Making Sense of Ethnographic Material

Analysis/Synthesis

• What is the meaning of what you have observed?
• Why do you think what you observed happened?
• Do you see any connections or patterns in what you observed?
• Do you see connections between what you observed and the findings of other scholars?

Breaking it Down

• What is happening --> vignette
• Why it is happening --> analysis
• What theoretical concepts help to explain what is happening --> synthesis

Untitled Slide

What is happening?

How might you explain what is happening? (Think about underlying social forces)

The sense of community and mutual obligation amongst network members offers some assurance against dopesickness. When members of the Edgewater Boulevard scene began injecting alone too frequently and refused offers to pool money to buy heroin, they were accused of being selfish and risked being socially isolated. The moral economy generated frequent expressions of solidarity but the logic of the gray zone imposes greed, deceit, and opportunism onto generosity. Everyday is a "state of emergency” (Benjamin [1940] 1968: 247), and aid to others must be meted out selectively as a zero-sum calculation…Furthermore, no plea for help can be taken at face value because hustling for heroin by any means necessary is the defining attribute of a righteous dopefiend. --Bourgois & Schonberg, pg. 84

Synthesis Activity