1. The management of emotion in fieldwork research and ethnographic creativity Tony Watson Nottingham University Business School, September 2008 (tony.watson@nottingham.ac.uk)

2. Ethnography An ethnography is a written account of the cultural life of the whole or a part of a community, a social group or an organisation Ethnographic studies contextualise specific matters within the broader cultural whole or the ‘way of life’ of the society, or the part of a society that is studied To help here, we can valuably turn to Mills’ The Sociological Imagination (1959/ 1970)

3. Personal circumstances and their ‘structural’ context The ‘sociological imagination’ project of Mills was one of helping people relate their own lives to structural and historical aspects of the societies in which they live He was concerned for ‘personal troubles’ to be related to ‘public issues’. This means always relating personal circumstances to social structures, cultures and social change Personal circumstances, especially ‘troubles’, inevitably have emotional dimensions which researchers concerned with ‘telling the truth’ cannot ignore or sideline

4. Emotions and culture To bring emotions into ethnographic analyses without descending into psychological reductionism, it is helpful to distinguish between feelings and emotions. Feelings are bodily felt sensations which relate to a person’s psychological state. Emotions are the way these sensations are made sense of with reference to culture, either privately or socially. An illustration from my own ‘ethnographic apprenticeship’…

5. Ethnography and the pursuit of truth Truth claims can be made in PRAGMATIST rather than exclusively in correspondence terms Pragmatism means judging knowledge, concepts, theories etc not as ‘correct’ or ‘incorrect’ but as MORE or LESS effective in INFORMING PRACTICE We judge our material in terms of how well it tells us about ‘HOW THE WORLD WORKS’ in the sphere we are writing about You cannot talk about ‘how the world works’ without considering emotions

6. Fictionalising and truth Working within Pragmatist principles allows us to fictionalise elements of our ethnographic accounts – especially to deal with issues of confidentiality etc It also allows us to write fictional pieces, make fictional films etc which are based on fieldwork experiences or ‘data’ which are sociologically ‘true’. Today’s film illustrates this.

7. Ethnography, research and teaching The truth-telling aspect of ethnography – if it is presented as a skilled and ‘readable’ narrative means that it can function equally as well as a teaching medium as a piece of research output The ‘It’s not your Business’ film was designed primarily as a teaching device – yet it is very much a product of ethnographic research

8. Field research is a preparation for ethnography: it is not ethnography itself To do field research in depth, the researcher becomes a ‘participant observer ’ Participant observation is a research practice in which the investigator joins the group, community or organisation being studied – as a full or partial member - and both participates in and observes activities, asks questions, takes part in conversations and reads relevant documents

9. Exchange and trust in ‘deep’ fieldwork To get (1) research access, (2) information and (3) personal experiences which can provide ‘first-hand’ insights into life in the research setting, the researcher must continually make and remake exchange relationships with individuals and groups Many of these exchanges involve emotional matters – to get close to people means exchanging friendship, warmth, humour, respect, etc At the heart of this is the building of TRUST relations

10. ‘Exploiting’ emotions threatens trust Trust and mutual respect are vital – because the participant observer often has to challenge or clash with colleague/ informants in a way a ‘normal’ researcher would not (e.g. ‘metrics’ row in ISM study) This trust and mutual respect would be undermined if one were to be seen as exploiting people’s emotions, feigning friendship, ‘acting out’ empathy etc

11. Two narratives to illustrate all this – and to stimulate debate ‘Voice, silence and lies: the construction of buildings and the destruction of families’ A sequel to ‘Voice, silence and the business of construction’, Organization 14(2) 2007 ‘It’s not your Business’ An ethnographically- derived fictional film which deals with issues of relationships, emotions and strategic change in a small family business

12. Some personal references An ethnographic monograph 1994/ 2001 (reissued edition) In Search of Management, London: Thomson Learning An ethnographic article 2007 ‘Voice, silence and the business of construction’, with D. Fletcher, Organization, 14(2): 155-174. On ethnographic writing 1995 ‘Shaping the story: rhetoric, persuasion and creative writing in organisational ethnography', Studies in Cultures, Organisations and Society, 1(2): 301-11 2008 forthcoming, with M. Humphreys, ‘Ethnographic practices: from “writing-up ethnographic research” to “writing ethnography” in S. Ybema and D. Yanow (eds) ‘The complexity of everyday organizational life: an ethnographic approach’ London: Sage. Ethnography and fiction 2000 'Ethnographic fiction science: making sense of managerial work and organisational research processes with Caroline and Terry', Organisation, 7(3): 513-534 2004 ‘Shy William and the Gaberlunzie Girl’ in Y. Gabriel, ed. Myths, Stories and Organizations: premodern narratives for our times, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 223-35. 2008 in press’ In Search of McManus: mystery, myth and modernity’ in Kostera, M. (ed) Organization Olympians: heroes, heroines and villains of organizational myths, Basingstoke: Palgrave-Macmillan, 142-54.