In Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, Robert M. Emerson, Rachel I. Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw present a series of guidelines, suggestions, and practical advice for creating useful fieldnotes in a variety of settings, demystifying a process that is often assumed to be intuitive and impossible to teach. Using actual unfinished notes as examples, the authors illustrate options for composing, reviewing, and working fieldnotes into finished texts. They discuss different organizational and descriptive strategies and show how transforming direct observations into vivid descriptions results not...

From roommate disputes to family arguments, trouble is inevitable in interpersonal relationships. In "Everyday Troubles," Robert M. Emerson explores the beginnings and development of the conflicts that occur in our relationships with the people we regularly encounterfamily members, intimate partners, coworkers, and othersand the common responses to such troubles.
To examine these issues, Emerson draws on interviews with college roommates, diaries documenting a wide range of irritation with others, conversations with people caring for family members suffering from Alzheimer s, studies of...

From roommate disputes to family arguments, trouble is inevitable in interpersonal relationships. In "Everyday Troubles," Robert M. Emerson explores the beginnings and development of the conflicts that occur in our relationships with the people we regularly encounterfamily members, intimate partners, coworkers, and othersand the common responses to such troubles.
To examine these issues, Emerson draws on interviews with college roommates, diaries documenting a wide range of irritation with others, conversations with people caring for family members suffering from Alzheimer s, studies of...