.  "Post-Modern Ethnography:  From Document of the Occult to Occult Document."  Writing Culture:  The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography.  Ed. James Clifford and George E. Marcus.  Berkeley:  U of California P, 1986.  122-141. 

Van Maanen, John.  Tales of the Field:  On Writing Ethnography.  U Chicago P, 1988. 

Wilson, S.  "The Use of Ethnographic Techniques in Educational Research."  Review of Educational Research 47 (1977):  245-265. 

Winsor, D. A.  (1990).  Engineering Writing/Writing Engineering.  College Composition and Communication 41.1: 58-70.

Zou, Yali, and Enrique (Henry) T. Trueba, eds.  Ethnography and Schools:  Qualitative Approaches to the Study of Education. Lanham, MD:  Rowman & Littlefield, 2003.