JS Lect 3: Enthnomethodology I
Ethnomethodology, and Accountability and Un-accountability in Action
Based on material from:
HAROLD GARFINKEL (1967) CHAPTER 2: STUDIES OF THE ROUTINE GROUNDS OF
EVERYDAY ACTIVITIES, pp.35-75
As in previous lectures, we are still in the realm of trying to make the vast network of “background
expectancies” – in terms of which we make sense of, and account for, what we are doing in our lives –
‘rationally-visible’ in some way. That is, we are trying to ‘document’ it in some way, so that we can
make it into something we can discuss and criticize, and, perhaps, attempt to change.
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To begin: let me take you back to some issues I mentioned in my first lecture: to do with ‘words
standing for things,’ and ‘putting our ideas into words’...
S
Instead of taking it for granted that we understand another person’s speech simply by
grasping the inner ideas they have supposedly put into their words, that picture of how we
understand each other is coming to be seen as the exception rather than the rule.
S
Most of the time, we do not fully understand what another person says.
S
Indeed, in practice, shared understandings occur only occasionally, if they occur at all.
S
When they do, it is only by people testing and checking each other’s talk, sometimes by them
questioning and challenging it, reformulating and elaborating it, and so on.
S
Other times, they simply confirm their understanding by ‘following on’ from another’s
actions in an expected way, and the other does not object.
S
For in practice, shared understandings are developed or negotiated between participants over
a period of time, in the course of an ongoing conversation.
“Ethnomethodological studies analyze everyday activities as members methods for
making those same activities visibly-rational-and-reportable-for-all-practicalpurposes, i.e., ‘accountable’, as organizations of commonplace everyday activities”
(1967, p.vii).
1. Methods or Practices of common sense reasoning:
S
These practices are a set of ‘methods’ for turning our personal experience into experience of a
socially shared, i.e., objective reality.
S
How can we ‘get at’ these methods, so to speak, how can we get them out into the light of
day?
S
“The exception proves the rule,” we say - something out of the ordinary, unexpected, ‘proves’
what our expectations must have been.
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S
S
Hence Garfinkel’s (1967) method for which he has become famous: “... to detect some
expectancies that lend commonplace scenes their familiar, life-as-usual character, and relate
these to the stable social structures of everyday activities. Procedurally, it is my preference to
start with familiar scenes and ask what can be done to make trouble” (p.37).
To illustrate what is involved here – that it is not a simple matter of perfectly shared
understandings – Garfinkel had his students report on an everyday conversation, by writing
on the left side of a sheet what was actually said, and on the right side what they and their
partners understood they were talking about.
A student reported the following dialogue with his wife:
Husband:
Wife:
Husband:
Wife:
Husband:
Wife:
Dana succeeded in putting a penny in the parking meter today without being picked
up.
Did you take him to the record store?
No, to the shoe repair shop.
What for?
I got some new shoelaces for my shoes.
Your loafers need new heels badly.
To make ‘trouble’, Garfinkel imposed on his students the task, on the right side, of being accurate,
clear, and distinct – there should be no ambiguities, no ‘which parking meter, which store, or which
shoes?”
Students complained about having to write ‘more’ and ‘more’ – and eventually complained that
‘repairing’ ambiguities and vaguenesses was impossible – the task led to an unending, expanding,
branching network of relevant features.
HUSBAND: Dana succeeded
putting a penny in
a parking meter today
day without being
picked up.
This afternoon as I was bringing Dana, our
four-year-old son, home from the nursery
school, he succeeded in reaching high
enough to put a penny in a parking meter
when we parked in a meter zone, whereas before he
had always had to be picked up to reach that high.
WIFE: Did you take him to
the record store?
Since he put a penny in a meter that means
that you stopped while he was with you. I know that
you stopped at the record store either on the way to
get him or on the way back. Was it on the way back,
so that he was with you or did you stop there on the
way to get him and somewhere else on the way
back?
HUSBAND: No, to the
shoe repair shop.
No, I stopped at the record store on the way
to get him and stopped at the shoe repair shop on the
way home when he was with me.
WIFE: What for?
I know of one reason why you might have stopped at
the shoe repair shop. Why did you in fact?
HUSBAND: I got some
new shoe laces for my
shoes.
As you will remember I broke a shoe lace on
one of my brown oxfords the other day so I
stopped to get some new laces.
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WIFE: Your loafers need
new heels badly.
Something else you could have gotten that I
was thinking of. You could have taken in your black
loafers which need heels badly. You’d better get
them taken care of pretty soon.
S
“What the parties said would be treated as sketchy, partial, incomplete, masked, elliptical,
concealed, ambiguous, or misleading version of what the parties talked about” (p.27).
S
To make trouble, he imposed on his students the task, on the right side, of being accurate,
clear, and distinct – there should be no ambiguities, no ‘which parking meter, which store, or
which shoes?”
S
Students complained about having to write ‘more’ and ‘more’ – and eventually complained
that ‘repairing’ ambiguities and vaguenesses was impossible – the task led to an unending,
expanding, branching network of relevant features.
S
Ordinary, everyday understanding is essential incomplete - it carries an open horizon of
unexplored content - yet it is still a very full understanding, in the sense of more being
understood than was said.
The ‘gap’ between what was ‘actually said’ and what was ‘understood’ by the conversationalists, to
these conclusions:
S
S
S
S
S
S
“1) There were many matters that the partners understood they were talking about that they
did not mention.
2) Many matters that the partners understood, were understood on the basis not only of what
was actually said but what was left unspoken.
3) Many items were understood through a process of attending to the temporal series of
utterances as documentary evidences of a developing conversation rather than a string of
terms.
4) Matters that the two understood in common were understood only in and through the
course of “understanding work” that treated an actual linguistic event as “the document of,”
or as “pointing to,” and underlying pattern of matters that each had already supposed
[required further work involving the documentary method].
5) In attending to the utterances as events-in-a-conversation each party made reference to the
biography and prospects of the present interaction, which each used and attributed to the other
as a common scheme of interpretation and expression.
6) Each waited for something more to be said in order to hear what had previously been
talked about, and each seemed willing to wait” (pp.39-40).
The ‘documentary method’: “The method consists of taking an actual appearance as ‘the document
of’, as ‘pointing to’, as ‘standing on behalf of’ a presupposed underlying pattern. Not only is the
underlying pattern derived from its documentary evidences, but the individual documentary
evidences, in their turn, are interpreted on the basis of ‘what is known’ about the underlying pattern”
(1967, p.78) – each is used to elaborate the other: the parts the whole, and the whole the parts.
THE PARTS ARE ‘ROOTED IN’ THE WHOLE
<-------------------------------------------------
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WHOLE
PARTS
--------------------------------------------------->
WHILE THE WHOLE ‘GIVES FORM’ TO THE PARTS
S
The matter talked about: “a developed and developing event over the course of action which
produced it. Furthermore, both the process and the product were known from within this
development by both parties, each for himself as well as on behalf of the other” (p.40).
S
For example: The sense finally attributed to the wife’s “What for?” may not have been
available to the husband until after she had remarked “Your loafers need new heels badly.”
S
Thus at any point, the ‘sense’ of the utterances, and ‘what was talked about’ by their use
remained ‘specifically vague’ and open-ended “with respect to internal [intralinguistic]
relationships, relationships with other events and relationships to retrospective and
prospective possibilities” (p.41).
S
These properties of common understandings are in sharp contrast to the kinds of unambiguous
understandings we seek, say, in science.
2. Scientific vs. common sense rationalities:
-1. Forms vs. meanings: In arriving at the steps for solving a problem, one must use methods
that conform to the rules of formal logic and scientific procedure. In short, the scientist
operating within the realm of scientific theory must use rules of formal logic to construct the
steps for solving a problem.
-2. Unequivocal vs. vagueness: One must use language that is ‘semantically clear and
distinct’. The meanings of terms should be unequivocal. In other words, their meaning should
be fixed and remain stable from one situation to another.
-3. Without pragmatic justification: The insistence upon semantic clarity and distinctness is
maintained without pragmatic justification. It is an end in itself rather than a means to an end.
-4. Observations vs. reasons: The definition of the situation must contain facts that have
been confirmed by science. Matters of fact must be factual according to scientific knowledge
and procedures. Thus, the scientist must base his actions upon facts confirmed by science.
These four ‘rationalities’ are ‘grounded’ in scientific forms of life, but are not a part of everyday
social interaction. Indeed, attempts to impose them upon other people in everyday life, makes
ordinary social interaction impossible.
He reports some interactions in which he had students insist upon semantic clarity and distinctness
during ordinary exchanges:
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Case 1
The subject was telling the experimenter, a member of the subject’s car pool, about having had a flat
tire while going to work previous day.
(S) I had a flat tire.
( E) What do you mean, you had a flat tire?
She appeared momentarily stunned. Then she answered in a hostile way: “What do you mean, ‘What
do you mean?’ A flat is a flat tire. That is what I meant. Nothing special. What a crazy question!”
CASE 2
( S ) Hi, Ray. How is your girl friend feeling?
( E) What do you mean, “How is she feeling?” Do you mean physical or mental?
( S ) I mean how is she feeling? What’s the matter with you? (He looked peeved.)
( E) Nothing. Just explain a little clearer what do you mean?
( S ) Skip it. How are your Med School applications coming?
( E) What do you mean, “How are they?”
(S) You know what I mean.
(E) I really don’t
(S) What’s the matter with you? Are you sick?
CASE 3
“On Friday night my husband and I were watching television. My husband remarked that he was tired.
I asked, ‘How are you tired? Physically, mentally, or just bored?’”
( S ) I don’t know, I guess physically, mainly.
( E) You mean that your muscles ache or your bones?
( S) I guess so. Don’t be so technical.
( After more watching )
( S ) All these old movies have the same kind of old iron bedstead in them.
( E) What do you mean? Do you mean all old movies, or some of them, or just the ones you have seen?
(S) What’s the matter with you? You know what I mean.
( E) I wish you would be more specific.
( S) You know what I mean! Drop dead!
CASE 4
During a conversation ( with the E’s female fiancee) the E questioned the meaning of various words
used by the subject...
For the first minute and a half the subject responded to the questions as if they were legitimate
inquiries. Then she responded with “Why are you asking me those questions?” and repeated
this two or three times after each question. She became nervous and jittery, her face and hand
movements. .. uncontrolled. She appeared bewildered and complained that I was making her
nervous and demanded that .1 “Stop it”. ... The subject picked up a magazine and covered her
face. She put down the magazine and pretended to be engrossed. When asked why she was
looking at the magazine she closed her mouth and refused any further remarks.
CASE 5
My friend said to me, “Hurry or we will he late.” I asked him what did he mean hy late and from what
point of view did it have reference. There was a look of perplexity and cynicism on his face. “Why are
you asking me such silly questions? Surely I don’t have to explain such a statement. What is wrong
with you today? Why should I have to stop to analyze such a statement? Everyone understands my
statements and you should be no exception!”
CASE 6
5
The victim waved his hand cheerily.
( S) How are you?
( E) How am I in regard to what? My health, my finances, my school work, my peace of mind, my. ..?
( S) ( Red in the face and suddenly out of control. ) Look! I was just trying to be polite. Frankly, I don’t
give a damn how you are.
CASE 7
My friend and I were talking about a man whose overbearing attitude annoyed us. My friend expressed
his feeling.
(S) I’m sick of him.
( E) Would you explain what is wrong with you that you are sick?
( S ) Are you kidding me? You know what I mean.
( E) Please explain your ailment
( S ) ( He listened to me with a puzzled look. ) What came over you? We never talk this way, do we?
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3. The ‘Morality’ of Everyday Understandings:
-E’s breaches resulted in extremely rapid interactional breakdown’s, which also, were very
rapidly and powerfully, morally sanctioned: cases 1 and 6, S’s assumed posture of ‘righteous
hostility’; and in all the other cases, the S’s made strong efforts to restore the a state of
reciprocity, and demanded explanations.
-In each case, S treated to intelligible character of his own talk - vague as it might be - as
something to which he was morally entitled, and correspondingly treated the breaching move
as illegitimate, deserving of sanction, and requiring explanation.
-The experiment indicates that maintaining ‘the reciprocity of perspectives’ is not merely a
cognitive task, but a task that each actor ‘trusts’ that the other will also try to accomplish as a
matter of moral necessity.
-In other words, people will not allow others to demand of them that they speak with a set of
predetermined meanings, but they feel that they have a moral right to demand interpretive
cooperation.
-Indeed, the fact is: the ‘making sense’, the production of a meaning, is not a simple ‘onepass’ matter of an individual saying a sentence, but would be a complex back-and-forth
process of negotiation between speaker and hearer, involving tests and assumptions, the use
of the present context, the waiting for something later to make clear what was meant before,
and the use of many other ‘seen but unnoticed’ background features of everyday scenes, all
deployed according to agreed practices or ‘methods’.
-These are in fact the properties, Garfinkel claims, of ordinary conversational talk. And as he
says (1967, pp.41-42):
“For the purposes of conducting their everyday affairs person refuse to permit each other to
understand ‘what they are really talking about’ in this way. The anticipation that people will
understand, the occasionality of expressions, the specific vagueness of references, the retrospectiveprospective sense of a present occurrence, waiting for something later to see what was meant before,
are sanctioned properties of common discourse” (p.41).
“They furnish a background of seen but unnoticed features of common discourse whereby actual
utterances are recognized as events of common, reasonable, understandable, plain talk” (p.41).
“Persons require these properties of discourse as conditions under which they are themselves entitled
and entitle others to claim that they know what they are talking about, and that what they are saying is
understandable and ought to be understood” (pp.41-42)).
“In short, their seen but unnoticed presence is used to entitle persons to conduct their common
conversational affairs without interference. Departures from such usages call forth immediate
attempts to restore a right state of affairs” (p.42).
Moral sanctions follow such transgressions. Thus, to insist words have pre-determined meanings is to
rob people of their rights to their own individuality. But even more than this is involved: it is to
deprive one’s culture of those conversational occasions in which people’s individuality is constituted
and reproduced. It is also to substitute the authority of professional texts in warranting claims to truth
(on the basis as we now see of the unwarranted claim that they give us access to an independent,
extralinguistic reality), for the good reasons we ordinarily give one another in our more informal
conversations and debates.
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