media products and ethnography

media products

• such as newspapers , magazines, advertisements, radio, music products , posters, films,novels, the internet and computer products , fanzines and so on tell us something about the particular society that we live in

• sociologists will often use media extracts or items such as adverts or television programmes to examine and analyse the values , priorities or concerns of a society at any one point in time

• a technique used by some sociologists to analyse media reports or products is content analysis- usually the aim of this type of research is to identify how particular social groups or social situations are portrayed in the product of being analysed

• usually, sociologists design a content analysis schedule : a list of things the sociologist is looking for in the media content on which they record how often the ‘thing’ occurs

• this is normally done by counting the frequency of certain images such as those contained in adverts and photographs or words contained in newspapers/ magazine articles or headlines

• in this sense, content analysis is mainly a quantitative method

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strengths of content analysis

• it is very cheap. all the sociologist needs to do is buy the magazine or newspapers or watch the television programme

• it is a comparative method in that it allows the sociologist to compare media reports and content over a period of time . in other words, it can be longitudinal.

• quantitative content analysis is regarded as reliable because other sociologists can repeat and cross-check the results by looking at the same media using the same content analysis schedule

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weaknesses of content analysis

• it ca be a very time consuming method because media products might need to be checked over a fairly long period of time

• it can be largely subjective, the categories used by content analysis is based on what the researcher deems as important

• it cannot be assumed from content analysis that media products and content have an effect upon their audience ; this may not be the case . it is not proven or unproven

• media products may only tell us about the personal and political beliefs of those who produce media products i.e the prejudices of journalists and broadcasters

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ethnography

• means writing about the way of life , or culture of social groups

• at its simplest , it involves the researcher inserting himself or herself into the natural setting of the social group being studied and participating in and observing their daily activities

• other methods particularly informal or structured interviews may be used to sketch out a fuller picture of the groups behaviour

• the purpose is to describe culture and lifestyle in a way that is faithful and in a way in which they see it themselves. also to but their behaviours in a social context

• the idea is to ‘tell it like it is’- that is , to capture ordinary activities and peoples interpretations of those activities

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ethnography and interpretivists

• ethnographic research is referred by interpretivist sociologists who argue that only ethnographic methods such as unstructured interviews allow researchers access of the ‘lived experiences’ of particular social groups and to get inside their heads

• in this sense, ethnography is all about imitating real life

• its about achieving verstehen- being able to empasise with or think like the people who are being studied

• this closeness to the research subjects has led interpretivists to claim that ethnography produces the most valid and authentic type of qualitative data of any type of social research methods

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media products

• such as newspapers , magazines, advertisements, radio, music products , posters, films,novels, the internet and computer products , fanzines and so on tell us something about the particular society that we live in

• sociologists will often use media extracts or items such as adverts or television programmes to examine and analyse the values , priorities or concerns of a society at any one point in time

• a technique used by some sociologists to analyse media reports or products is content analysis- usually the aim of this type of research is to identify how particular social groups or social situations are portrayed in the product of being analysed

• usually, sociologists design a content analysis schedule : a list of things the sociologist is looking for in the media content on which they record how often the ‘thing’ occurs

• this is normally done by counting the frequency of certain images such as those contained in adverts and photographs or words contained in newspapers/ magazine articles or headlines

• in this sense, content analysis is mainly a quantitative method

strength of content analysis

• it is very cheap. all the sociologist needs to do is buy the magazine or newspapers or watch the television programme

• it is a comparative method in that it allows the sociologist to compare media reports and content over a period of time . in other words, it can be longitudinal.

• quantitative content analysis is regarded as reliable because other sociologists can repeat and cross-check the results by looking at the same media using the same content analysis schedule

weakness of content analysis

• it ca be a very time consuming method because media products might need to be checked over a fairly long period of time

• it can be largely subjective, the categories used by content analysis is based on what the researcher deems as important

• it cannot be assumed from content analysis that media products and content have an effect upon their audience ; this may not be the case . it is not proven or unproven

• media products may only tell us about the personal and political beliefs of those who produce media products i.e the prejudices of journalists and broadcasters

ethnography

• means writing about the way of life , or culture of social groups

• at its simplest , it involves the researcher inserting himself or herself into the natural setting of the social group being studied and participating in and observing their daily activities

• other methods particularly informal or structured interviews may be used to sketch out a fuller picture of the groups behaviour

• the purpose is to describe culture and lifestyle in a way that is faithful and in a way in which they see it themselves. also to but their behaviours in a social context

• the idea is to ‘tell it like it is’- that is , to capture ordinary activities and peoples interpretations of those activities

ethnography and interpretivists

• ethnographic research is referred by interpretivist sociologists who argue that only ethnographic methods such as unstructured interviews allow researchers access of the ‘lived experiences’ of particular social groups and to get inside their heads

• in this sense, ethnography is all about imitating real life

• its about achieving verstehen- being able to empasise with or think like the people who are being studied

• this closeness to the research subjects has led interpretivists to claim that ethnography produces the most valid and authentic type of qualitative data of any type of social research methods