Becker or Hammersley: Whose Side Are You On?

Howard Beckers ‘Whose sid e are we on’ and Hammersley’s ‘Which side was Becker on’ gave us a good introduction to discussing reflexivity and bias in social research. Reflecting on your own practice during the micro-ethnography or the interview you conducted, whose side were you on? How are you going to deal with this level of subjectivity or bias in your analysis?

The authors explain how sociologist doing research into the world where they live “can find themselves caught in a crossfire”(Becker 1967).

They at some point tend to lean on one side. For example doing a research on deviance generates “great sympathy with the people studied” that can affect the research result (Hammersley; 2001. Becker; 1967).

“Reflecting on this, I can see myself in the same situation during my ethnography research because the topic belongs to our social world. My ethnography topic is “Christmas rituals” As Christmas is very popular in our society I have tried to be neutral to let the participant express their views or make comments but I was still have that interior feeling and excitement of Christmas.

I felt interested in the answers as I myself celebrate Christmas.

It is possible with great effort to impartially conduct a research free of personal and political bias or judgements however a minimal bias is still there as any human being tend to have a position, it may be impossible to be totally neutral. For example if a researcher has a filling about deviant groups they are studying, they might insist on positive points about them and minimise or make fewer comments on negatives side” (Hammersley; 2001; Becker; 1967).

Reflect on the feedback you received on your 2500 word essay (submitted in week 10). Use the guide here and here to help you and say how you intend to ‘feedforward’ the comments you received into future work.* Remember too that feedback is not intended as personal criticism but is provided to help you improve your future work and develop your academic skills (see here).

I tried to use positively the feedback and corrected the mistakes. I could see what I need to improve. Also It made me go see writing mentors I am planning to not make the same mistakes in the future works and exams. I am learning good writing skills from the writing mentors’ information and from the website.

Write down one question about your Research Review assessment. Ask the question in the class and then, based on what you learned from discussion, add your answer here. You can also add references here to any resources (helpful websites, books, etc.) that may have helped you gain a better understanding of the issue.

Question: Why some armed forces prefer to seek help for mental health ssues outside their own services?

Answer: The answer was because they are not sure about, how the disclose of their status would be handled by their command in terms of stigma where there is a risk of being labelled “mad, weak and not fit for military job” (Sharp et al; 2015).

Listen to the podcast from BBC Radio 4’s ‘Thinking Allowed’ programme here. What is it about Goffman’s work that makes him very distinctive and important as a sociological thinker?

The way “Goffman present the staging and his explanation on how an individual in ordinary work situations presents himself and his activities to the others with lots details and contributory elements such as the audience , the other team of performers, the back and the front stage is an impressive deep thinking. It is a full book of very well organised information. he talks about actors keeping the boundaries of their roles, the discrepancy in roles, the communication and the art impression like decoration and physical layout settings related to different stages, the actors and the characters played. Such organisation of events and situations staged by different players, the order of actions and reaction, the coordination and analysis of all those small details and inadequacies thus his information control and ritual models of the interaction process demonstrate his great thinking”(BBC Radio/Utube video).