Selected Problems of Field Work in the Planned Community

Bibliographic Data

ID5249291
AuthorsRobert Κ Merton (corresponding author), Robert K Merton
Year1947
Volume12
Issue3
Pages304
Publication date1947-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Sociological Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0003-1224 • E-ISSN: 1939-8271
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/2086520
OpenAlexW2332953134
LanguageEN
Citations received22

AMONG the most widely practiced and least codified procedures of social research are those comprised by the large-scale collection of observational and interview data communities. A few accounts of participant-observation are available but, general, a deep silence cloaks many of the concrete problems found work. Thus social anthropologists, themselves heavily committed to community research, have recently been indicted for the extent to which . . . (they) have been articulate about their techniques. .*. 1 The experiences of fieldworkers have not commonly been codified and set forth for all to read. As a consequence, these procedures have largely remained private skills passed on through example and word-ofmouth to a limited number of apprentices. The reasons for this public reticence are not entirely clear. Perhaps so much of what is done in the field seems to require only the application of common sense-with which, presumably, social researchers like other folks are liberally blessed-that there appears small point codifying situations, problems and procedures. Yet it is acknowledged that sociology and anthropology, like

Field (mathematics · Sociology · Work (physics · Central European Literary Studies · Engineering · Mathematics · Mechanical Engineering · Polish-Jewish Holocaust Memory Studies

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