Doing Sociology for Ordinary People: Navigating Systems Using Institutional Ethnography

Format: open

As institutional ethnography grows across disciplines and locations, more researchers are using it to explore diverse tensions and produce varied forms of knowledge. Yet a key challenge remains: conducting an IE piece of work within established academic standards and procedures can prove quite difficult. Particularly so, if the researcher has lived experience of the field under inquiry.

Researchers in working groups often describe frustration in applying IE’s conceptual apparatus while explaining their methodological decisions to others. Researchers seeking support from the IE community tend to ask a few key questions. These are how do navigate doing an IE as insider/outsider? How do we communicate the sociology to research informants, traditionally trained academics and lay persons? And how do we navigate expectations of “good” research practice without comprising the ontology of the sociology?

As institutional ethnographers, we must reflect on how our work is shaped by academic conditions, traditions, and the wider world we live in.

We invite papers discussing how IErs’ work is shaped by academic standards, processes, and procedures while navigating the tensions of maintaining IE’s ontological commitments; and producing work rooted in ordinary people’s lives. We encourage researchers at all career stages to share what they have learned from applying IE, how they have navigated these challenges (or not), and what we might do to foster change meaningful change within our academic community.