Wearing a Pith Helmet at a Sly Angle:

Written Communication Jul 1993

RALPH CINTRON

Abstract

The entry of ethnography and ethnographic methods into writing research, particularly during the 1980s, has been highly productive. However, this research continues to ignore many of the doubts concerning ethnography that anthropologists themselves have been raising for a number of years. This article (a) outlines more than a decade of civil war among anthropologists, (b) considers the relevance of that debate to writing researchers working ethnographically, (c) argues for more experimental ethnographic texts in contrast to the entrenched models that currently rule the field and despite the institutional resistance that experimental texts are bound to generate, and (d) suggests in cursory fashion the fate of “postmodernist” discourse in the context of the more normative discourse of institutional life. Along the way, the article analyzes some of the rhetoric of the ethnographic work of writing researchers, including Heath's Ways With Words.

Journal: Written Communication
Published: 1993-07-01
DOI: 10.1177/0741088393010003003
Open Access: Closed
Topics: qualitative research multimodality

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (5)

Russell (2022)

From Methodology to Method in Genre-Based Ethnographies

Written Communication
Molloy (2015)

Recuperative Ethos and Agile Epistemologies: Toward a Vernacular Engagement wit…

Rhetoric Society Quarterly
Lillis (2008)

Ethnography as Method, Methodology, and “Deep Theorizing”

Written Communication
HERNDL et al. (2000)

Research as Social Practice

Written Communication
Blyler (1995)

Research as ideology in professional communication

Technical Communication Quarterly

Cites in this index (2)

BRODKEY (1987)

Writing Ethnographic Narratives

Written Communication
DOHENY-FARINA (1986)

Writing in an Emerging Organization

Written Communication

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