Fieldwork

by Bruce Jackson

Fieldwork deals with the practical, mechanical, ethical, and theoretical aspects of collecting data. Jackson discusses how fieldworkers define their role, how they relate to others in the field, and how they go about recording for later use what occurred in their presence. This treatment offers an abundance of useful information to those who do folklore fieldwork as well as those who work in any of the other social sciences or humanities. An appendix relates the author's own experiences while documenting Texas's death row.   
 

Genres: Folklore, Anthropology, Nonfiction

328 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Bruce Jackson is an American folklorist, documentary filmmaker, writer, photographer. He is SUNY Distinguished Professor and the James Agee Professor of American Culture at the University at Buffalo. Jackson has edited or authored books published by major university presses. He has also directed and produced five documentary films.

Reviews

[Magen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Honestly, this is probably a five star book. I love Bruce Jackson, even from the perspective of a casual reader, but I would not know his work had he not been recommended to me as a student in the field.

The only reason I'm giving this four stars is because it's several decades outdated. Jackson's writing in the first half and in the chapter on Ethics is timeless and will never be outdated (though perhaps contextualized historically if you're looking to critique him from various critical lenses), but his chapters on equipment are totally unnecessary now. I tried to read through them anyway to understand more of the technical process from back in the day and maybe pick up things that could be applied to my blue tooth mic and iPad set up, but it was so specific to the tech of the time, that I just skipped it.

I could've maybe spent more time reading up on note-taking. I probably should have. Oh well.

This book is staying on my shelf forever.