ENGL 1102 Morriah Striplin Four-Faces of Ethnography (Finished) HW 6

Classical Ethnography a lax form of ethnography writing that focusses more on teaching and explaining itself to a mass rather than a scholar. The Classical style is simpler and easier to read, it avoids the bombardment of language and complexities used to make a work sound formal. The Classical ethnography form sells itself to the reader by having an active, engaging voice. While it seeks to persuade the reader it doesnt do so by drowning them in intellect. The classical form is concise and clear in its contents, it is a form tailored to a wide audience. The Introduction of the Classical is more formal than the rest of the paper and often starts with an attention grabbing first sentence that sums up the topic of the paper. The rest of the paper is voiced in a personal way with storied examples and observations all explained in ordinary speech. The overall feel is that of a face to face conversation with an equal. Mainstream Ethnographys like their Classical cousins appeal to a wide audience, however, they lean more towards the science they are part of. This leads to a slightly more formal form of paper that can engage a professional of the field while still semi readable by the general audience. The main change is that of the quality and interpretation of the Mainstreams data: there is a greater emphasis on the logic behind the observations. There is a greater amount of language and data interpretation in the paper, and the research question behind the paper is a bigger part of the formatting and argument of the ethnography. The personal connections of the author to the reader are far less pronounce than in the Classical form, and the Mainstream paper is extremely objective. Postmodern Ethnographys are a form that are very flexible with varying fields of study, however, they also are far less concerned with the objectivity of their context. Postmodern lacks the clear goals of the classical and mainstream, they are less strict with the gathering and presenting of data, the clear line between observation and opinion. Postmodern formed papers are built on the subjectivity of their author and as such are very story orientated. This makes them far harder to utilize for arguments or as a formal paper written for professionals of the field. The Postmodern is very experimental in its writing and freed from the constraints of reliability, making it less than desirable for professional arguments but a useful tool for easy discussion. Postmodern is the only form that allows for auto-ethnography the authors own experiences thrown in the mix of his observations. Lastly comes the Public Ethnography, out of all forms of ethnography this one is tailored to encompass the widest audience and is not gauged towards scholars like the classical and postmodern. It is an informal form choice with story like qualities very similar to the Classical. However, the main difference is the formality and coherency of the format to the average Joe. While classical is readable Public goes out of its way to be understandable to all levels of people. To counter balance its general wording, Public puts heavy emphasis on describing everything with a great amount of detail, allowing the readers to feel like they are reading a story. Because of this the Public ethnography is a form best used for public journals and other media. Public ethnography is the least formal and most understandable of the forms in terms of wording.

My Choice of Forms: Of the four forms of ethnography I personally think that the Classical form is best suited for my paper. The form itself is a fairly flexible with plenty of room for me to experiment but with a solid core and rubric to give me a starting point. For the body of my paper, I think I lean more towards the Public form due to its story like qualities and emphasis on description. I have always been a good story teller and I want my ethnography to play towards this strength. A hybrid of Classical and Public formatting will I believe- give me the greatest amount of leeway for my storytelling ability. It is also very important to me to be able to use autoethnography in my paper, as my personal connections to the research are key insight into the argument I am trying to make. To this end the subjectivity that classical and public formatting allows is key. Other than autoethnography I wish it keep a distance from the chaos of postmodern format as it is notoriously haphazard and hard to read. Similarity my personal observations and bias will rule out the extreme objectivity of Midstream ethnography, but I will try to utilize some of its format for my argument.