Comparing Ethnographies Across the Americas: Why and How

• In Event: Comparing Ethnographies: Learning From Local Studies of Education Across the Americas

Abstract

Here the co-editors of the volume in development reflect on why we need a comparative ethnography of education, on what kinds of comparison are needed, and on how to work toward that goal.

Framework. Ethnographic case studies ground understanding of education in the local context, but understanding grows significantly when we compare across cases—especially across national and regional boundaries, since schooling is such a taken-for-granted institution. Crucially, scholars should compare research conducted by local scholars, for the social sciences differ in vocabularies, theories, and cases around the world (e.g., Connell, 2007; Heilbron et al. 2008).

Although interested in global research, we focus on the Americas because they are more than diverse enough, because their educational systems intertwine (Zúñiga & Hamann, 2009), and because we build on collegial relationships built at Inter-American Symposia on Ethnography and Education.

We focus on a methodology, ethnography, used by anthropologists, sociologists, and others because it is easier to compare across a field that ostensibly shares core assumptions and a common toolkit. Moreover, ethnographic methods encourage us to focus on local context, while our discipline of anthropology encourages a comparative perspective.

Methods and Evidence. We adapt principles for comparing qualitative research proposed by Hymes (1980) and by Noblit and Hare (1988). (We would imagine with Hymes an ethnology of education, but “ethnology” carries problematic connotations in parts of Latin America.) We hope to develop comparative generalizations (Hymes), but generalizations that still rooted in particular contexts (Noblit & Hare). We recognize that context is historically cumulative (Hymes), and that comparing ethnographies, which are interpretive studies, requires further interpretation (Noblit & Hare).

Most importantly, we acknowledge that comparison will work only if it is cooperative (Hymes), that is, enacted reciprocally by ethnographers from North and South. Therefore, the thematic papers are co-authored by ethnographers from two different countries who speak different first languages. They compare ethnographic studies across national boundaries in terms of their socio-political, historical and cultural contexts, their methodologies, their theoretical concepts, and their implications for practice.

Lessons. We are learning, first, that US and Latin American scholars do not use exactly translatable terms for some key concepts—and that similar terms, such as “majorities” and “minorities” differ in meaning in important ways. Second, although scholars address the same broad themes across the Americas—learning as a social activity, the organization and effects of schooling, social inequity—we do not always frame the same research questions. For example, ethnographers of teachers may focus on teachers’ knowledge in the United States but on labor processes in Argentina. Finally, comparative work across borders has been as challenging as expected. However, small-scale comparison modeled on meta-ethnography has proven feasible and helpful.

Significance. A body of research dominated by US-based scholars is inequitable, works against a worldwide interest in building the broadest possible pool of common knowledge, and feeds US parochialism (Delamont 2011). Our comparisons demonstrate that noticing cross-regional differences in ethnographic research does indeed awaken new questions and lead to new understandings of learning and schooling.

Authors

• Kathryn M. Anderson-Levitt, University of California - Los Angeles

• Elsie Rockwell, Centro de Investigacion y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Mexico