Fictional Methods in Ethnography:

Believability, Specks of Glass, and Chekh~

Robert Rinehart
California State University, San Bernardino
Wi~~ reallt calls fo~ tlrnJ, ~fttn radiCJlI and c.cperimentni ways of "doing " tlhnognrplrjc
wntmg (t.g ., Den21~1 Ellis .& ~hller, Harrington, Richardson), the responsibility of

tlhnographers to wTlteconvmcmgly comes to lllefore.ln this artic/e, thtauthorexplara

the use, worldvit'W, ond tva/untion a/writing llullsttmSfrom Q humanistic traditionjw
the ~uman disciplines. The aut""., deJinmtes some sLrnnds oftlhnography-the 11M of
fictIOnal methods, the use offichon that has been jactflllliud, and the use officliO'ltllI
ethnography. He examines whyfiction andfictional devices may it/fact be moreeJJfn:Jt
in conveying cerlain aspects of lived experience, especially to acndtmics, than so-called
s~ntific langUilge, and explores, throughout thearticle, selecttd macr&- and m;crot1J,.
niquts that may make fictional ethnography moTt engaging, palatable, and eJfoctivtills
but oneform of the etllnographic strand.

You wiJI get the full effect of a moonlight night if you write that on the rniIL-dam
a little g lowing star-point flashed from the neck of a broken bottle. (Chekhov.
1~~
,
Fiction reveals truth that reality obscures. (West, 1973)
Order is indeed the d ream of man, but chaos, which is only another word for
dumb" blind, witless chance, is still the law of nature. (Stegner, 1987)

POWER AND TEXT

As writer Jessamyn West (1973) indicates in the epigraph above, there UI!
varied truths: There is scientific truth, which, until recently, has embedded
itself in a realist tradition. There is subtle truth, magical truth, lyrical truth,
visceral truth, truth that implies verisimilihlde-the list goes on. The human-
Aut.hor 's Note: A version of this article was presented at the annual meetings of th!
Society for th.e Study of Symbolic Interaction, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, August U.I2,
1997. For theJ.r su pport and feedback on this work, I wish to thank Jim Denison, Vicky
Paraschak, SuzalUleSulherland, Synthia Sydnor, Maurya Anderson. Amy Wheeler,and
Bob Wichert. I also wish to thank Nonnan Denzin,Carolyn Ellis, and Laurel Richardson
for their helpful and encouraging comments.
Qualitative Inquiry, Volume 4 Number 2. 1998 200-224
0 1998 Sage Publications, Inc.

200

istjc tradition in the academy, however, is almost unique in its wilJingness to

eXplore the latter kinds of truths, whereas the scientific tradition remains
steadfast in its methodology.
One of the fundamental points I wish to examine-and promote-in this
article is the use, worldview, and evaluation of writing that stems from a
humanistic tradition for the human disciplines. CertainJy, many authors have
called for more literary sociology; others have encouraged more truthful
fiction . I call for what might be termed a fictional ethnography. More specifi
cally, I want to explore some strands of ethnography-the use of fictional
methods, the use of fiction that has been factualized, and the use of fictional
ethnography. I intend to look at various and varied exemplars from books
and film. My point is not to categorize, for discrete categories are impossibili
ties in ethnography, but rather to enlighten, to exemplify some of the ways in
which ethnography can better answer differing questions.
Furthermore, I wish to explain why fiction and fictional devices may in
fact be more effective in conveying certain aspects of lived experience, espe
cially to academics, than so-called scientific language, and to explore,
throughout this article, selected macro- and microtechniques that may make
fictional ethnography more engaging. palatable, and effective as but one form
of the et hnographic strand. As Ellis and Bochner (1996) put it, this scientific
language is a "received genre of realist writing that construes the author as a
neutral, authoritative, and scientific voice". Clearly, there is a sense of lyricism
and even of magicl in lived experience that is outside the ken of quantitative
social "science" discourse: by reducing experience to its component parts,
some of this magic-for want of a better word-is lost. 2
Lives, true enough, can be seen as compartmentalized and fragmented : To
handle the chaos of contemporary life, many of us have learned the skill of
compartmentalizing, of classifying experience into neat, scientific compo
nents. But raw experience, I contend, comes at a rush. It is only after the effects
of life have washed over us that we reconstitute them as belonging to this or
that category.J Life is magical and complex and multifaceted, and that is how
ethnographers using a fictionally derived method might learn to "report" it.
But, as we know from Foucault, how we choose to name other people and
groups-how we categorize them-often tells more about us, about our
stance on how things are, than it does about any truth of who they are. It tells
more about that which is true to the namer.
Naming and classifying people is a precursor to telling stories about them.
On a fundamental level, if I choose to call someone a "woman," a "girt" a
"lady," a " mother," or a "daughter," each of these apparently colorless words
canies with it connotations for readers. As one reads those simple nouns, one
begins classifying them: A dominant reading might find woman and girl and
lady as roughJy equivalent terms based on biology but find mother and
daughter similar because of roles. By virtue of the active act of choosing to
tell something about someone, we have created a pedagogical stance that is

dee~ly political. We have created a space for ourselves as executors of ot~

stones, and what we choose to say has a profowld impact on how people r
their lives and feel about their places in the world.
IV.
The dynamics of na:mng .and t~ll~g stori~ ~re a bit .of an allegory for
embedded power relatIOnships wIthin the wntmg/ receiving process:' As
Norman Denzin (1992) writes,

Our most powerful effects as storytellers come when we too expose [italics added)
the cultural plot and the cultural practices that guide our writing hands and lead
us to see c.oherence where there is none or to create meaning without an
understandlOg of the broader structures that tell us to tell things in a particular

way. (p. 27)

The simple act of self-reflection, which Ellen Langer (1989), in her book
Mmdfulness encourages for making better choices in life, is a creative act that
may pr~marily privilege intuition over logic.s As ethnographers, or as writera
of a~y 11k, we need to better understand the processes by which we create
stones, but also we need to understand how stories, with all their embedded
craft. and .art, may op~ose, or reify, or slightly skew the existing power
relatIOnshIps. For effectIve stories change the reader.
But exposing the power relationships also indicates where we, as w riters
stand in relation to those wewrite about and to those who are powerful. Wal;
Harrington (1997), writing about what he terms "intimate journalism"_
about "the journalism of everyday life"-intimates this power struggle over
words and ideas in the following passage:
I sus~e~ that the old-heads of straight news fear consciously or unconsciously

that If time, effort and space on the page are regularly given over to the
journalism of everyday life, they will lose out in the newsroom struggle for
resources and status, that the skills they have spent a lifetime learning will be
less valuable, that their power will bediminished. There's probably truth in these
fears. At every newspaper there simmers animosity between the "hard" and
"soft" journalists- with the soft faction always holding less power. (p. xiii)

Thus, in the writing/receiving process (analogous to the teacher /student

re~ationship), for many writers, just as for many teachers, the power that they

WIeld (encompassed in their knowledge) is vested in symbolism and in

symbolic acts.
The discourse of science is but one of the sets of symboHsm, but it is a
pervasive one, especially in the social sciences. As Richardson (1994) has put
it, qualitative writers "can eschew the questionable metanarrative of scientific
objectivity and still have plenty to say as situated speakers, subjectivities
engaged in knOWing/telling about the world as they perceive it" (p. 518). The
recent infusion of "creative nonfiction" programs proliferating in academe

d welcomed by the public (Schneider, 1997) testifies to the humanistic

:~dition attempting to address subjective knowledge.

rJIREE KINDS OF WRITING

There is all malU1er of writings useful for knowledge/ power accrual: The
range includes-but is not limited to-poetry, short stories, factual-laden
nonfiction, reportage, tracts, satire, and ethnography. Some forms of anthro
polOgy, journalism, an~ ~ology hav~ ~pened UPII~P~ces fO.r a ~e o,~
fiction-influenced nonfictIon, whether It IS termed mhmate JournalISm
(Harrington, 1997), true fiction, "literary journalism" (Sims & Kramer, 1995),
"vulnerable anthropology" (Behar, 1996), "poetic representation" (Richard
son, 1993), "New Journalism" (Wolfe, 1973), "postmodern detective writing"
(Denzin, 1997b, p. 164), or "creative nonfiction" (as cited in Harrington,
1997).6 Clearly;. classifications of writing for knowledge's sake are confusing.
What, for example, is Orwell's (1949) Animal Farm? Novel, political tract,
children's story;. extended parable, prosaic representation? Categories some
times describe marketing genres; other times they describe stylistic differ
ences or how truth is represented.
But for purposes of discussion, I wish to make some arbitrary (and
clear, although real clarity is not possible) distinctions between the
ways different types of knowledge are conveyed in writing. Based. on the
intent and worldview of the author, there are at least three kinds of ethno
graphic writing: academic ethnography;. fiction, and fictional ethnography?
There are different questions answered and different ways of knowing im
plicit in each type of writing. And truth means different things to the writers
of each kind of work.
The first, academic, is the kind of writing that bases itself on replicating,
as much as possible in written fonn, some sort of truth. Writers of academic
ethnography attempt, as best as they can, to "capture" the experience so that
readers may more nearly approach primary experience. Examples of this
writing-in which the researcher may use "data ... from field notes" (Ronai,
1992, p. 104) or other methods that lend a feeling of security in mirroring the
"truth" to the researcher-abound in the literature (d. Bochner, 1997; Ellis,
1995; Ellis & Bochner, 1992; Emerson, Fretz, & Shaw, 1995; Payne, 1996; Ronai,
1992,1996)8 Interestingly, Bochner 's (1997) recent piece on "Narrative and
the Divided Self" in Qualitative Inquiry explores some of the artificialities
inherent in this approach: In the embodied self, for example, the culturally
learned split between personal life and professional life is just not genuine.
Nevertheless, of the three kinds of ethnographic writing, this is the most
certain of its claim to traditional forms of truth.

The second type of writing is fiction. Fiction comes to its truth aI

incidentally, as an outgrow th of discovery of truths based on the moo",,:::
of characters, the story line (or plot), and the interaction olthe elements oftb.
story Fiction nught be based on actual events, but often, it is based on the wri~
interpretation of actual or imagined events. Yet, through fiction, the ~
may viscerally inhabit a world. Leo Tolstoy's (1952) War and Peace "teadtos"
the perceptive reader arout class relationships; Stegner's (1987) CrOSSing,.
Safety ~tructs one about faithfulness and friendship (and writing); the
brothers (1991) film Barton Fink lets the "reader" Inhabit the crazy world 01
Hollywood writers; and Margaret Atwood's (1996) Alias Grace problema_
a murder, an accused murderess, and through its "teaching," perhaps s "
readers' views of court cases. But readers feel those worlds, inhabit
worlds, for writers intend to show rather than tell.
The third type of ethnographic writing is fictional ethnography. II COIft.
bines the realist goals of academic ethnography and fiction but with an.,.
to both instruction and feeling. In fictional ethnography, writers may atte""
to relate the chaos of the world to the reader. In academia, it is perhaps "
most radical of the three. In fictional ethnography, most authors attempt III
replicate .the sense of the experience. U something did not necessarily happea
the way It waS reported, recollection made it feel as if it did. Denzin (19974
puts it this way, "II's stupid: you remember what you tho ught, not what YDII
said." Truth, in this type of writing, is not a realist narrative but rather .
sensual, magical, lyrical truth. The feel of the experienco>-verisimilitude-il
what the writer is after. Exact recordings of words said are less important thia
what the sayer meant to say. How does the writer know what the sayer meaaI
to say? Deep immersion in the culture. in the world portrayed, and attentiali
to context as well as detail (Geertz, 1972). This may be gleaned by the whole
context of the event "reported." A variety of fictional methods-rangingfmal
point of view to internal monologue to flash-forward and back-are usect,
and attention to detail is important, but the conveyance of the experience II
paramount. Thus, fictional ethnography writers might use composites II
several types to convey retirement . from professional hockey (Andel'SOl\,
1995), withdrawal from sport due to injury (Denison, 1996), or the experientll
of playing paintball (Rinehart, 1996).
Fictional ethnography combines attributes from both academic ethnogra
phy and fiction. The fundamental thrust of fictional ethnography is to get.
both the affective feel of the experience and the cognitive "truth" of it. ThIt
kind of adaptation of fictional methods for ethnographJc research may answer
different questions than does academic ethnography, although again, I repeot
the caveat that I made these categories discrete for discussion purposes. Ja
the actual writing of them, the methods (and intents) often blur. Wri_
may-and often do-borrow from or combine different forms. From the poiaI
of view of the academic ethnography writers, fictional ethnography colltaiOll l1
falsehoods and is often more flair than substance. Conversely, from the

eo..

a.

of view of fictional etlmographers, some of the questions academic ethnog

raphers ask have become mere listings.

LIVED EXPERIENCE, REPRESENTATION,

;\ND AUTHORITY'
Bad writers are uncommunicative. Ethan and Joel Caen (1991), writers of
the movie Barton Fink, establish what they see to be a key element of bad
writing: losing touch with everyday, lived life. They characterize Charlie's
anger at the writer Barton's isolation from the messiness of life.
Charlie: You don't listen! C'mon, Barton. You think you know pain? You think I made
your life hell? Take a look around this dump: you're just a tourist with a

typewriter.
Barton's problem, as a writer, was that he had lost any location with lived
ex.pe rience. He had become "just a tourist with a typewriter," absent of
identification with real people. He forgot about story. He practiced mono
logues, not dialogues. Similarly. uncommunicative writers in the social sci
ences may become so immersed in "fact" that they fail to realize that they
have not engaged their readers.
But more than that, Barton Fink had lost the ability to remember and
convey on paper what constituted lived experience. For ethnographic writers
who use fictional methods in their writing, representing well and be lievably
is crucial.
Visceral feel in a piece may give it a deeper sense of representation,
legitimation, and authority. "Seeing is not understanding. Understanding is
more than vis ual knowledge. Understanding is visceral" (Denzin, 1997b,
p.46).

How does a writer achieve this sense of the visceral? How to better
represent the understandings of those we write about? Fictions that are not
realist may still manage to convey a "been there" feel, although they are
fanciful or fantastical--or ordinary. Writers should understand that fantasy
and imagination and affect are integral-if not key-parts of life experience.
Although one purpose of reading text might be to better capture the initial
experience, the quality of that experience is open to interroretation. Also, affect
and cognition may be different for different audiences. 0
Issues of representation derive from believability. As Neumann (1996)
writes, " We are born into a mystery... _Our search is a struggle to understand
t~e puzzles of our Own 'nativeness' " (p. 182). How can authors represent
hved experience of self and others accurately? How to demonstrate that the
author has either been there and done that or has empathized to such a degree
as to convey the experience as it originally felt? Believability is dependent on
a kind of description that is accurate in a holistic, evocative, emotionally

engaging sense. And that description relies on glimpses of telling detail """
than on total immersion in detail.
What is enough detail, and what is too much detail is one of the funda.
mental diIferences between believable and cloying.. between engaging and
pedantic, between creatively accurate and merely replicable and boring w......
ing. In this sense, then (as in life itself), the empty spaces, or the silences,
to verify the existence of the telling detail just as surely as does the detail itself.
The spaces serve as markers of connection, lyrical markers of writing that ia
fundamentally magic.
Not everyone responds to a piece or a method (e.g., minimalism, in which
less is more) in the same way. And even within a single reader, different
responses may be elicited, such as responses to differently nuanced music.
We, as readers of a work, have the capacity for multiple, multilevel, multiLa~
ered engagement with works. We have only to be taught how to read some..
thing. And we are taught by critics but mostly by writers themselves. II
Carol Rambo Ronai'. (1996) work, "My Mother [s Mentally Retarded,.
resonates with me at several points: I keep coming back to her hints (silences
through abstraction) of sexual abuse by her mother: "She sexually abused lite
herself" (p. 114). Through use of the academic device of citation, and then by
reciting statistics, she puts her own lived anguish in stronger reliel The
silences are earned by Ronai; they are silences relative to the earlier, explicll
description of her father's abuse:

sen.

"No, no, no," I whimpered as he dragged me to the bed, raking my panties down
my legs, scratching long red welts with his nails. " No," escaped from my lips,
now barely a whispered sigh as he parted my legs and descended, face first,

between them. (pp. 113-114)

In this work, the omission of details is an effective method: It makes me,
the reader, work extremely hard at imagination. It is a reinforcement of thI
dark silences surrounding maternal sexual abuse. Yet, at the same ti.J-.,
Ronai's (1996) account of her father's actual abuse in dear, horrifyinaIJ
concrete terms, electrifies me. I keep coming back to both of these methodi.
in my mind revisiting them and their textures (one reading might suggest that
the silence and the detail perhaps reflect, respectively, stereotypical femalo
and male models of agency). These two parts of her account disturb me, but
in profoundly different ways.
Like Ronai, other writers of ethnographic writing must learn to better
engage readers, to teach them how to read a variety of ethnographic styl_
This is not to say that we must provide outlets for voyeurs but rather, without
resorting to bathos or pathos, that we should bring the reader into the world
we are recounting (Bochner & Ellis, 1996, pp. 20-24). As Kahlil Gib....
(1926/1971) writes, "If he is indeed wise he does not bid you en ter the ho_
of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind" (p. 51),

Thus, we must use craft to create art; we must constantly work to enhance
ur toolbox of writing implements, to write scenes, to show rather than tell.
~e might learn better to expand our own repertoire of skills in severat
non_mutuallyexdusive, ways: (a) by trial and error, (b) by studying craft with
master writers, and(c) by reading and incorporati.ng methods we see enacted
in what we read.
Scholars use trial and error all the time. What is sending a manuscript out
for feedback but a use of the Irial-and-error method? Becker (1986) refers to
this as "getting it out the door" (chap. 7, pp. 121-134). By use of extrinsic
feedback (in this case, external readers), writers may better find ou t how they
collvey or do not convey what it is they actually mean. If we can show our
work to friends, to those we study, to colleagues both inside and outside our
disdplines,12 we may perform "verifications/' but also learn to discern and
winnow marginal from helpful advice. Naturally, we must be wary in accept
ing corrections and advice from others: Our visions of our work, of the truths
we wish to tell, are unique. We can extend this self-education by creating
formal or informal writers' groups or short- term writing workshops in which
we share our work with others (and others share with llS; thus, our peers
become our mentors).
Ellis and Bochner (1992) take the confirmation process a step further: They
performed their story of an abortion for a.n audience. In their :Vri.uen text,
which includes the performance/play, thelr prefatory remarks mdlcate that
drama and written ethnography are not always consistent with each other.
An audience that witnesses a perfonnance of this text thus is subjected to much
more than words: they see facial expressions, movements, and gestures; they
hear the tones, intonations, and inflections of the actors' voices; and they can feel
the passion of the performers. (p. SO)

Clearly, dependent on the modality, writers gain different th ings from sharing
with colleagues. But, in writing ethnographic fiction, I think writers must
st rive to achieve a similar visceral involvement by their readers.
We must remain wary to work to refine our singular worldviews, not
merely to homogenize with others in the group. Although we need to bounce
ou/ written ideas off others, we must also Jearn to be o ur own best readers
because we will be, anyway. Of course, the use of this method e.xdusively may
lead to a certain "regression to the mean" effect in which our cutting-ed.ge or
idiosyncratic ideas may be watered down.
An adjunct to this "getting it out the door" is using our own senses-as
many as work for us-to better "hear" our work. Some writers read to
themselves or others out loud, listening for audience response or for notes in
the writing that ring false. Others try to visualize or taste or hear as they write
or read, the textures, tangs and spices, and sounds of the environments they
are attempting to re-create.

208

Rinehart / F1C110NALMETHODS IN ETHNOGRAPHY

QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / June 1998

The second method , studying the craft of writing with mas te r teachers. 1Ij
an apprenticeship. Fiction writers take workshops and study their owr.
creations as they receive feedback from those who presumably know rnoa.
about writing than they do themselves. The writers who corresponded. Will
Chekhov were doing this.
Finding one's own voice is critical to the evolution of a maturing ~
but as part of the proce;s, seeking out those writers with whom we resonate ....
uS gam confidence In our ab ility to see the world . To agree with thecom~
of a single master teacher is generally folly (w ith obvious notab le excep~
Plato perhaps comes to mind ). In o ther words, we should he eclectic in
changes suggested by others, whether they are mOTe experienced or peera
Always draw on the original experience as a check. One of the problems ~
exclusive use of the method ofseeking a "higher source" is that, again, outside
forces are at work on the writer: At some point, the maturing writer IIUIIt
develop her or his own voice and sense of worth rather than constandJ
compa ring oneself to a singular master.
The third method, by reading and incorpo rating methods that we
enacted in what we read, allows the writer more agency. The writer
more eclectic in expanding her or his methodological tool box while deve.
ing a sense of unique, individual style. Ha rri ngton (1997), a vete ran newspa.
perman and scholar, admi ts to borrowing Madele ine Blais's method far:
attribution for writing a story about the poet Rita Dove.

makias

b",,,,,,.

1 s tud ied how Blais had managed to quote her subjects with almost no attri

bution-as in Hshe says" or "he says"-and realized she had introduced most of
her quotes with colons, allowing her to eliminate the attributions. 1 shamelessly
cribbed the technique. (p. xiv)

Expanding one's repertoire of skills will not make one a lesser Writer in
ce rtain style; on the contrary, the nuances of differing styles, blended tOI.ellIII
make writing more interesting, acrobatic, and vital. For example, tec""",ioI
issues that might improve the verisimilitude of the text include e:~~::~~:~
tion with narrative voice and point of view, attempting to "get into"
of subjects: Mitchell (1993) discusses his encounter with a right-wing
dealer USing standard academic voice; how different it might have been
he reported from the point of view (first person) of the dealer.13
Similarly, fictional ethnography writers might play with va rious
tools. Some use present tense to create immediacy. As lillmann-Healy
recounts, she uses present tense so that "the action unfoldls] before your
(p. 104). She ~lso has used an extended conceit of personification, a~,~:~.
bulimia (not Bulimia, beca use that would be too heavy handed) and
"bulimiC) to come live with me" (p. 76). Experimentation-and finding
what works for different pieces-is the key to successful writing, in any
Other writers have successfully indicated, for example, d egrees of
sian or hesitation with ellipses, common fillers such as "uh" or "ee,"

ZIE

dialogue tags with p~perly chosen a:tion verbs or with "telling" gestures
l\1at not only give achon but also venfy character or a~",:,nce story (W~od,
1990). Franklin (1986) writes about accurate sensory depIction and recordmg,
which means that the writer must demonstrate that she o r he has somehow
been there.
. .
". "
Yet wri ters cease to grow when they IIfl11t themselves to select tricks that
ce ~orked : Each new world, each new exploration, demands a slightly
~~fferent tack. Browne (1993), talking about writ.r:~ " Failure," says that a
writer str ives to "do It better, get It right, next time (p. 41). DraWing from
orwell and Eliot, he argues,
While one is still com ing into full articulation of the original subject, as the "fu!1
consciousness" is ea rnestly at work on the topic at han?, the good old anarc:hlc
unconscious is whispering of new horizons and subverting the wholeenterpnse.
(p.4l)

So, like it or not, successful writing depends on ~dapti~e . writing skills.

Especially with fictional ethnography. many of the skills of hcllon can be used
to good effect.

ANTON CHEKHOV'S LETTERS

Chekhov knew tha t a full range of tools makes one a more skillful, accurate
writer. He observed other writers' methods, and he observed keenly. As he
critiqued their work, he internalized some of t.h~ir mo~ ef~ective methods.
He wrote his ideas about the art and craft of wnhng to hiS friends and fellow
writers, and in his writings are revealed his concem with app re~e ~di ng
that which is believable a nd representative of what the characters inSist on
doing.
Chekhov, who Raymond Carver regarded as a master, was a minimalist.
He warned authors of overkill (and reaction to overkill) in terms of detail. In
aJl1888 letter to V. G. Korolenko, he writes of this minimalist technique.
From fea r of crowding in too many details, 1 go to the opposite extreme ... . As
a result, one gets, not a picture in which all the details. are merged into a w~ole,
like stars in the heavens, but a mere summary, a dry Inventory of impressiOns.

(Chekhov, 1924, p. 3)

Clearly. this choice of spare writing is idiosyncratic, yet it conforms well with
most academic ethnography in that detail is remarked on but not dwelt upon.
To A. S. Souvorin, in an 1888Iettor, Chekhov (1924) comments,
You deem it necessary to expLaiJl every situation and move. Repina [a charac!er
in Souvorin's story I says, 'I have poisoned myself!' and you, not conten t With
this simple sta tement, make her go on talking a f~w ~nnecessary phrases, and
thus sacrifice si mple reality to your sense of consaentlousness. (p. 100)

 _-. -

.",,~

... ~. ,

}WIC "';'::00

If writers a.re to approximate thec~~ture of lived experience, the writing

reflect havlIlg been there as a particIpant, not as a cataloguing-and p_~
ably uninvolved-observer.
~-.
Once, Chekhov (1924) claimed that his intention in writing was twofold;
:'to paint"Iife in its true aspects, and to show how far this life falis short of...
Ideal ,~fe. (1889 letter to A. N . Pleshcheyev, p. 15). His advice to a biographlf
was, Write what you hke. If you haven't facts [regarding his background
lif~!, substitute Iyrici~m" (1892Ie,tter to V. A. likhonov, p. 35). Complain~
o.f ~,n over;vrought "motJeyness of e~fecl that impairs the general imp;:
slon resultlIlg from thoroughly detaIled description," and comparingsto.
ries to novels, Chekhov writes, "In short stories it is better to say not enough
than to say too much, because,--because-I don't know why!" (p. 106). So.n.
ethnographers have chosen the novelistic form, often saying so much ()ieN
of "facts") that they sacrifice verisimilitude.
'--.....
Chekhov's (1924) advice to A. S. Souvorin spells out planning ahead.
If o~e denies tha~ creative w~rk involves problems and purposes, one must
admit ~hat an a.rhst c~ates Without premeditation or intention, in a state 01
a~errahon; Iherefo-:e, If an .a uthor boasted 10 me of having written a novel
Without a preconceived design, under a sudden inspiration, I should call him
mad.

Y~u are right in demanding that an artist should take an inteUigent attitude to
hlS work, ~ut you confuse two things: solving a problan and stating a probltm
correcl.ly.1t IS only the ~ond that is obligatory for the a rtist. ... It is the business
of the Judge to put the nght questions, but the answers musl be given by the jury
according 10 their own lights. (pp. 59~)
And the jury, of course, js the reader who shares in creating the story.
Chekhov was a stickler for details. His descriptions are based. on his belief
that "~descrip~ions of Nature one ought to seize upon the little partkulan,
grouping them In such a way that, in reading, when you shut your eyes, you
get a picture" (Chekhov, 1924, p. 70). Warning Gorky of what Chekhov (1924)
saw as hIS smgle flaw as a writer, Chekhov writes in an 1899 letter, "The only
def~t is the lack of restraint, the lack of grace. When a man spends the least
pOSSible ~u?,b.er of movements over some definite action, that is grace'"
(P '/~6): ThIS ms~te~ce on spareness ~ desCription-the result creating a sense
of bemg there -IS key to Chekhov s style. But make no mistake: Chekhov's
is .n~t a~ argument for #snapshot" description; rather, he is arguing (or a
mlnlmallst style, one in which worlds are encapsulated in a single, weIJ..
thought phrase. Furthermore, Chekhov discusses the depiction of "sad or
unlucky peopl~" "':'ith wh~mauthors "want to touch the reader's heart": '1iy
to be colder-It glVes theIr grief as it were a background, against which it
stands out in greater relief" (p. 97).
Accuracy of s~sory experience is only one of the keys to believability.
Accuracy of ambiance, of undercurrents, of the baggage the actors bring to

Rinehart / FICTIONAL METHODs IN ETI-INOGRAPHY

211

. teraction (the symbolism of the interaction) is crHical to create believable

theJn
..stories." Hear what Monica Wood (1990) says:

J leresnng dia logue, in fiction and in life, depends as much .on what you leave
n t as what you put in. In the following scene you are trylOg to reveal some
~ped of ~he relationship between a mother and daughter, from the daughter's
point of View.
"I'd just like to see you settled, that's all," my mother says.
''What do you mean?" 1 know exactly what she means.

uSettled," she says, glaring. "I mean settled."

''I'm settled, for heaven's sake. I have a job, a house, a dog.l send out for
pizza every Friday night.+' She's still looking at me. "Mom, I'm stttltd."
She purses her lips, drums her spotted fingers on the tabletop. "There's
more to this life, young lady, than the company of a dog."
In this scene, what the mother and daughter do 110t say is what makes the scene
work. The daughter knows what the mother is getting at, the mother knows.the
daughter knows, and yet each is refusing to acknowledge the other's mearung.
This unspoken argument provide the scene with emolionallensio~ and reveals
the characters as two strong wills locked in struggle. If you rewnte the scene
u.c;i.ng the dialogue the first version left out, you get something like this:
"I wish you'd get married," my mother says.
"} don't want to get married, Mom. I have everything I need right now."
She is glaring at me. "A husband would make your life a lot fuller."
The scene loses its punch when you write the "real" dialogue ..Remember, p.eople
seldom say exactly what they mean. That's what makes stones, and reallJfe, so
interesting. (p. 19)
The techniques of writing are woven into and with the substance of
representation so that separation of technique from substance. would make
each a fundamentally different process. For example, the SImple use of
dialogue tags by subjects/ characters conveys representation . Note the foll~w
ing ways in which class, age, location by place, perhaps race, a.nd certaInly
individual style may be represented (believably and subtly) by dIalogue tags:
..... and I'm all, 'You can't do that!' "
and so I go, 'You can't do that!' "

.... . and I'm like, 'You can't do that! ' "

,... , and so I says, 'You can' t do that!'

.... . and I say to her, "You can't do that!' "

In each case, subtle distinctions provide guides for the reader to feel the lived
experience of the subject. Yet the actual words "You can't do t~at! "-eve~ the
exclamation mark after the words-are identical. How a wnter establIshes
authority determines whether that writer's "map,,14 for lived experience rings
true for certain readers, at certain times, in certain moods .

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QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / June 1998

Writers of short fiction use a variety of methoo.. to engage readers. Altho. . .

individual stories, intents. and focuses deterrmne which methods writers....,.
employ, effects are largely determined post facto. Remember, the act of writiat

requires rewriting so that resonances appear-on a first readmg-magl~

Denzin (1997b) calls writers in the human diSciplines who use short 6ctici.
techniques "the new writers [who] seek a model of truth that is na~
deeply ethical, open ended, and conflictual, performance, and audienaJ
based, and always personal, biographical, political, structural, and hislOl'ial!.
(p. 266). That is to say, the art of writing is not scientific, as science.is ~
defined; there is still an element (a very large element) of Ullcertamty In how
a pjece of writing might be received. But interactionist ethnographers !"'If
learn some of the (mainstream) tools of the trade 1S for short fiction, w"","
may aid the reader in learning to read the stories that are written and .
bring the reader of writing closer to actual lived experience.

Rinehart / FICTIONAL METHODS IN ElHNOGRAPHY

213

Clearly, there are those who argue for either one of two extreme positions:
highly experimental, subjective pieces that evoke lived experience, and highly
objectified, scientific, subjectless work in which the author attempts to be
abSent. But just as surely, there are writers who argue, as do Bochner and Ellis
(1996), for a pragmatic and judicious use of fictive devices to explore different
uestions than can be explored using positivist modalities (p. 22). The back
~h against this more subjective writing is not a fundamental question. The
fundamental questions include, What kinds of questions are we asking? What
do we want to know about or better understand? What and how might we
Jearn from others' experienct;S?J7
Speaking of his experience in a North American ashram, BTUller (19%) sees
the dynamic between the scholarly and the personal as an opporturuty for
scholars.
What started out as part of my personal life was soon transformed into part of
my professional life. The point is that, for an ethnographer, any e.xperience-at

PRIVACY AND PUBLICITY

The increased use of short stories as exemplars of affect, experience, . .
evocation of sensory detail for sociological, anthropological, and adtunt
understanding (e.g., Anderson, 1995; Ceglowski, 1997; Clough, 199'1;;
Denison, 1996, 1997; Denzin, 1997a; McCall, 1997; Richardson, 1997a, 1~
Rinehart, 1995a, 1996) is a trend that troubles some scholars. Behar (1996) hi;.'
written about an academic backlash toward what she terms "vulneralJlJ.
writing.," toward a misapprehension of the genre as self-conscious If~
gazing".
The charge that aU the variants of vulnerable writing that have blossomed in the
last two decades are seJf-serving and superficiaL full of unnecessary guilt 01'
excessive bravado, stems from an unwillingness to eVE'n consider the possibWty
that a personal voice, if creatively used, can lead the reader, not into miniilture
bubbles of navel-gazing, but into the enormous sea of serious sodaJ issues. (p. 14)

Writing about affect and about values from o~e's own point of view may
10 produce a "pedagogy of hope," as Paulo Freire (1995) terms it, whichhe!!~f
at the local (individual) and informs the global (social) and which transfonltl
existing power relations. The academic backlash, to be sure, may be graunclei
in a deep mistrust of the worth of the self. 16 lndividuals cannot simply tn..t
their own belief systems; rather, they must check themselves and their wadi
against some higher authority (which, of course, is a belief system). lIochnIt
and Ellis (1996) discuss this worldview. It is one inhabited by "people wfIO
were educated to treat human subjectivity as a threat to rationality and
believe that differences of opinion could be arbitrated by objective ait. .~~
beyond dispute" (p. 21).

home or abroad, of self orof other~ffers the potential to become fieldw ork. We
select only a small segment from the vast expanse of life encounters to write
aboUt. (p. 317)

Those who object to "the truth of life's fictions" (Denzin, 1997b, p. 266) or to
West 's "truth that reality obscures"-that is, fiction-misunderstand the
surface for the substance. What is it that is most deeply felt, experienced, and
evoked? For many people, the beginnings of understanding come from the
senses. Even those whose primary form of understanding is cognition are
touched by feeling and affect. But, of course, within the individual, there is
an integration of the whole.
Readers must bewilling to engage with the work. And some work is highly
engagable, fundamentalJy because of how it is written. Many social scientists
make the mistake, I think, of believing that what something is written about
should suffice to engage the reader.ls
All of the above, as I reread these passages, sOUllds like some sort of
apology for the use of fiction in ethnographic writing. I feel that the tie-in
between justifying the use of fiction and the techniques of fictional discourse
is inextricably linked. Still, I realize that many of the justifications, reasonings,
and rationale for the use of fiction in social science, sociology, anthropology,
cultural studies, and other human disciplines have been made elsewhere (e.g.,
Denzin, 1994; Ellis & Bochner, 1996; Ellis & Flaherty, 1992; Richardson, 1997a).
Richardson (1997a), (or example, draws from Balzac and .lola as precursors
of scientific-based literature (p. 90). Chekhov (1924) also characterized Iitera
ture--gCX>d literature-as based in objective science:
Familiarity with the natural sciences and with scientific method has always kept

me on my guard. (p. 36)

214

QUAUTATTVE INQUIRY /June 1998

You ~buse me for objectivity, calling i~ indifference to good and evil, lack of ideaJs
and Ideas, and so on. ... Of course It would be pleasant to combine art with
ser~on, but (or m~ .personally i~ is extremely difficult and almost impossible~
oWing to I,he ccncillions of te?'ruque. You see, to depict horse-thieves in st'Ven
hundred hnes I must all the time speak and think In their tone and feel in their
spirit, O,therwise. if I introduce subjectivity, the image becomes blurred and the
sto~will not heas compact as all short stories ought to be. When Iwrite, I reckon
entirely upon the reader to add for himself the subjective elements that _

Rinehart / FICTIONAL METHODSlN ETHNOGRAPHY

215

onstructured way are tricks. These are merely tools for presentation of wo rk

that might better many the world as the observer might map it with the map
itself. They are parts of craft. The truest observers, whatever that might mean,
must also communicate their observations so that the audience more effec
tively gets what it is they are trying to communicate. So, how is it that a writer

renders subjects most effectively?

lacking in the story. (p. 64)

Paradox.ica~y, ~hekhov achieves, through spareness and reader involvemen~

THE PROBLEM OF TOOLS

that 5ubJechve mvolvement he so eschews in his writing.

Recently, Ceglowski (1997) posed a question couched in science when she

asked, "How will experimental textual forms be evaluated?" (p. 199). T_
IS an ImpliClt assumption in the statement th.1t there might be singular Or better
or ~o~se fonns of ~valuation. Although her answer includes checking "with

ally "invented" by writers, that to list them would be a futile exercise. Orwell
(1946/1953) writes, "By the time you have perfected any style of writing. you
have always outgrown it" (p. 316). What we write about is played out

participants to venfy that the stories accurately depict their lived experience

inventively by writers in different forms to better capture experience.20

{p. 2(0):-which she attributes to Denison (1996)-there needs to be a wider

disCUSSion. Of.the releof gate keeping with regard to validity / evaluativeissues
for short fictJonal ethnographies. A pragmatic approach-much like an .~
pro~ch stemmlOg from salable fiction-might be, "If it works, it is good.

We continually reily. challenge, and recast our ways of knowing. Scientific

discOurse is currently dominant in the academy. As Umberto Eco (1995) has

POSIn?, and then answering, questions of lived experience, of approaching

expenence of the Other so that the reader becomes engaged with and Un.
mersed in the work, make fictional ethnography "effective."
This kind of evaluation ties in with artistic performance. Hamlet has been
staged thousands of times-and every actor who reads Shakespeare's lines
i~terpre.ts them . differently. Moreover, every performance of Hamlet, every

mghtly tncamahon of the role of Hamlet, is slightly different. Yet, are theynol
aU Hamlets? Might we be able to say that this paranoid Hamlet is more
"auth~ntic'~ or "accu~ate" than that psychotic Hamlet? It is an inappropriate
question, given the richness of a variety of takes on HamJet (or on Hamid).
Furthermore, doesn't the sense of verisimilitude of each performance rest
with.in the worldview of each individual audience member?
This is not to say that there is no criterion for evaluation; rather, the criteria
for the human disciplines might better borrow from the arts, from aesthetics,
than from pure science, to establish multiple bases of evaluation. If, as

There are many fictive devices in existence and many mcre being ccntinu

written, "Our perceptual relationship with the world works because we trust
prior stories . ... We accept a story that .our ancestors have handed down to
uS as being true, even

though today wecall these ancestors scientists" (p. 130).

Stories work .on many levels to engage readers: NBC television has, for years,
used the strategy of stories to engage a targer audienceshare for their Olympic
broadcas ts, Hawaiian lronman Triathlon, and other sporting events (Rine

hart, 1995b).21
Academic disccurse, too, is story. lance had a graduate student who
continually identified our ''body of scholarly literature" as "stories." He
entered into the relationship with the authors of these scholarly stories with
a bitof a skepticism, knowing full well that they were constructions, that they

were ideas in the making, fit to be engaged with and contested by readers of
the work.
We must strive to find new ways of fitting the technique with the map {or,
in the postmodem world, perhaps the refracted and refracting hologram)."

liinterpretive community," determining One "transcendent criteria" is im

It is in the seeking of new technique, not just in the determination that the
technique worked better or worse, that we may grow. How might we better
strive to effectively convey not only "facts" but affect, and not only detail but
context? We can use techniques that are more macro or devises that are more
dearly micro.
Macroissues insist on certain #right" microtechniques to make the piece
cohere somehow believably; the context and details reinforce each other. The

plausible (Bruce & Greendorfer, 1994, p. 263).

But it is in the crossing over-from literature to ethnography. for example

on craft .

that wnters (and readers) must better learn the devices of fiction to be more
effective in presenting work that rings true. These are not tricks-no more
than learning to observe unobtrusively or practicing to interview in an

In A Son of the Cirel/s, John Irving (1994) begins the novel with a section
called Author's Notes. These notes are presumably a preface to the novel, yet
they serve the novel well. "This novel isn't about India. I don't know India. I

Howard Gardner (1993) has posed, there indeed are multiple intelligences, If
then t~e~ concomitantly should be multiple modes of evaluation, all equita
bly priVileged .. A broad model of evaluation is one based on pragmatism: Is
the w.ork effective? Because there are a variety of w.orldviews even within the

"magic" of believable fiction-and effective fictional ethnography-is based

216

QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / June 1998

Rinehart / ACIlONAL METHODS IN ETHNOGRAPHY

was there ~nly o.nee, for less than a month" (p. IX). Yet, of course, the nOVel
~bout I~dla : It IS about Irving's India, which, admittedly, is made u
ImpresSIOns gleaned from friends who are Indian, Irving's sense of f ~ of.

ne~s, and ~bout ?~ple who are betvleen the borders ofCanada and I,~
Irvmg Writes, dlsmgenuously, at the end of the Author's Notes "I
AI
don't 'know'India, and A Son of the Circus isn't 'about' India. It is ..
about an indian (but no/ an Indian), for whom India will always remain-T
unknown and unknowable country" (p. xi).
III

"'!""'...:.!

Ethnographers use a similar technique both when they personaliz

when they provide disclaimers of universal truth. These are large i5SU~ :
serve to frame the writing an.d the research story. As such, they are maCJOil.
sues, and the successful frarrung of them provides a certain tone to the w ric.
It may be scholarly (written in the passive voice, omniscient paint of ~
absent of markers of personal impression), or it may be seductive (invi .
the reader to share experiences, to empathize, and to viscerally identifytilts
acts. of sed.uction). ?irect address, with the "you" implied, is but one
achl.eve ~~s s~duction. The tone might be conspiratorial, challenging, hope.
ful,. msp]nng;]t may overtly or covertly tlttempt to move the reader to action;
or It m~y serv.e to entertain the reader. But any tone should be consistent
(unless mc.ollSlstent t~ne provides. unde~standing of, for example, unstable
states of mmd aT a vanety of changmg POints of view) so that the Teader .
understanding through the piece.
gallll
Microissues are less discussed than macroissues in the use of fiction ~
~derstanding, largely because they are so idiosyncratic. There is no t~
hst of tools; each work requires and demands a djfferent set of tools. Richard
son and Lockridge (1991/1997) suggest, appropriately, that "if you want to
re~d.er lived expenence, you have to learn fictional techniques. Take a fiction-
wn~~ course. Read great fiction writers" (p. 66). Experience, practice, and
an ~blhty to h~ar rhythms and to reproduce sensation are important to writers
of hved expenence. Writers need to experiment with point of view; sentence
length and rhythm; dialogue (and tags); active and accurate vocabulary; and
p~ctuation, nonstandard dialogue, and telling detail to make the story corne
alive.

way-:

?ne of Denison's (1997) projects since moving to New Zealand from the
Uruted States has been to explore epiphanic moments in the Jives of sports-
per~ons: He ha~ turned to short stories to achieve a representation of Umy
subjects collective experiences." To create verisimilitude (and a Kiwi feel for
the piece), Denison has used New Zealand-flavored verbiage. For example,
he talks about
spent h<?urs hu.rling a cricket ball in the air and catching it, or chucking a tennis
ball agamst a wall and scooping up the rebound .... Two kids in Mr Davidson's
class were crook the day of the fifty meter race. Brian made appoinlments to race
them later: (p. 2, italics added)

217

Acarefui choice of words cansubtlychangethewhole navar, and authenticity,

f the experience for the reader.
o Denison (1997) also has used dialogue tags and gestures to good effect.
"Dad," he started, "what was it like to play for New Zealand?" His voice was
soft and he rocked back and forth in his seat. Then he added, "How did it feel to

~ on to the field with the Silver Fern on your chest, and to sing the national
anthem in front of all those people?" Now his voice was building, gaining
strength, and before continuing he straightened up and tumed to me. "How
come you never talk about ~t, Mum either?"

The words are slung together, echoing the building rush of the boy. The use
of the 5 so und in "His," "voice," "was," "soft" and even "seat" begins the
build; then, the simple question; then, the rhythmic phrases separated by
commas ("his voice was building. gaining strength"), followed by the onrush
of the three quick verb phrases ("and before continuing he straightened up
and turned on me") creates a strong emotive feel to the section. This is one
example of what fictional techniques can do for ethnography. But more than
that, knowing the techniques of fiction can mean the difference between report
ing it as we intended to report it aT creating it as we intended to create it, and
totally mishandling it. And the appropriate techniques are ever changing.

CONCLUSION
The worJd o f the mind and of the senses is made up of our telling ourselves
stories. Eco (1995) expresses it this way:
At any rate we will not stop reading fictional stories, because it is in them that
we seek a formula to give meaning to our existence. Throughout our lives, after
all, we look for a story of our origins, to tell us why we were born and why we
have lived. Sometimes we look for a cosmic story, the story of the universe, or
for our own personal story (which we tell our confes.sor or our analyst, or which
we write i.n the pages of a diary). Sometimes our personal story coincides with
the story of the universe. (p. 139)
I think our personal story coincides with parts of the story of the universe, or
thl! story of other people, or of groups, quite frequently. This is what Denzin
(1989a) calls the concept of the universal singular (p. 19). This universal
singular helps us to resonate with stories, whether they are scientific and
mathematical (for worldviews that lean toward thoseclirnes) or romantic and
optimistic. A magical lyricism is one reason why readers (in the broadest
sense) come back again and again to certain types of stories. Whether the
stories are called nonfiction, truth, like truth, or fictional matters only by
degrees, for if someone gains some small shred of Eco's (1995) "formula to
give meaning to Our existence" from others' stories, then the stories have met
a fundamental goal.

218

QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / June 1998

Rinehart / FICTIONAL METHODS IN ETHNOGRAPHY

NOTES

219

8. Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw (1995) betray this bias toward objectivity when they

1. I am grateful to Synthia Sydnor for this insight.

2. TIlis is not to presume that the traditional compositional dualities (a duaUsa.
that, inddentally, needs further exploration) of craft and art are not present in gOOd.
writing. As Harrington (1997) writes,
We [maY1 make the mistake of assuming that some people just have the
knack. Some people do have the knack, but much of artful journalism
whether or not it is about ordinary people, is Simply hard work--craft.
know, because whatever artfulness exists in my journalism was acquired, nol
inherited.. (p. xvii)

But I do wish to explore the lyrical aspects of writing, if only to provide a balance to the
nonlyrical, scientist-based type of writing extant in much of current social science
work.
3. This sense of rush in life is primarily why I titled one of my works '''Warp Speed

in Barcelona."

4. There are, as well, the embedded power relationships between researcher utd
researched. The voices of those we study, if they are to be filtered through scholaq,'
writings, must remain true to the impulses of the researched.
S. As Paraschak and Rinehart (1995) state, '1ntuition is a less-apprecialed form 01
logiC. The privileging of 'lOgiC' over 'intuition' may, in fact, reflect a set of ideologies
steeped in patriarchal dominance."
6. Writers of every school have problematized these neat designations. For exam.
pIe, Stegner (1987), in Crossing to Safety (classified by the publisher as a work of fiction),
writes,
nus is a crueal place for the dropping of hints and the planting of clues, the
crucial moment for hiding behind the piano or in the bookcase the revela.
tions that later, to the reader's gratified satisfaction, I will triumphantly
discover. If r am after drama. Drama demands the reversal of expectation ...
inevitability takes careful pinsetting. Since this story is about a friendship,
drama expects friendship to be overturned. Something, the novelist in m~
whispers, is going to break up our cozy foursome .... Weu, too bad for
drama. Nothing of the sort is going to happen. Something less orthodoxly
dramatic is. (pp. 172-173)
By confiding in the reader, by addressing the reader (an antiquated conceit, but used
marvelously by Stegner), and by admitting to the constructed nature of the written
work, the narrator has stylistically retained a sense of dramatic tension while convinc'.
ing the reader of the "truthfulness" and trustworthiness of the narrator. It is a brilliant
s troke.
7. For slightly different takes on these categories, see, (or example, Van Maanen
(1988), who discusses "Realist Tales, Confessional Tales, and Impressionist Tales/" as
well as "Critical, Formal, Literary, and jointly-told Tales" and Neumann (1996), who
writes of "an ethnographic impulse that looks outward. " anautobiographical impulse
that gazes inward for a story of self .. . [and] how these two impulses have c0n
verged ... in the idea of autoethnography" (p. 173).

un I "the ethnographer's experience of another world approximates rather than

",co lutely
, replicates members' experience" (p. 218, rooblote 7) . I suggest th at It IS
.

~bSO

ible to "absolutely replicate" anything (given spatial and temporal constraints).

IInpOSS
.or.
b y many
9. The relationship of author to subject
subject matter has b een stud ed
I
seholars, in sociology, journalism, and anthropology, among them CWford and ~arcus
(1986), Franklin (1986), Geertz (1988), Krieger (1991), Ellis and Flaherty (1992), Elhs and
[loChner (1996), Sims and Kramer (1995), Denzm (1997b), a?d Hamngton (1997). Dut
the author-Io-subject or authorto-subjectmatter relationship 15 also a techn ical (and
artistic) concern of fiction writets, among them Chekhov (1924), Gardner (1983), Gold
berg (1986), Ueland (1987), and Wood (1995).
.
.
10. How do you listen to music? Does the melody wash over you fust like a sensual
wav,
e ar are the notes and instruments and vocalizations distinct and separate and
mathematical? Do you listen to the words on first hearing a pie~e, ~r does that come
later? Composers intend for us to come to different types of musIC differen.tly, but our
individual responses are unique as well. For example, I usually do not hsten to the
words to popular songs until after dozens of hearings. Others, I know, listen to the
words first.
11. An example of a critic "teaching" audience how to "read" is a recent review of
the film Amistad, in which criti c Duane Byrge (1997) writes Ihat the film "is most
vexingly long on philosophical wind but disappointingly short on hum~n emo tion,"
although it shows "initial visceral and intellectual promise" (p. 04). HIS Comments
instruct the reader of the film that the story should be shown, not just told.
12. I am grateful to Suzanne Sutherland for this point.
... .
13. This "getting into the head " of the subject is not unheard of lO Journahstlc
traditions (see, e.g., Herrington, 1997).
14. Rinehart (1993) discussed modernist, linear, and postmodemist maps. "In a map
of my interpretive biases, that map is not necessarily ~inear, dramaturgi.cal, or unidi
mensional. Rather. my 'map' is like a hologram, dancmg between multiple extremes
(which may elide and blur), much like Geertz' anthropological reflexivity" (p . 15).
15. Isay "mainstream" because I acknowledge that there are seemingly infinite ways
of communicating feeling and affect through writing, not the least of which would be
classified by som eone such as Raymond Williams (1977) as "dominant, emergent, and
residual." There are 'zines, for example, which communicate sarcasm, derision, empa
thy, and other values though non mainstream methods that range from nontradlt!onal
font size and style to resistance itS exemplified by the lack of page numbers, advertisers,
and glossy slick paper. There is Tom Robbins's work-for example, Even Cowgirls Get
'he Blues (1976), S/ill Life Wi'h Woodpecker (1980), and IWabug Peif""" (1984)-nonJinear
and evocative, which, taken as a whole, conveys a worldview that is self-conSCiously
avant-garde.
16. Or the backlash maysimply renect a power struggle over "truth" between highly
educated academics and those whom they study (or any of a myriad of positionings).
17. This seems to me a very tribal sort of way of knowing:To learn from others' work
and experiences was a fundamental way of knowledge acqu~sition, until recently. ~ow,
in much of scholarly work (particularly in positivist social soence), scholars are tra~e~
to reject the wisdom of elder scholars but to retain the proof of their work only. ThIS 15
not to say that we should swallow whole the "wisdom" of elders based on some

220

Rinehart / FlC110NALMETHODS [N ETHNOGRAPHY

QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / jw!e 1998

misplaced patriarchal sense of authority but rather that we should listen better to WhIt

people tell us with their words, hearts. and nonverbal messages.

18. Examples abound. From fiction, I think of Amos Oz's (1991) To Know Q ~
Mary Caponegro" (1990) The Slar Cafe, Elizabeth Tallenr, (1987) Time With ~
and Wallace Stegner's (1981) The Women on tI~ Wall. In each case, the reader enters.

and inhabits-if only for a time-the worlds of, respectively. a fonner Israeli ~
Service agent, gendered politics, epiphanic moments of crisis in lives, and mid2flIh,.
century America surrounding World War n stateside life. In other fiction, such as ......
Esquivel's (1995) Ukt! Wattr f or Oweolate, the reader begins to live in a world in whicl
magic is accepted. By inhabiting the worlds, the reader may become engaged with ...
worlds (and vice versa). The reader may begin a lifelong quest for an understandingat
the other. To say that knowledge of demographics is equivalent to wlderstandln.g is.
obviously, simplistic. The scholarly demographic study that tells the reader Iboaa
patterns of mass murder sprees in the American Midwest may answer questions 01
knowledge about crime, but Thomas Harris 's (1988) Silence of tilt lilmbs so engages thI
reader on a visceral level that not only knowledge but also understanding of one I'ftUI
murderer resonates for the engaged reader. For readers, there is something ~..,
magical. lyrical, and visceral in Harris's novel that is simply not there in the srnoa.ty
study.
19. Gardner (1993) writes ofseven intelligences, none given privilege o ver the othen,
consisting o f linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, bociily-kinesthetic, musical. inter
personal, and intTapersonal . Furthermore, these intelligences are no t discrete fromorw
ano the r. A given individual may, for example, to varying degrees demonstTate each 01
the inte lligences.
20. However, the re are lists. Harrington (1997), for example, caUs these the "'bask
techniques" for his " intimate journalism":

Thinking, reporting a'id writing in sanes . .. capturing a 'IIlrrator's voice and/at

wriling tlu! storyfrom the point of view ofone orsnlC'al subjects . .. gathering teIling
details from our subjects' lives . .. gathering reol-life dialogue . . . gatJ~ring "il'lh
rior" monologue . .. reporting to establish a time line . . . immersing ourselvts tem
porarily in the lives of our subjects . . . gat/lering physiCtlI detoils of places and
people . .. always Mi"g aware that no matter how artful our stories may be, {they
have meaning} ... (ensuring the} reader's beliiftllllt . .. all of this is true!
21. This use of story by the media has been both praised and criticized by tho;ewho
study contemporary culture. Comedian and cultural commentator George Cattia
(1997), fo r examp1e, resonates with sport purists when he writes about huma~
sto ries used by the media .
Here's something I don't care about: athlete' s families. This is really the
boHom of the s ports banel. I'm watchin' a ballgame, and just because some
athlete's wife is in the stands, someone thinks they have to put her picture
o n the screen. And I miss a double steal! Same with a ballplayer'S father.
Goddamn ! "There's his dad, who taught him how to throw the changeup
when he was two years old ." Fuck him, the sick bastard! His own sports
dreams probably crashlanded, so he forced a bunch o f shit o n his kid, and
no w the kid 's a neurotic athlete. Puck these athletes' relatives.. . .

221

1 also d on' t care if an athlete's wife had a baby, how she is, h ow the baby is,
how much the baby weighs or what the fuckin' baby's name is. It 's g o t no thin'
to do w ith sports. Leave it out! (p . 53)

22 The paralle l metapho~ of map and hologram respectively re flect the modem
d postmode m worldviews as well as the way w e mig ht look at pheno mena, as in

~nz.in'S (1970 /1989b) concept o f "triangulation" (pp. 234-247) and Richardson's

(199 7a ) call for "crystallizatio n" (p . 92).

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Robert Rinehart is all adjunct professor in kinesiology at Califomia State

University, San Bemardino. He has published articles in cultural studies,
sociology of sport, and fiction and poetry i1l various literary journals. His
forthcoming book, Players All: Contemporary Sport Performances, will be
publis/led by Indiana University Press at the end of 1998.

QUALITATIVE

INQUIR~

OHIO lI F\/n/to

Qualitative IJ;\Q:llrY,
Volume 4, Number 2

TV
June 1998

EDITORS
Norman K. Ocnzin. University ollI/ino;s
Yvonna Lincoln. Ttxas A&M Univtrs;ty

CONTENTS

CO-MANAGING EDITORS
Jack Bralich, Univtrsily o/Illinois
Sara Connell, Univvsity ofIllinois
Rob R. Leffel, TtxQS A6'M Un ilJl!rsity
Shawn MikJaucic, Univtrsityo/llJinois

Glimpses of Street Life: Representing Lived

Experience Through Short Stories
Marcelo Diversi . . . . . . . . . . . . ..

.., . . . . . . . . . . 131

EDITORIAL BOARD
Michael Agar, Anthropoiogy, Univtrsity of Mary/and
Talal Asad,Anthrop%gy. NroJ 5<11001 for Soc.iJl/ Rtstarch. Ntw York
Pau l A. Atkinson, Sacill! and Administrativt Studies, U"iversi/yoj CmJIJ!
Patricia BeUScoU, Child lind Family CHvtlopmtl1t, Uniwrsity OfGlOrg;.
Ron Chenail, Social and Systanic Studit!s, Nova Southmsltrn Univnsity. FlorW
Patricia Clough, Sociology. CUNY Gradllilit U l1ttr
Carolyn Ellis, Sociology, Ul1ivtrsity a/South Florida
Philomena Essed. Insfil ult! for Dtvtlopnu:nt Rtsmrcn Amstudam,
Un ivlrsity of Amsftrda m
Nigel Fielding, Sociology, Ul1iwrsity o/SUrTty, Guild/ord
Michelle Fine, Social Psychology, City Univtrsity ofNtw York
Gradualt Ctnftr
Kenneth Gergen.. Psychology, Swarfllmoft: CoJltgt
Ivar Coodson, Education, UnivtrsityojfAst Anglia, Norwich, UK
Egon Cuba, Indiana Utlivtrsity, wrilus
Jaber F. Gubrium, Sociology, Uniwrsity of Florida
Sandra Harding.. Philosophy, Univtrsity ofDtlatwft
Douglas Harper, Sociology, Duqutsnt Univtrsity, PtnttSylvan ia
5..'\ lIy Hutchinson, Nursing, Un ivtrsity of Florida
C heris Kramara e, UUivtrsity of Ortgon
Steiner Kvale, Psychology, University of Aarllus
Patti Lather, Etillcafion, Ollio Statt Univtrsity
John Lofland, SociolOgy, University of California , Davis
George Marcus, Anthropology, Ria UniVtrsity, Ttxas
Meaghan Morris, Ollturnl Studits, ltuhptndtnt Scholar
John U. Ogbu, Anthropology, Univtrsity of California, Btrulty
Virginia Olesen, Social (llId BtJwvioraJ ScitnCts,
Un;vtr'Sity of California, San Frat"isco, mtrila
Janice Radway, English, Dllkt UllitJtrsity. Norlh OJraliua
Shulamil Reinharz, Sociology, Brandtis UniDtrsity, Massach~tts
Karen Sacks, AntJlrt1pOlogy, Univtrsityofu/ifornia. Los Angtlts
James J. Scheurich, Ed,tcaliot1J11 Administration, Uniutrsity ofTtztls, Austill
Tomas A. Schwandt, EdliCOliotl, Indiana Unl'utrsity
David Silverman, Sociology, Goldsmiths' Col/tgt, Londo,.
Tom Skrtic, Sptcial Education, Ulli~rsity of Ivmsas
John K. Smith, dllcational Psychology, Ull ivtrsity ofNorlhmll0W4
Robert E. Stake, Education, Univtrsify of Illinois
William Tierney. Hightr Education Policy Siudits. Uniwrsily

Kaleidoscope Notes: Writing Women's Music

and Organizational Culture
Stacy Holman Jones . . . . . . . . . . ..

. . . ... . . . . . . . 148

The Ethics of Rapport: Institutional Safeguards,

Resistance, and Betrayal
L. Mun Wong . . . . . . . . . . . ... .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178

Fictional Meth ods in Ethnognphy:

Believability, Specks of Glass, and Chekhov
Robert Rinehart . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . .. . . . . . . . . . 200
Known in Part: The Transformationa l Power
of Narrative Inquiry
Donald F. Hones . . . . ... .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
Kinder Ethnographic Writing
Herb Childres, . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .. 249

Evaluators' Use of reer Debriefing:

wee Impressionist Tales

Joanne E. Cooper, Paul R. Brandon, and
Marl ene A. Lindberg. . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . 265
Peer Debriefing in Qualitative Research:
Emerging Operational Models
Sharon Span . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Reading Between the Lines:
Interpreting Silences in Qualitative Research
Blake Poland and Ann Pederson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . , . .. 293

of Soufirtm Cali/emrin
John Van Maanen. Mtlllllgellltnt, Ma5Sllch~lIs Institutt of Ttchnoiogy
Harry F. Wolcott, Anthropology, Un ivtrsilyof 0 regon, E.mtrilus

Dvora Yanow. Public Administration, California Stalt Uniwrsity

For SAGE Periodicals Press: Samantha Sargent, Maria NotariinsekJ,
Susan Selmer, and Merlin Hellener

Sage P . d ' I P
eno lea 5 ress

f$\
A Divi'. ion of SAGE Publica ti on" Inc.
~ Thousand Oaks. London. New Delhi