34.168, Review: Applied Linguistics: Guillén-Galve, Bocanegra-Valle (2021)

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-34-168. Thu Jan 19 2023. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 34.168, Review: Applied Linguistics: Guillén-Galve, Bocanegra-Valle (2021)

Moderators:

Editor for this issue: Maria Lucero Guillen Puon <luceroguillen at linguistlist.org>
================================================================


Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2023 00:53:31
From: Caroline Hutchinson [hutchinson.caroline at nihon-u.ac.jp]
Subject: Ethnographies of Academic Writing Research

 
Discuss this message:
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/reviews/get-review.cfm?subid=36848097


Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/33/33-71.html

EDITOR: Ignacio  Guillén-Galve
EDITOR: Ana  Bocanegra-Valle
TITLE: Ethnographies of Academic Writing Research
SUBTITLE: Theory, methods, and interpretation
SERIES TITLE: Research Methods in Applied Linguistics 1
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2021

REVIEWER: Caroline Hutchinson, Nihon University 日本大学

SUMMARY 

Ethnography is a methodological approach arising from the discipline of
cultural anthropology, which aims to describe cultural phenomena and
behaviour, and understand them from the perspective of participants in that
culture. “Ethnographies of Academic Writing Research”, edited by Ignacio
Guillén-Galve and Ana Bocanegra-Valle, explores the application of
ethnographic methodology and approaches to the field of academic writing
research. The seven chapters introduce the core tools of ethnographic research
and their potential to contribute to our understanding of academic writing,
providing practical examples of ethnographic studies in which these methods
have been applied.

In her foreword, Theresa Lillis identifies a tendency towards implicit
normative expectations about what an academic text should be, with texts and
writers that deviate from those expectations being seen as ‘wrong’ and
evaluated negatively. She argues that ethnography, with its potential to
capture the context in which texts are produced and the perspectives of those
producing them, offers a means to bring to light and challenge many of these
assumptions. Such insights may help teachers and researchers to move away from
“deficit framings” (viii), and to better understand the experiences and
contributions of diverse academic writers and writing.

Chapter 1 is an introduction by the editors, Ana Bocanegra-Valle and Ignacio
Guillen-Galve. They begin by tracing the journey of ethnography as
methodology, from cultural anthropology in the late nineteenth century to its
increasing application in other fields seeking insights from more qualitative
research. They believe that ethnographic research approaches have the
potential to shed light on academic writing practices and development from the
perspectives of those engaged in them (the emic perspective), as well as those
researching them (the etic perspective).

The chapter goes on to outline in brief the core concepts that are explored in
the book, before relating them to the practical research outlined in each
chapter. These concepts are:

Thick description. This term refers to the use of multiple data sources
collected at the location being studied over an extended period of time,
incorporating the perspective of the researcher and the researched (see
Geertz, 1973).

Deep theorizing. Following Lillis (2008), this refers to narrowing the gap
between language and culture, text and context. This can be achieved through
attention to the ways in which language refers to context (indexicality), and
how those using or understanding language orient themselves to what is said.

Participatory research and reflexivity. Through observation, researchers can
gain a better understanding of academic writing from the writer’s perspective;
at the same time, researchers should be reflexive, acknowledging and
interrogating their own position in relation to the research.

Research ethics. As ethnographic research entails detailed, sustained
engagement with participants and their perspectives, it is essential to
safeguard confidentiality and ensure transparency in the research process.

In the second chapter, Christine Tardy examines the concept of thick
description in greater depth. She begins by noting that while the term is
widely used in academia somewhat loosely to mean rich or detailed description
of context, it is important to revisit the core principles of thick
description if we hope to use it to gain insight into academic writing.
Following Geertz (1973), Tardy argues that true thick description entails an
insider perspective gained from sustained interaction with the target of
research, and an interpretative lens that links description, local knowledge
and theoretical concepts. These goals may be better achieved through what
Sarangi (2007) calls ‘thick participation’, a collaborative relationship with
research participants involving sustained engagement and researcher
reflexivity.

Tardy then describes a review conducted of the use of the terms ‘thick
description’ and ‘thick participation’ in journals publishing academic writing
research. She finds no papers referring to thick participation, and notes that
the term ‘thick description’ tended to be used only once in each paper. She
considers in greater detail the extent to which key related aspects of
ethnographic research are reflected in the papers under consideration: use of
multiple data sources, sustained engagement, emic or insider perspectives,
reflexivity, and theorization connecting local data to broader paradigms.
Tardy concludes by arguing that sustained engagement and collaboration can
yield greater insight into the perspectives of research participants, while
also necessitating a greater need for reflexivity and the attention to
research ethics. 

In Chapter 3, Jennifer Sizer considers ‘textography’, a term created by Swales
(2018). Textography combines textual analysis with ethnography, and Sizer
argues that it provides a means for writing researchers to produce thick
descriptions incorporating attention to text, context and practice. After
giving an overview of published research into a wide range of texts, contexts
and practices including authorial identity, the writing process, and
communities of practice, Sizer turns to methodology. Textography supplements
textual analysis with contextual data sources such as interviews,
observations, field notes, participant diaries and member checks in which
participants are invited to comment on transcripts. This allows for the
triangulation of data and can enhance the credibility of conclusions drawn. 

Sizer then discusses some methodological and ethical considerations for
researchers. She emphasizes that data should reflect context as naturally as
possible. Where possible, participants should be given space to interpret
their actions and give context; conclusions should be generated as data is
collected, rather than data being collected to validate a hypothesis.
Providing context through ethnographic methods should generate thick
description, incorporating the temporal element of sustained engagement
through narrativization. At the same time, researchers should be aware of the
potential ethical implications, such as the difficult balance between thick
description and participant anonymity. 

In Chapter 4, Sofia Albero-Posac and María José Luzón consider online
settings. The proliferation of digital technologies has transformed academic
communication, but exploring these communication practices requires scholars
to rethink certain key aspects of traditional ethnographic methodology. The
authors argue that thus far, no consensus definition has emerged of ‘digital
ethnography’, and point out that many ethnographies take account both of
online and offline communication. Thus, they turn instead to outlining the
constraints and affordances of digital media: digital data persist beyond the
moment of initial communication, and are more easily duplicated, seen widely
and shared widely than traditional communication. These differences may have
ethical implications, for example by making it more difficult to preserve
participant anonymity, or easier to collect data without fully engaging with
participants.

The authors go on to review articles focusing on the online communication
practices of academics. Although few explicitly used the word “ethnography”,
they were able to identify 37 that seemed to incorporate procedures used for
ethnographic research. Methods utilised included surveys and questionnaires,
interviews exploring context and participant perceptions, observation and
document analysis, and autoethnography or reflection on the researcher’s own
writing practices. The chapter concludes with a call for further studies
considering practices across online and offline contexts, with a flexible
approach allowing data to be collected from multiple sources.

Chapter 5 considers the contribution of ethnographic methods to understanding
what Rosa M. Manchón refers to as “writing processes” and “text production
processes” (p.86). “Writing processes” refers both to the cognition leading to
the production of writing, a mainly individual process, and to the actions of
writers producing such texts while situated within diverse social contexts.
“Text production processes”, in contrast, refers to time- and
space-distributed practices. Manchón believes that ethnographically-oriented
approaches can help researchers shed light on the latter two concepts, which
have become more salient to researchers as a result of ‘methodological rich
points’: moments when researchers come to realize that previous conceptual and
research tools do not give us the full picture of the phenomenon we are trying
to understand.

The first such ‘rich point’ Manchón identifies has accompanied the social turn
in Applied Linguistics, with L2 writing researchers shifting from a focus on
individual cognition to one on socially-situated writing practices. She
emphasizes that the focus of such research remains on the individual rather
than the context, and in fact entailed a great deal of focus on individual
learners’ agency, identity, and concept of self. The second ‘rich point’
concerns the realization that writing activity takes place in a distributed
manner both in time and space, frequently involving collaboration. This way of
working, along with its collection as data, would seem to be greatly aided by
the development of digital technologies. Summarising studies relating to these
two ‘methodological rich points’, the author concludes that employing a
combination of cognitive and ethnographic methods in writing research is the
best way to deepen understanding within the field.

The final two chapters of the book switch focus from the theoretical to the
practical. In Chapter 6, Baraa Khuder and Bojana Petrić reflect on their
research with exiled Syrian scholars engaged in re-establishing their academic
careers, in English, in their new contexts. The authors emphasize the need for
particular sensitivity to ethical concerns and researcher reflexivity when
dealing with vulnerable participants. Of particular relevance to the study was
the differing insider/ outsider positioning of the two researchers. One
researcher was Syrian, sharing a first language and background with the
participants, a fact which seemed to facilitate participation and
interviewing, but which also had some disadvantages. 

One potential disadvantage was the assumption that shared knowledge and
understanding meant less need to be explicit about meaning – the assumption
that ‘you know what I mean’. Another was that participants might be less
comfortable sharing controversial opinions with compatriots, who they would
presume to have similar emotional investment in the issues, than with
outsiders. A further possible issue the authors raise is that of maintaining
some degree of detachment when playing the multiple roles of researcher,
fellow academic, friend and sometimes writing consultant. In addition to
triangulating multiple sources, including participants’ own reflections, it
seems that the collaboration between insider and outsider researcher was
invaluable in avoiding overidentification with the participants.

Chapter 7, written by Natalia Ávila Reyes, describes two ethnographic research
projects that aimed to explore the academic writing and emic perspectives of
underrepresented students. The author begins by outlining some of the ways in
which the expansion and diversification of the student body has been framed as
a burden for academic institutions, leading to a narrative of student deficit.
In this paradigm, normative expectations around text production can create a
gatekeeping dynamic in which divergent expression is penalised, hampering
students’ social participation. To counter this, Ávila Reyes calls for the
consideration of text in combination with discourse and social practice, and
for a focus on student writers’ perspectives.

The two research projects described took place in Chile, a country in which
increasing numbers of lower-income students are attending university.
Semi-structured “literacy history” interviews were conducted to understand
students’ prior engagement with literacy practices, in addition to
conversations about texts written by participants. Interestingly, students
tended to downplay their involvement with non-academic literacy practices, and
many reported feeling underprepared for university. The research also
uncovered a degree of discomfort surrounding ‘ownership’ of academic writing
in which impersonal style and citation is commonly preferred. 

EVALUATION

Despite the volume’s extensive discussion of ethnographic approaches, the
reader is left with some ambiguity over what constitutes ethnographic research
into academic writing, and whether a study can be termed ‘ethnographic’ if it
checks some of the methodological boxes referred to but not others. The
authors raise the issue of definition in the first chapter, and there is
reference throughout the volume to the somewhat loose use, or non-use, of
terms such as ethnography when researchers describe their research. Thus,
while the tools introduced, and their value, are clearly expressed, the book
does not set out a strict definition or set of steps to follow to successfully
do ethnographic research. Perhaps the volume would benefit from more practical
examples such as the studies described in the final two chapters, as I found
these to be the most helpful in understanding the interpretive power of
ethnographic research in practice.

Nevertheless, this book offers a comprehensive overview of what ethnographic
approaches can bring to the study of academic writing, covering theory,
methods, and providing practical examples of actual studies and their
interpretation. It introduces tools that can be adopted in order to gain
greater insight into the perspectives of writers with regards to their writing
products and processes, offering the potential to challenge implicit academic
norms and deficit framings. Further, the volume emphasizes the ways in which
participative research and sustained engagement with participants in turn
necessitate careful attention to ethical concerns and continuous
re-examination of our roles and assumptions as researchers.

REFERENCES

Geertz, C. (1973). The interpretation of cultures. Basic Books.

Lillis, T. (2008). Ethnography as method, methodology, and “deep theorizing”:
Closing the gap between text and context in academic writing. Written
Communication, 25(3), 353-388.

Sarangi, S. (2007). The anatomy of interpretation: Coming to terms with the
analysts’ paradox in professional discourse studies. Text & Talk, 27 (5-6),
567-584.

Swales, J. M. (1998). Textography: Toward a contextualization of written
academic discourse. Research on Language and Social Interaction, 31(1),
109-121.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Caroline Hutchinson is an Associate Professor at Nihon University College of
Economics, Japan. Her interests include English-Medium Instruction (EMI),
Content-Language Integrated Learning (CLIL), learner autonomy and academic
mentoring. She is currently considering how best to support students in
researching and writing their graduation theses, and how to explore student
perceptions relating to that process.





------------------------------------------------------------------------------

***************************    LINGUIST List Support    ***************************
 The 2022 Fund Drive is under way! Please visit https://funddrive.linguistlist.org
  to find out how to donate and check how your university, country or discipline
     ranks in the fund drive challenges. Or go directly to the donation site:
                   https://crowdfunding.iu.edu/the-linguist-list

                        Let's make this a short fund drive!
                Please feel free to share the link to our campaign:
                    https://funddrive.linguistlist.org/donate/
 


----------------------------------------------------------
LINGUIST List: Vol-34-168	
----------------------------------------------------------