Rationales for re-studies If the original study was not sound, it - PDF document

19-Apr-18 Background • Study and Re-study of Bishop McGregor: 1973-4, 1984 (Burgess 1981, 1983, 1987). Reflections on the value of • The rarity of re-studies in the sociology of ethnographic re-studies education. • Re-studies much more common in the field of anthropological and sociological community studies (Crow 2012). Martyn Hammersley The Open University • Investigation of schools-as-communities: Hargreaves (1967), Lacey (1970), Ball (1980), Burgess (1983). Symposium to celebrate the academic career of • Problems with re-studies: getting back into the Professor Robert Burgess, University of Leicester, May 2014 field, controversies over findings. Tensions Rationales for re-studies • If the original study was not sound, it cannot be used as a baseline to investigate change. • Replication • If the community has changed, then replication is • Mapping change over time no longer possible. • Exploring new aspects of a case • If the re-study investigates different aspects of the institution or community from the original investigation, it can serve neither replication nor Many re-studies combine these three purposes. the mapping of change. • Is not variation in findings simply a product of There are some tensions amongst them. differences in the personal outlook of the researcher or of the methods and theoretical framework used? The contrast between the accounts of A couple of classic controversies Redfield and Lewis • Robert Redfield (1930) and Oscar Lewis (1951) ‘Lewis found Tepoztlán to be strikingly different from on Tepoztlán: ‘where Redfield found harmony, the way that Redfield had portrayed it. Whereas Lewis found conflict’. Redfield had seen Tepoztlán as a harmonious and • Margaret Mead (1928), Wendell Holmes contented village, Lewis discovered it to be riven (1987), and Derek Freeman (1983, 1998) on with strife. Not only were villagers discontented because they were ill-fed and disease-ridden, but Samoa: ‘the greatest controversy in also they were filled with jealousy for and mistrust anthropology for over 100 years’ (see Bryman of their fellow villagers. Tepoztlán, in short, did not 1994). resemble the intimate folk society Redfield had described.’ (Wilcox 2004:66) 1

19-Apr-18 This case ‘provides a most interesting example of the difference in perception and selection of materials Explaining the discrepancy between the two ethnographers. Redfield was interested in harmony; he was interested in what made things go well. Oscar, as everybody knows, was interested in what • Redfield or Lewis got it wrong, or perhaps made things go badly. As a result, those two studies both did. which are very interesting and very informative, are excellent statements about the temperaments of those • Tepoztlán had changed in the interim. two men.’ (Mead 1976:144) • The discrepancies between the two accounts Replying to criticism, Lewis writes: ‘It seems to me that reflect differences in the personalities, concern with what people suffer from is more productive theoretical orientations, or methodological of insight about the human condition, about the dynamics of conflict and the forces for change. To stress approaches of the two investigators. the enjoyment in peasant life [as Redfield agreed he did] is to argue for its preservation and inadvertently to boost tourism’ (Lewis 1970:252). Burgess re-study Variation in the character of re-studies • Single researcher on both occasions. • Lone researcher versus team research. • Same researcher carried out original study and re- • Original researcher(s) carry out the re-study study. • Somewhat different methods employed. versus new researcher(s) carrying it out. • 10 year time gap. • Same methods versus different methods • Slightly different focus: original study examined employed. the experience of teachers and students in • Short versus long time period between study ‘Newsom classes’, whereas re-study looked and re-study. particularly at the role of the headteacher and the These types of variation have important senior management team. implications for the nature of any re-study, and • Useful findings, for example about the effects of for which of the purposes it can serve. falling rolls on schools. And little controversy! Questions Conclusion: the value of re-study • Do re-studies simply open up a logical impasse, revealing or perhaps even generating intractable • It highlights threats to the validity of social problems, thereby damaging the reputation of research findings, but can also show that the social research? findings are more robust than critics claim. • Or do they, as Redfield argued, demonstrate ‘the Provides a means of assessing the significance of power of social science to revise its conclusions and validity threats. to move towards the truth’, a point with which • Offers a strategy for investigating change in ways Lewis agreed? • It is easy to exaggerate the discrepancies between that take account of local variation, for example as studies, and this has been done in some of the regards the impact of state policies, or of broad controversies, and to exaggerate the tensions social trends. among different purposes of re-study. Usually they • Why aren’t more re-studies done? The idolatry of can be resolved pragmatically, as Bob showed. the new! 2

19-Apr-18 References Ball, S. (1981) Beachside Comprehensive: A case-study of comprehensive schooling , Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Bryman, A. (1994) 'The Mead/Freeman Controversy: Some Implications for Qualitative Researchers', in R. G. Burgess (ed.) Studies in Qualitative Methodology , Vol. 4, Greenwich CT, JAI Press. Burgess, R. G. (1981) An Ethnographic Study of a Comprehensive school, unpublished PhD thesis, University of Warwick. Burgess, R. G. (1983) Experiencing Comprehensive Education: a study of Bishop McGregor School , London, Methuen. Burgess, R. (1987) ‘Studying and re-studying Bishop McGregor school’, in Walford, G. (ed.) Doing Sociology of Education , London, Falmer Press. Freeman, D. (1983) Margaret Mead and Samoa: the making and unmaking of an anthropological myth , Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press. Freeman, D. (1998) The Fateful Hoaxing of Margaret Mead: A historical analysis of her Samoan research , Boulder, Westview Press. Hargreaves, D. H. (1967) Social Relations in a Secondary School, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul. Holmes, L. (1987) Quest for the Real Samoa: the Mead-Freeman controversy and beyond , Massachusetts, Bergin and Harvey. Lacey, C. (1970) Hightown Grammar , Manchester, Manchester University Press. Lewis, O. (1951) Life in a Mexican Village: Tepoztlán Restudied , Urbana, ILL, University of Illinois Press. Lewis, O. (1953) ‘Controls and experiments in fieldwork’, in Kroeber, A. (eds) Anthropology Today , Chicago, University of Chicago Press. Lewis, O. (1970) Anthropological Essays , New York, Random House. Mead, M. (1928) Coming of Age in Samoa , New York, Morrow. Mead, M. (1976) ‘Discussion: American ethnology: the role of Redfield’ (other discussants: J. Collins, E. C. Hughes, and J. Griffin), in Murra, J. (ed.) American Anthropology: the early years , Proceedings of the American Ethnological Society 1974, St Paul MINN, West Publishing Co. 3