Contexts

sociology for the public

Contexts Blog

how to do ethnography right

by syed ali and philip cohen
Ethnographies are works of deep research based on in-depth, open-ended interviews and keen observations of how people go about their lives in different contexts. Researchers … Read More

the unhappy marriage of IRBs and ethnography

by abigail e. cameron
A student submits an IRB application to study “media freedom” and the struggles of citizen journalists for her doctoral dissertation. The study methodology includes immersion … Read More

doing qualitative research as if counsel is hiding in the closet

by dana r. fisher
A lot of my research studies political elites. As such, I am frequently conducting participant observation and open-ended, semi-structured interviews in the halls of the … Read More

want to improve your qualitative research? try using representative sampling and working in teams

by stefanie DeLuca, susan clampet-lundquist, and and kathryn edin
In the mid-1990s, the federal government launched a high-profile social experiment in five cities to determine if escaping concentrated neighborhood poverty could change the lives … Read More

accessing the hardest to reach populations

by Kimberly Kay Hoang and Rhacel Salazar Parreñas
On January 3, 2009, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote an op-ed “If This Isn’t Slavery, What Is?” In it he described the … Read More

it’s about the depth of your data

by annette lareau and aliya hamid rao
A key strength of in-depth interviews and ethnography is obtaining textured insights into social phenomenon. Yet, many qualitative researchers try to invoke the reliability of … Read More

ethnographic masking in an era of data transparency

by alexandra murphy and colin jerolmack
Demands for data transparency are sweeping across the social sciences. Calls for the sharing of survey instruments, code, databases, and even interview transcripts, have grown … Read More

Podcasts for the sociologically inclined

by Carrie Clarady and Rose Malinowski Weingartner
Some of us here at Contexts Grad Team are big fans of podcasts. Here are our top picks. Read More

An Asian American Mother’s Question to Chris Rock and the Academy

by Miliann Kang
A screengrab via Inside Edition’s YouTube page. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences issued a statement two days ago regarding offensive jokes about … Read More

keeping it real with twitter and #realacademicbios

by Stephen Barnard
Social media has come to play a significant role in Higher Education. Academics use social media for many things, including public scholarship, professional … Read More

About Contexts

Contexts is a quarterly magazine that makes cutting-edge social research accessible to general readers. We're the public face of sociology.

It is a publication of the American Sociological Association, edited by Amin Ghaziani (University of California-Santa Barbara) and Seth Abrutyn (University of British Columbia), with Letta Page.