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SOC 531: Community Organization

SOC 531: Community Organization. Oral History. Oral History. Morris uses a method that has come to be called oral history this is used by historians who are now allowed to study the recent past the interviews with key informants are often not as formal as sociologists might like

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SOC 531: Community Organization

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  1. SOC 531: Community Organization Oral History

  2. Oral History • Morris uses a method that has come to be called oral history • this is used by historians who are now allowed to study the recent past • the interviews with key informants are often not as formal as sociologists might like • historians sometimes act more as journalists than as social scientists • there is, in fact, a fair degree of interdisciplinary confusion if not animosity on this point

  3. Historians vs. Sociologists • Historians insist that names and dates are recorded accurately • sociologists are often inclined to disguise the identity of their sources • historians complain that sociological data are thereby useless • can't identify names • can't connect names and dates

  4. Historians and Sociologists (continued) • historians often claim that they use waivers to protect against lawsuits (which satisfies universities and publishers) • sociologists often complain that historians • violate the rights of their subjects • ask leading questions • produce potentially embarrassing information • that can be directly attributed to the respondents

  5. Sociological Oral History • Morris (and Hogan) offer more or less open-ended interviews with key informants • they use snowball samples to identify knowledgeable sources • but they also acquire considerable background before conducting interviews • Morris uses archival materials and secondary sources

  6. Key Informants • Hogan uses participant observation (beginning with his friend, "Tom") • In both cases, as sociologists, they • had specific questions they wanted to ask • had considerable knowledge of who the subject was and what their experience was • based on organizational records and secondary sources, for Morris • based on observation, for Hogan

  7. Key Informants (continued) • Morris explains (p. 328) how he acquired this background knowledge before conducting interviews • Morris explains (p. 329) how he triangulated sources to guard against selective memory and bias, more generally • Hogan (Appendix A) describes his observations and independent sources

  8. Archival Sources • Aside from these sociological tricks of the trade (or research methods) • Morris and Hogan rely on multiple methods, including organizational records available in local archives or from the organizations themselves • multiple methods are characteristic of community studies (Whyte is the exception here)

  9. Archival Sources (cont.) • Archival methods have, traditionally, been somewhat mysterious • historians require that graduate and even undergraduates use archives • but they rarely teach course on archival methods Sociologists are now incorporating archival methods in their methods courses, both quantitative and qualitative

  10. Archival Methods • We will talk more about archival methods when we read Walton • Aside from this, there is some discussion of archival methods in Hogan (1990) • better sources in sociology include Charles Tilly, From Mobilization to Revolution (1978), Roberto Franzosi, From Words to Numbers (2004)

  11. Oral History (sum) • Oral history combines • interviews with key informants • archival material for context • Sociologists and historians agree on issues of validity • need to triangulate sources • need for background information and context before interviewing

  12. Oral History (sum) • Sociologists and historians disagree • on anonymity and protection of respondent • on reliability and bias associated with • ad-hoc or undocumented methods of selecting subjects or asking questions • journalistic as opposed to sociological methods of probing for information (directive or nondirective) • legalistic versus sociological approach to problems of interviewer effects

  13. Oral History (parting comments) • Morris offers a questionnaire from his interview with Rev. Ralph Abernathy (Appendix C) • Hogan will pass around his fieldnotes from an interview with Tom's Boss (more focused: good development, enlightened developers, your project, changes over time, the city, and the Natural Community Conservation program).

  14. Oral History (final) • You who envision yourselves doing participant observation • should think about using key informants • should think about using archival and secondary sources • before you interview your informants • before you participate

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