Ethnomethodology Wes Sharrock The British Journal of Sociology, Vol. 40, No. 4 (Dec., 1989), 657-677. Stable URL: byp:flinks jstor-org/sici sici=0007-191.5%281989 12%2940%3A4%3C657%3 ABSSB2.0,CO%IB2-P The British Journal of Sociology is curently published by The London School of Economics and Political Science. Your use of the ISTOR archive indicates your acceptance of ISTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at flip: feworwjtor org/aboutterms.htmal. ISTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in par, that unless you fave obtained pcior permission, you may not dowaload an cnt isus of @ journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content inthe ISTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial uss. Please contact the publisher cegarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at bhupsferwer.jstoc.orp/jounals/lonschooL hal Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transtnission. ISTOR is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to creating and preserving.a digital archive of scholarly journals. For more information regarding ISTOR, please contact jstor-info@umich edu. hup:thwwwjstor.orgy “Thu Mar 18 09:01:00 2004Wes Sharrock Ethnomethodology WHAT'S THE SCORE? Immediately on publication in 1967, Harold Garfinkel’s Studies ix Etinomettodology made a strong and controversial impact on British sociology, which attracted far more attention than was altogether beneficial to the longer term health of the enterprise within the British concept. It became the focus of the kind of attention and expectations chat it could not accommodate, for i¢ was never likely &o gratify the requirements that sociologists in a hutry and those with a mission would bring (o it, Initial interes¢ and misplaced enthusiasm. quickly faded, sometimes replaced by a resentment that echno- methodology had not lived up to the image rather arbitrarily created for it. Other fashions came along, and the volume of comment expanded, especially the gratuitous and negative kind. The number who have remained well disposed to ethno- methadology through that period (or a good part of it) is small, a substantial proportion of them being linked {more or less directly} through the Sociology Department at Manchester University Though a small band, it has been 2 productive one and there is an extensive literature in the area. The arrival and subsequent residence in the UK of Gail Jefferson, a key figure with Harvey Sacks and Emmanuel Schegloff in the formation of ‘conversational analysis’ had a major impact on the shape of ethnomethodalogy here, With characteristic generosity and energy she provided mach ‘of the transcribed material that is used for work on conversation’s ‘organisation and instruction in the methods for analysing this, which accounts for the predominance amongst UK ethnomethodologists of aan interest in he use of the techniques of conversational analysis ducing the later 1970s and through the 1980s." Over the span of two decades, studies of a more or less ethnomethodological sort have covered a range of substantive topics including the formulation of arguments in sociology texts (Anderson 1978) the analysis of newspaper headlines and stories, (Lee 1984; Coleman 1986; McFfoul 1982), courtroom proceedings (Atkinson 1979; Atkinson and Drew 1879), interviews (Butcon forthcaming (a), Greathach 1986}, interrogations (Watson 1983 forthcaming), The Britsh Jnl of Soin Vane 0 bo €658 Wes Sharrock educational and business simulations (Francis 1987) classroom organization (Cull and Payne 1992; French 1987}, doctor-patient encounters (Heath 1996; Anderson and Sharrock, 1987}, moral categories (Jayyusi 1994), political speeches (Atkinson 1984, Heritage and Greathach 1986) medical hygiene (Rawlings forthcoming}, cognitive theory (Coulter 1979, (983), business conduct (Anderson, Hughes and Sharrock 1987}, the division of labour in clerical work (Sharrock and Anderson, unpublished) and in ait traffic concral (Anderson, Hughes, Shapiro and Sharrock 1988; Anderson Hughes and Sharrock, 1989}, as well as a diversity of phenomena within conversation’s organisation — including the development of topic {Button and Casey 1984, 1985), the positioning of the particle ‘oh’ (Heritage 1984) and the production of ‘troubles talk’ (Jefferson and Lee 1981, 1987) Since che bulk of current work currently is within the ‘conversa- tional analysis’ frame of reference it can be summarised following Graham Button, (forthcoming b) under cheee main heads: the analysis of (2) specific actions and their sequential implications for next actions; (b) an emphasis on the organisation of responses to actions; (c) sequentially interrelated actions making up a section of talk. Further unifying some of the studies under the first heading, has been an interest in the operation of preferences. These are not the psychological preferences of speakers, but those of utterance types, in the sense that the form of the utterance indicates that of the possible responses actually available a particular one is called for. Classically, the question "You don’t want co go out do you?” though it allows both ‘yes’ and ‘no’, ‘prefers’ the negative response, Button’s own work with Neil Casey (1984 1985) examines the way preferences ate at work in the production of topic beginnings. A continuing concern with the working out of a conversational sequence’s developmental possibilities leads ta a concern with how responses ‘build upon” prior turns and project further developmental possibilities. Christian Heath's (1982; 1985) studies creat some non- verbal activities as responses ta the other's silence, soliciting further talk. He is, thereby, also analysing the integration of verbal and non- verbal activities. Though conversation is contructed on an utterance- by-utterance basis, it is built into various sub-sections, and the construction and integration of longer sequences of talk is covered by Butcon’s third heading, The production of prolonged talk co the same topic, and the ardering of a succession of topics, are main instances of this. Jefferson and Lee's (1987) concern with a specific kind of topic, ‘troubles talk can be cited for its treatment of the mode of entry into and management of sequences which feature the telling of troubles. Attempts have been made to meet complaints about the apparent indifference of conversational analysis to the institutional setting ofEthnomethodology 659) talk, Atkinson and Drew (1979) have discussed curn-taking in the courtroom and Greatbatch (1986; 1988) within the news incerview. ‘The merits of such studies in depicting modifications of the standard turn taking machinery for conversation, considered as a project in the compatison of ‘speech exchange systems’ is not particularly controversial, but expectations about the ‘pay off of such studies in terms of the analysis of ‘institutional phenomena’ is showing signs of becoming much mote so within ethnomethodology. My own conviction has long been that the desire to make conversational analysis responsive (o ‘the institutional setting’ is to make a quite unnecessary concession to those who complain about neglect of that, pethaps even to misunderstand the character of turn~ taking investigations themselves, The entire methodology af those investigations was designed to abstract out ‘institutional fearures’ precisely to expose the specifies of turn taking arrangements (on the legitimate assumption that you don’t have to do, ar even try to do, everything). The attempt ta reconnect institucional features with turn taking phenomena is gaing ro be methodologically problematic, especially if ‘institutional features? ate conceived in pretty much the standard ways. There is a need for more reflective examination of the character of conversational analysis and the kind of interest that it takes in talk, which assuredly is not the only kind of interest that can he taken, Garfinkel’s original suggestion was that che phenam- ‘ena which sociologists treat as ‘institutional ones’ can. be examined substantially as oral phenomena, consticuted in central respects as ‘ways of talking’. Treatment of them as ‘ways of talking’ is certainly not identical with ¢reatment of them as arrangements of turn. taking” Some of my own collaborative efforts are meant to follow out Garfinkel’s suggestions. These do not necessarily reject the conversa tional analysis tradition, though they are meant to indicate a suspicion that the transcript and turn taking system are nowadays Ietishised, but they do try to treat the embeddness of the talk within is socially organised environment as its primary feature, and not as secondary to its turn taking character. Thus, with Wacson (Sharrock and Watson 1989}, I have discussed the way in which ‘police work’ is formulated as an integeal part of police work itself and, through that, have considered how the standardisation of social phenomena is made visible, As part of a team studying the organisation of UK air traffic control, I have been interested in che treatment of talk not as the production of sequenced turns (though it is that) but as the execution of traffic controlling operations (Anderson, Sharrock and Warson 1989}, Further, the talking ¢hrough of dre controlling ‘operations is necessarily seen to be embedded in and explicative of the organisation of the air traffic system, so there has been there (as in our studies of entrepreneurial pursuits) a necessity to concern ‘ourselves with the location of activities within che division of labour660 Wes Sharrock (Anderson and Sharrock 1985, 1987). Attention to the division of labour does not represent any accommodation ¢o criticisms, for it is the pursuit of the original initiative, which did not call upon us co disregard such matters, only to ensure that we didn’t treat them in the way they are usually handled. Which, of course, we don’t do. ‘The selective list of topics and this brief review af some studies indicates the diversity and continuing vigour of activity within ethnomethodology, though I have no doubs that the topics still seem, to most sociologists, not only diverse but strange and/or pointless. ‘The majority will’ want persuading not about the energy oF persistance of ethnomethodologists, but about the worth of their activities. WHAT'S THE POINT? Here, one comes up against the fact there there is a great gulf which typically divides ethnomethologists from other sociologists, which hhas elsewhere been analogised to that between those who can see what a fine novelist Jane Austen is and those who see her only as a nineteenth-century Barbara Cartland. ‘There is an immense discrep- ancy in sensibilities, and ic is doubtful that many of those who hew to the latter opinion can be brought to see what the former do. Certainly, the ethnomethodological sensibility which prides itself on its sensitivity to and care with its materials, and which aspires to provide clase analysis of those, is emtirely out-of-temper with the prevailingly theoreticist mood which dominates so mutch of British sociology, which revels in sweeping generalisation and which, if ic deigns a consider materials at all, subjects them to the most perfunctory examination.’ Those who have no interest whatsoever in the analysis of research materials and have never seriously attempted their careful (often unmotivated) inspection are unlikely to recognise, lec alane, appreciate the sense of accomplishment available (o those who (ry to analyse such materials in an intensive and close way, when they manage to give their materials as serupulous a treatment as they can. ‘Theareticists do take nate of ethnomethodology, but typically treat it in the way that theoreticists treat all sociological work, as a variant of their own cannibalising interests, without regard for the autonomous concerns such work may have. Thus, ethnomethodolagy is treated as though it were engaged in the standard theoreticist encerprise of contriving a general conception of ‘social structure’, even though it specifically disavows this stock objective. Naturally, it is found wanting relative to the requirements of a project in whi has no part. Theoreticists, having only the most remote interest in researching social life, are utterly indifferent to what matters most toEthramethadotogy 661 cthnomethodology, namely, achieving and maintaining an intimate connection between reflection on theoretical themes of sociology and, the conduct of investigations into actual social settings where in these themes might be actualised. Ethnomethodology’s concern with the close investigation of materials makes it somewhat, though not all thac much, more congenial to British sociologists who take an interest in ‘qualitative research.’ The agenda of these investigators is, by no means common with ehnomethadology, the formers’ ventures into the study of mundane social settings being designed to engender constructive ‘social science’ versions of these locales whereas che latter eschew, or ought to, any such objectives. Such remarks run che risk of sounding disparaging to ‘qualitative research” but they are not meant ta, only to make the point that the extent to which ethnomethadology differs fram ‘constructivist sociology’ is generally and seriously underestimated, even amongst those wha have greater sympathy for it. As a result, the argument hardly ever involves a real meetings of minds. Most’ often, objections to ethnomethodology simply are not cogent, but are more usually ritual affirmations of difference, anathernas against it for failing co conform to che complainant’s conception of what sociology ought t be, Ethno- methodology doesn’t fit in with other people’s conception of sociology. Tt was never meant (0. Having insisted that there is a gulf between other kinds of sociology and ours, it behoves me to say something about what kind ofa gap there is. There are, of course, many different ways in which this difference may be formulated, and I am sometimes tempted 19 say that it is not a matter of one major difference, or even a few of them, but of an overwhelming multitude of small ones. Pucting that temptation aside, T would say that my own drift out of the ‘mainstream’ of sociological thinking has resulted from my inclina~ tion to give a thoroughly methodological reading ta. sociological works, rather than the metaphysical and epistemological anes that they moze regularly receive. Take, for example, Alfred Schucz's treatment of ‘the world of daily life’ as the ‘paramount’ reality, and his corresponding emphasis upon the role of ‘common sense underscandings' (Schultz, 1962), His writings on this are character- istically read as though they comprised a metaphysical claim, that the world of daily life is the ultimate locus of social reality, and an epistemological onc, that common sense understandings — since they adequately comprehend the nature of social reality — are incorrigible. Naturally, there are many sociologists who wish to contest these claims. Whether or not Schutz, ought to be understood as making such claims, the potential that he might be is of no particular interest for me, since what catches my eye in this is the way in which he analyses the methadolagical role that ‘common sense understandings’ have in enabling and terminating inquiry.662 Wes Sharrock Outside of the domain of philosophy, where the method of systematic doubt can be applied, inquiries cannot be conducted on that basis. Incelligible doubis can only be raised and resolved within the context of much that is not doubted, which is ‘taken for granted", and the status of that which can or cannot be doubted is a socially provided one. The ultimate epistemic status of ‘common sense understandings’ just docs not arise, does not in any way affect the observation thai inquiries which ‘apply anyching less than the thoroughgoing method of doubt will he inevitably subject to socially derived ‘common sense understandings’. This leads to the issue of how professional sociological studies (theoretical and empirical) are themselves regulated by insistence upon socially sanctioned bona fide facts of life (which is another way of saying ‘common sense understandings’). This is not a question to which one can curn to ther sociologists for any kind af answer, for it is not one which they have raised with respect to their own workings. The role of “the obvious’, of what ‘goes without saying’, ‘stands beyond question’, or ‘can by supplied by the hearer/reader’ is not something that has been systematically and self-consciously treated in the main sociological tradition, and certainly noc in the manner that I would have in mind. Obviously, the interest would not be in producing a sweeping characterisation of the relationship berween ‘sociology’ and. ‘common sense’ but in inspecting, rather, the intricate ways in which, in particular studies, distinctively sociological conceptions are inevitably intertwined with a dense body of matters that can he taken to be ‘known in cammon’ prior to the institution of the inquiry in hand and which can, as grounds for further action and inference, shape its course. ‘An appreciation that professional sociological inquiries, to less than the affairs of routine conduct, are pervaded by ‘common sense understandings! directed me, at least, toward the inspection of the details of sociological inquiries, af the way in which such understandings are incorporated into them throughout the entire course of work, from initial investigations to final writing up. From the standpoint of more conventional theorising and methodology, such understandings must necessarily remain tacit (for spelling them. out, in that context, would simply be a matter of saying things that need not be said, of articulating what people need not he tald.) The relevant understandings could not, therefore, be reconstructed from afier-the-fact descriptions of either che phenomenon or the proced- ures by which it was researched, hut demand, instead, that one look into the details of the materials themselves and the procedures by which they were assembled and analysed. Such an acquaintance with the ‘raw materials’ of sociological research and with the ways in which they are handled and transformed into conventionally useable sociological data engendered an awareness of the (typically recaleit-Ethnomethadolngy 663 rant) particularities of the materials. Speaking up for the particulati s in a discipline like ours, which places such immense priority on the search for generalities, does not ensure one much of a hearing, for particulars are taken to be of virtullay no interest, merely to be abstracted aut in order that the general relationships may be made apparent. My impression was that it is often less a matter of extracting generalities ftom the particulars, chan it was of making the generalisations at the expense of the particularities. 1¢ was, therefore, gratifying to come actos writings by, first, Ludwig Wittgenstein, next, Harold Garfinkel, and finally, Harvey Sacks, in which the same sentiment was expressed. Their suggestion was that the character of philosophical and sociological theorising would be greatly aleered if it was required to conduct itself systematically through the examination of examples, rather than providing them only occasionally, treating them in a superficial, often cavalier, manner, when it daes so, without examining them clasely enough 10 ensure that they do unequivocally example what they are supposed 6. ‘Phe insistence in focusing, and closely, an (what I have called) examples leads many readers to look at the examples only to see what kind of activities they example, and to conclude they record ivial pursuits, and the study of them is of correspondingly negligible value. People talking about taking their dogs for walks or busy filling in the fact sheet on a form do noc provide intrinsically momentous topics comparable to the ones some of our colleagues deal in, Complaints about the inherent triviality of the exercise on the basis of the insignificance of its exemplary materials might have more interest if they showed minimal awareness of the possibility that the examples may often be chosen precisely because they are trite, in the hope that this will allow attention co be fully concentrated on the anaytical issues being raised, and to achieve a simplification of otherwise over-complex problems. The fact is that in general it is not the substance of the examples that matters at all to ethnomethodologists, for it usually hardly makes any difference what the materials are. The important thing is their role, namely that of attempting to make topics of sociological discussion visible in the witnessable daily life of the society, attempting to discern how these matters could conceivably manifest themselves to those who inhabit the society? It would he a mistake, and it is one frequently made, (o suppose that cthnomethodology’s arguments pertain to the causal conditions of conduct, when its primary concern is with the observable/detectable character of social phenomena: it does not ask ‘under what conditions would a person be caused to act? (which is the standard question) but ‘under what conditions does an action become recognisable and its cause {if any} identifiable?" In this discrepancy between metaphysical and methodologicalay Wes Sharvack readings can be found, I chink, one main sort of the difficulties which prevents cogent debate aver and with ethnomethodalogy. The fact that it seeks (or ought to) to eschew ontological commitments of the same order that others are determined 0 make, would, if acknowledged, prevent the latter fram creating ethnomethodolagy as though ic relevantly either agreed or disagreed. with chem. It adopts {ot ought to} a studied neutrality (an “indifference’) toward the various contending standpoints, having nothing to say on its own behalf with respect to the matters they centrally contraversialise ‘There is sufficient continuity hetween ethnomethodology and its predecessors to allow it to call itself a sociology. It does pick up an traditional issues, but in an attentuated way, insisting on thoroughly reconceiving them, At the most primitive level, this involves a thoroughgoing substitution, one which displaces the attempt to derive the problematics of social organisation from the principles of social theory, for one which secks to identify the ‘endogenous’ problematics of specific social environments, That is, instcad of trying to determine what people would have to do and how they would have to live if the principles of one or other social theary were crue, the concern is with the organisational relevances that inhabitants of the society treat as the actual conditions of their conduct. This substitution achieves an extensive reconstruction of the character of professional sociological inquiry. The standard ‘operation requires the demonstration through cagent argument from and to general principles of sociological thought and method that a certain problem must be encountered and responded to by the members of society, whether they are writing of its presence or not. ‘Thus, for example, conventionally one argues from Weber's characterisation of bureaucracy, from proposed. principles of social theory similar to or different from Weber's (and, of course, by way of common sense understandings of idealised or typified conditions and courses of action), that there is a tension between authority and expertise in bureaucratic arrangements. It is then legitimate to assume that this tension must affect the conduct of bureacratic staffs even if they are not aware of its doing so, and one is licensed to go and examine their actions to see how those actions can be construed as ‘responses’ and ‘solutions’ (0 this tension, even though they are not intended as such by those who perpetrate them. For better ot worse, this is not the way of cthnomethodology. It calls for the accumulation of materials which exhibit the conduct of a setting's inhabitants in such a way as to accomplish a demonstration that some proposed feature of a social setting is recognized as such co those frequenting che setting, Where those features are endogenously recognized as problematic, then a similarly documented demonstra- tion that conduct in the setting is intendedly ‘a response’ or ‘a solution’ ca it is tequired. ‘Though it is not wholly correct to understand it so, this treatmentEthnomethodology 665, will likely be understood to be talking about ‘the level of intention” and is likey to provoke the reaction that this is precisely the well- recognised (rouble with ethnomethodology, that it operates entirely at the level of intention and does not acknowledge the necessity to recognise, for the sake of the complete sociological picture, a level of ‘unintended consequence? at the very least. First, though this is to wrongly suppose that the distinction between the intended and unintended consequences of conduct is one which is the property of social science, for itis assuredly the case that this distinction is made. within social sectings. It would be a truly naive member of society (by the society's own standards) who supposed that you only got what you bargained for, that your projects produced only the things you wanted from them and so forth. Second, and more importantly, this objection. reiterates the supposition that ethnomethodology is giving “the level of intention’ a metaphysical value, when the issue actually is 2 methodological one, At @ minimum, it is the ready ‘assumption of much sociology that the determination of what the members of society do perceive and intend can be determined quite unproblematically, whilst the difficult bit is to identify the unseen and unintended features. Ethnomethodology is canvassing the possibility chat the effective identification through research materials ‘of the perceptions and intentions of society's members is, in the present state of sociological inquiry, every bic as problematic as the actributian of ‘unintended consequences’, The priority assigned to ‘enclogenous’ understandings of social settings represents a methado- logical, not a mezaphysical one: before we insist that certain features of social life are ‘unintended’ features of it we need to be in a position to specify, justifiably, what its intended ones are. WHAT OF THE ETHNOMETHODOLOGICAL CRITIQUE” ‘The existence of an ‘ethnomethodological critique’ of more conven tional sociology docs not sit easily with the above talk of ‘indifference’. A critique which truly deserved that name would be ‘one which raised its objections fram a distinctly echnomethodological paint of view, but such a critique would, in my opinion, merely resemble the kinds of denunciation of ethnomethadology itself which Thave earlier described as ‘ritual affirmations of difference’. It would effectively decry functionalism (or whatever) for not being ethno- methodology. Further, it would only be cruly worthwhile if ic was designed to provide superior solutions to the problems of functional: ism (or whatever) than those provided by functionalism itself. The most effective criticism is that which queries the viability of projects in their own terms, and the criticisms which can be most tellingly made by ethnomethodologists are not those which presuppose their own standpoint, but those which take other sociological projects666 Wes Sharrock initially at face value and then look at problems in their principled implementation. Most of the argument which is collected under the heading ‘the ethnomethodological critique’ does not comprise an ennumeration of faults which ethnomethodologists have found buc which others had previously failed to appreciate, The critique does not, at an important level, provide news to conventional sociologists about their theoretical and methodological practice, but mentions, rather, matters of which they are — at least in practice — ony too well aware. Those who do sociological research know perfectly well about the state of their inquiries, the extent to which (despite their best affores) their studies deviate from the rules of good research, practice, sound statistical sampling etc. and arc, throughout, dependent upon the (officially unacknowledged) good sense and, acuity of those doing the research to deliver results. From the way, for example, that the topic of ‘indexicality’ is routinely discussed, you would think that it was Garfinkel who was claiming to have noticed this, when it is clear enough that he is only repeating what 4 good number of philosophers and logicians had already noted, to the effect that the understanding of ordinary language utterances depends upon an awareness of the particular circumstances under which they are uttered, and that this is a source of great awkwardness for the handling of indexical expressions within formal’ discourse. Insofar as sociologists are working with natural language materials, and attempting to do so within the requirements of formal discourse, then it is only to be expected that there will be severe methodological problemas, For another example, take Barry Hindess’s recent Politics of Class Analysis (1987), This provides a forceful example of the extent to which the same disquict felt by cthnomethodologists originates quite independently of their approach. Hindess complains, about the proposed relationship between social class and political phenomena, that is dealt with in an entirely gestural way. He asserts that researchers cannot establish the proposed relationship in any ‘empirically demonstrable way, never making more than gestures tackling the problem (and this despite its massive centrality co whole programmes of inquity). One couldn't say anything harder than Hindess on this point, though one would say that ethnomethodolo- ists have long felt that the same argument applies more generally to sociological practice where researchers and theorists often seem. satisfied with largely gestural treatment of their difficulties There is no news in this, and certainly no attempt to make the problems seem worse than they do to those who live with them. What etbnomethodology introduces into the situation is the possibility of a fundamental change of attitude. That change is from an attitude which appreciates well enough that sociology is pervaded by difficulties but which routinely conducts its business subject to 2Ethromethadalogy 667 ‘for all practical purposes’ caveat. It secs the difficulties are temporary ones, occasioned by the primitive state of sociology theory and method and by the complexity of the problems it must confront, which will eventually be eradicated by the progressive sophistication, of our discipline. The alternative attitude is one which sees that the persistence of such ‘troubles’ with indexical expressions and the informal and unformulated character of the competence that informs and pervades sociological reasonings is not due to the inadequacies of efforts so far, but (perhaps) because these are constituent and reducible features of sociological reasoning, and that there will be no solution to these problems. The character of ordinary speech and common understandings are well known to sociologists, but they are recurrently of interest only because of their nuisance value to researchers secking access to social phenomena, and ethnomethodol- ogy simply seeks to make something sociological out of these well known facts. Ethnomethodology, therefore, does no more than claim that sociological studies fall short of ‘their own standards of methodological adequacy to an extent to which those who do such studies are already aware, so it docs not attribute to those studies any greater inadequacies than those they ascribe to themselves. [t notes, along with sociological methodologists, that the problems which confront researchers are chronic, and that research docs not make progress in the sense of permanently disposing of these obstacles, but treats these difficulties in a ‘dust under the rug” fashion, finding ad hac ways of setting them aside for his study, thereby only ensuring that the same problems will curn up and have to be dealt with in an equally ad fac fashion next time. The immensely standardised and stubborn character of sociology’s research problems might suggest that these things are not exiguous to the phenomena we are dealing with. Certainly nothing that has happened in the last two decades has done anything to suggest that ethnomethodology’s perception is mistaken, and the current demor- alisation of many of those who proseletyse for ‘harder’ sociology suggests that che intractability of just these proboms has once again been brought home to them, The repeated faliure to transcend even basic difficulties docs not, though, quench their enthusiasm for yet another effort in the same broad direction. Ethnomethodologists couldn't say anything more devastating about most of the work in the more ‘positivist’ tradition of American empirical social research than has recently been said by three dedicated and leading practitioners of that tradition, Otis Dudley Duncan (1984), Hubert Blalock (1984) and Stanley Lieberson (1985}, though these develop- ments are pretty much what ethnomethodologists could long ago have predicted.* One could, one can, go on thinking that researchers can eventually overcome the ‘mere practicalities’ which prevent the668 Wes Sharrack principled, thorough and effective application of their ideals of method to social phenomena. ‘The fact that efforts in this direction are unavailing allows at least some credibility co echnomethodology's alternative supposition that the phenomena themselves may not be so much obscared by as constituted through such practicalities, and that the attempt to analyse the latter out is not so much one which is comparable to a chemist’s exercise in purifying a substance so much as it is to that of taking away the walls of the house €0 see what is keeping the roof up (to borrow Garfinkel’s phrase} In sociology, of all places, dogmatising is to be avoided. I see greater all round prosperity if we appreciate that everything is up for discussion, so I certainly do not offer this conclusion as though were inevitable and apparent to everyone of good will. If one allows chat conclusion, at least for the sake of argument, then one sees that its upshot is another change of attitude, this time to the entire methodological apparatus of sociology, for this is one which is designed to achieve the capture of saciology’s phenomena in a way which will, if ethnomethodology’s reading is right, precisely exclude the very things which make the phenomena what they ate, The argument that the phenomena are not merely and exigently situated amongst practicalities, but constituted by them, is one that takes a great deal of working out and documenting, and whether or not one could show that standard sociological research does persistently cagage in such ‘wall removing’ is something else again, However, much Jess than this is needed to establish that sociological researchers do, and given the nature of the exercises they are involved in, must, disregard the practical character of social action in their official methodological operations, which leaves for ethno- methodology this: that there are matters into which it may initiate a programme of inquities which are not claimed by other sociologies but, as Copics of investigation, eschewed by them, It has phenomena and topics of its own quite independently of those treated by ‘constructive sociology’ Given that one has identified phenomena and copies which are not dealt with by extant sociologists, why tot simply include these topics in with chose on some more standard sociology’s list? Because the plication of the foregoing arguments is not that ethnomethodolo- gists are looking at different things that ‘constructive sociologists’ are, but that they are usually looking at exactly the same things, though in a differenc light, and from a different angle, and that 2 move somewhat comparable 19 a ‘gestalt switch’ is required to ect from one viewpoint 10 the other. Like the duck and the rabbit, the faces and the vase, ethnomethodology’s and sociolagy's ropies are only clearly visible in alternation with each other. The phenomena to which ethnomethadolagy would pay close attention being, for other sociologists the seen, but unnoticed, environment of theirEthnomethodelogy 669) enquiries, coming only into focus when they are problematic from the point of view of getting a study done. The phenomena and topics that cthnomethodology cakes up would not be available under such auspices, and the steps required to render chem accessible would require ‘reconstruction of other sociological standpoints on an extensive scale, and in ways which would cake them in the directions in which their enthusiasts do nor want to go. Attempts to ‘take note! of ethnomethedology’s arguments without modifying a given soci ological framework more than marginally will inevitably look unconvincing ftom its end, Perhaps the foregoing remarks contribute to clarifying the reasons for two notable features of ethnomethodolagy’s relations with the rest of sociology. Altogether, they suggest that the ¢wo are at work on very different levels, and that i¢ is therefore ill advised to turn ¢o ethnomethodology looking for rival and better solutions to soci- ology’s standard problems, and even more misguided to criticise it for failing to answer those problems. Secondly, if the argument about the necessity of a ‘gestalt switch’ is right, they suggest why the adoption of one or other of the standard sociological positions may be inimical co an understanding of ethnomethodology (for itis surely noticeable to us that work which is created, hy people from ather disciplines as reasoned, reasonable, possibly interesting, and cer- ainly legitimate in its own terms, is treated by many sociologists as though ic could not conceivably be any of thase things) The greatest burden under which ethnomethodologists have to labour is that of the criticisms which just will not go away, the criticisms which (in my opinion) comprise the ritual affirmations of difference, highlighting the fact that ethnomethodology (intention: ally) does not share the central preoccupations that motivate other sociologists, and does not put in central place its own machinery, those conceptions which are pivotal to their own, These criticisns most usually crystallise around issues of voluntarism and constraint, structure and agency. Sociologists more generally are in disagree- ment as to what proportionate contributions the ‘individual’ and the ‘social structure’ make in che determination of outcomes, the extent (o which social actors are free to choose theit courses of action and to which they are restricted and controlled by factors which are, pethaps, beyond their ken, Sociologists more generally disagree about the extent to which the individual is free to pursue ends, and they disagree, too, about the extent to which one standpoint or another does allow the actor freedom, relative to the amount persons are supposed to have ‘in reality.’ Its not a disagreement between (say) marxists and ethnomethodologists, for ic is a matter of disagreement amongst marxists themselves, There are marxists who think that human beings have a great deal of freedom to choose what they will do, and to determine outcomes, and are worried that670 Wes Sharrock ‘marxist writings sometimes give the impression that individuals are entirely determined by objective social conditions. Ethnomethod- ology is recruited into this disagreement, and is allocated (for various reasons} to the ‘voluntarist’ camp, is indeed counted the most extreme variant of this, apparently acknowledging no con- straints on individual action. Though Durkheim is otherwise in bad repute amongst many sociologists, there are very many who nevertheless honour his advice to ‘creat social facts as things’, accepting Durkheim's eriterion for the identification of a fact, viz, externality and constraint. Ethno- methodology is known to dissent from Durkheim's programme, particularly on the issue of social facts, which means that if Durkheim insists there are social facts, then ethonomethodology must be saying that there are not, Putting what might be two cogether with something else that might be two, many critics manage in any case to get five, and the next thing you know, ethnomethod- ology is a species of idealism, denying that there is anything which exists outside the individual human mind. Over and over, the transparency of the fact that people can’t just do what they want is cited in criticism of ethnomethodology, as though it were a point that we didn’t know about (which, if that were so, would surely reflect back upon its supposed transparency) ‘The first trouble with these kinds of criticism is chat too much is taken for granted in their making, that the basic agenda for sociological theorising is treated as already defined, when it is open for debate, and as if it were defined in just those ways to which ethoomethodology takes exception. The voluntarism/constraint and, steucture/agency dichotomies are treated as parameters of social theory, as givens within which all sociologists must locate themselves {another parameter being the individual oonsciousness/external world contrast). Though these may have an important role in formulating the disputes of philosophy over a long period, before being adopted by sociologists, there is no reason why ethnomethod- ologists should site their own work within those dichotomies, when they can treat those matters (oo as topics rather than conditions of their inquiries, It is, after all, the case that within society the diserimination of what someone did from what happened to them, of situations where they could do what they liked from those in which they had complete freedom of manoeuvre, in which they were doing what they wanted as opposed to acting out what they were required, even compelled, to do is routine everyday business. ‘The temptation is to say that ‘finding voluntarism and constraint’ or ‘identifying agency and structure’ or ‘distinguishing individual consciousness from external constraint’ are things which the members of society themselves go in for, except that this is probably not a really adequate formulation, for these philosophically derived phrasesEthnomethodelogy on cannot be expected properly to characterise the things people in their mundane environments ate up to when they ate, say trying to work out which of two conflicting witnesses is making it up and which is reporting how things really were, or where one person is trying to persuade another that, much as they'd like to, they just can't go out to the movies tonight. However, its not ethno- methodology's project to insist upon the sorting aut of sociology’s problems in terms of such categorisations, and it might even suggest (certainly T would) that one big mistake is to expect a general answer to such questions, (0 hope to say — in a general way — whether people are free or are constrained, or in what proportions they are both. Whether one can or not, though, it is possible to conceive a sociological strategy which does not atcempt on its own behalf to give general answers to such general questions. ‘The topic of ‘official statistics’ has been an eye catching one, and ‘once again, Durkheim has been at the heart of it, He is supposed to be criticised for relying on official statistics, for these are unsound in all kinds of ways that cthnomethodologists are supposed to have documented. An earlier point bears repetition, though: the methado- logical troubles of research are known to those wha do it, and che inadequacies of offical. statisties are well known to those who deal in them.? Pointing these out again. gives no news. Are there supposed to be things thar can be done to improve this situation, to ensure chat we can come up with an accurate count of suicidal deaths? No, the question chat cthnomethodology raises about Durkheim's Suicide and the conception of sociology it instantiates is: why on earth are we {as sociologists) attempting to decide how many people have died by suicide? What business is it of sociology's to count the number of suicides, and on what basis of socialogical knowledge could we possibly contribute to the determination of such figures? In a striking remark, though not one which has been much noticed since its publication in 1963, comes from Harvey Sacks ‘The crucial difficulty with Durkheim’s Suicide is not that he employs official statistics, but that he adapts for sociology the problems of practical cheory. ‘Suicide’ is a category of the natural language. It leads to a variety of practical problems, such as, for example, explaining particular suicides or explaining the variety of suicide rates, To say that Durkheim's error was to use official records rather than for example studying the variation in the reporting of suicide is to suppose that itis obvious that events occur which sacialogiste should consider ‘veally suicide? (emphasis added). (p. 8) ‘These words do not have scriptural status, and the role of the notion ‘of ‘practical theary' will be unclear co anyone who has not read the relevant paper (and probably to many wha have} but they are cited672 Wes Sharrock co show that there is, and long has been, a possible line of argument which does not go at all in the way in which ethnomethodology is widely imagined to. Durkheimian sociologists are necessarily concerned with the question ‘how many people of what kinds really died suicidally in this time period? but the ethnomethodologist’s complaint is not that they give a wrong answer, but that it is not the question they want to be asking. Ethnomethodologists have no answer to give to such a question on their own behalf.’ Sacks’ comment does not, of course, raise ontological questions about whether there really are suicides, such that we'd be getting into arguing that people in society who reported suicides were making them up, but asks instead about the utility and possible dispensibility of a notion of ‘really suicide’ for a sociological apparatus. Which brings us back, hopefully, to the Durkeimian insistance on ‘social facts’. If Durkheim says that ‘facts have two characteristics, that they are ‘external’ and ‘constraining’ then we apparently have two lines of ‘opposition to him open to us: we can either say that facts are not external and constraining, and that, therefore, social facts are not external and constraining, or we can agree with Durkheim that social facts are external and constraining, but say that in that case there can be no social facts, for social phenomena are not external and constraining. Ethnomethodology is varyingly seen to have taken either one or other of these courses so it either: (1) denies that social facts are things, and proposes instead that they are ‘interstibjective’ phenomena or (2) accepts that facts are external and constraining, but denies that there are any social facts, thus saying that society consists only of individuals and resides within their minds. OF course, there is another tack entirely, which is to avoid trying (0 say ‘what kinds of things ‘facts? are in the way Durkheim tries to do, and to go for something which is a banality bordering on a tautology, which is that facts are the things that fact finding procedures find. jince there is not much room for subtlety here, I make a rough and ready formulation, disavowing, as I do, any supposition that I am thereby relativistically endorsing any and all supposed ‘fact finding’ procedures. It might be as well to adopt the convention which obtained in ethnomethodology’s earlier days, of bracketing expres- sions in quotation marks, thus letting me say that ‘facts’ are those. which ‘face finding’ procedures ‘find’. Thereby one indicates not an all round endorsement of everyone’s proposals, but an attitude of neutrality requisite to the description of the diverse ways in which people in society go about finding out what is the case, the objective. being — of course — to find out about the practical organisation of “fact finding’ activities {without regard for their epistemological bona fides.) An interest in how suicides are identifed and suicide rates assembled displaces any concern to say how many suicides thereEthrametbodolegs 673 really are, and such a displacement occurs across the whole range of Copics in which other sociologists are actively concerned to establish ‘the actual facts’. In so far as sociologists are engaged in “face finding’ exercises of such sorts, then they are naturally of interest to ‘cthnomethodology as occasion for investigation into the practical social organisation of fact finding activities, but such a point of view toward them implies absolutely no cornment on the worth of such an. ‘enterprise, positive or negative, any more than i¢ does on the warth ‘of divination or theoretical physies. Rather than affirming or denying the existence of Durkheimian social facts, we get round ¢o treating Durkheimian social facts as the facts that Durkheimian sociological iquiries find {in inverted commas, of course). Putting things polemically, (and methodologically, not metaphysically}, let me say that from this point of view the social facts are neither ‘in the head" cr ‘out in the world? but entirely ‘within the (socially organised) practices by which they are assembled’. The routine attempts 10 force on ethnomethodology a choice between the two standard alternatives simply ignores the fact that it has stepped right outside the framework in which that choice makes sense. No more than usual do T suggest that all misunderstandings are the fault of, or unique to, the critics of ethnomethodology, for 1 have no doubt that there are ethnomethodologists who want to remain within the framework of the received alternatives (or who don’t see that one can get outside them) and consequently think that to dissent from sociological positions which premise themselves in asserting the external, constraining character of social fact, you have to go against their premise, and chat the only way to do so is to deny it ‘The influence of studies of conversation as models for ethno methodological inquiry means that the stereotypical study in ethnomethodology will feature a transcript and will engage in analysing its formal features, giving the impression that ethno- methodology’s studies are essentially of the organisation of social interaction, This poses that other question that won't go away: it is all very well analysing social situations bur what about the ‘teans- situational environment? (to use an expression which unjustifiably presumes a ‘situational’/‘crans-situational’ concrast.) Garfinkel him- self talks about the ‘local production’ of social order as ethnomethodo- logy's concern,” but this does not at all equate with the description of social interaction, though the organisation of the particular interaction, might be one aspect of the production of such order. There are other studies in ethnomethadology than studies of conversation, and the existence of the latter should at least serve clearly to correct the impression that may be wrongly drawn from the conversational cones, for the foci of many of those studies are not situations but sites, locations such as the street, the courtroom, the classroom, the air traffic control ops room, the paediatric clinic, a medium sized674 Wes Sharrock catering firm etc. and so forth, and the concern is not with formal, interactional aspects of those sites but with the concerted conduct of their business, with the management of pedagogy, the maintenance of safe air traffic flow, the administration of medical treatment, the delivery of catering services in a way that secures profits and so forth, earlier remarked that the trouble with the sociological search for generalities was that this was conducted at the expense of the particularities of the phenamena materials from which the generalities were purportedly drawn. Such generalities as are gencrated tend to divest the phenomena of the things which comprise their very identity as the everyday affairs that they are. This is, of course, a virtue in che eyes of those seeking such generalities, but it cannot be in chose like mine which are interested in preserving the ‘everyday character’ of the phenomenon in its analysis, Sociological studies frequently involve ‘a change of subject.’ Thus, ane sees the title of a paper about translation. One hopes it will be about people making translations but is realistic enough to expect that it will scarcely discuss that at all, primarily being about the need for seeing translation as an instance of stack sociological preoccupations, which nowadays are power, domination ete. [ never make the supposition that other people should share my dissatisfactions, so I certainly don’t imply that talk about power, domination and the rest is nat worthwhile, its simply that i’s not the reconceiving of commonplace activities in terms of sociological abstraction that I’m looking for. What I am looking for are sociological studies (which it is neither unreasonable nor necessarily irrelevant to want) which do talk about translation as such, and not (say) translation as a method of imposing domination on. It is only ethnomethodology which seriously attempts to do this, to make it a sociological affair to analyse ‘classroom instruction in science’ or “textbook instruction in maths’? without wanting to turn i¢ into ‘social control_in the classroom’ or ‘cultural transmission through socialisation’, The arts involved in constructing these latter kinds of study will be just such as co ensure that the business of ‘science instruction’ or ‘intelligible exposition af mathematics’ will be left out of account. A striking feature of all kinds of sociological work is the difference bewteen programmes and studies. I recently came across the ‘expression ‘the cognitive science present tense’, used t0 note the way in which cognitive scientists talk about things they propose to do as if they could already do them. There is much of this in sociology’s programmatic discussions, and people talk as if their approach could actually do the things chat, programmatically, it is setting out to achieve. Studies are, as we all know, a very different matcer, for they almost always turn out to be (if you read the apologies, qualifications and reasoning carefully) prologomena to initial exploration in the direction of making a study of... ete. One of theEthnomethodalogy 675 reasons why I find theoreticism unappealing is because it shows little awareness of the thing that researchers of all sociological persuasions know, chat making studies work out to do what you want them to is really hard, and chat most studies are really first stabs at objectives they can't realistically be expected (0 realise. Given the way things work, they are usually first and last stabs. T did not expect ethnamethadology's work to meet anything other than the usual difficulties in moving from programme to inquiries, and so {with the ‘exception of studies in conversation, where the materials and topics have been worked over pretty thoroughly and where a cumulative course of inquiry was established) T can only recommend most studies as exploratory ventures into the largely unprecedented exercise of putting the mundane affairs of daily life — be they policework, management, teaching, laboratory work, dome: arrangements — at the centre of sociological investigation, attempt ing to contrive initial ways of describing the social organisation of those affairs. Thus, though relative to the number of people available to do them, the number and range of studies is gratifying, considered relative to the demands that ethnomethorology makes on itself, that volume of work achieves modest beginnings.® (Date accepted: Aptil 1989} Wes Sharrock Department of Sociology Uninessity of Manchester notes LAs is evidenced through four role of mathematics in the social sei- collections — Atkinson and Hlertage ences’ (1984) for 2 cnctectve. (1984), Buon, Drew and Heritage 9. Gasfakel’s "Good organisational (1986), Button’ and Lee (1987) and reasons for "bad” clinic records” (in Roger and Bull (1989), Studies ia Ethromtbadslogy (1967))_ prox "2 Srill the most perspicuos and vides not a callection of hicherto (and woefully seglected) example of unknown facts with such records, but what i¢ means 19 do this is D.L. depacts team che litany of Ganiliar Weider's “Language and Social Realy roubles with these sources. c1g74) 6. The ‘local production’ of social 3. For a critical eharacterisztion of order is nat equivalent (o ‘the pecduc: theareticism see Frederic Crews, ‘In the tion of loes| social geder’ ether. gad owe of thenry in hie Sia 7. or an unmaiictory ate at agement (1988) thie, see Shareock and Anderson (une 1) This dacs not imply any unrelent- published). ing hostiicy to mathematics in sock 8. Thanks to John Lee for com: ‘logy. See Thomas P- Wilson's ‘On the erents676 Wes Sharrock BIaLIoGRAPHY Anderson, D.C. 1978. ‘Some organisa- bridge University Pres. ‘ional (eatures in the local production of Blalock, HLM, 1963. Basic Dilarnes 2 plausible tex, Philawphy of the Seca! the Secal Scenes. Beverly Hills: Rustell Sed 6: 113-135, Sage. ‘Anderson, R.J., Hughes, JA, and Bution, G. (orthcoming (a)). ‘Some Sharrock W. W. 1987. ‘Executive prab-desigo Specifications for turns at tall in lem finding: some materials and iwitial a job interview’, ic P. Drew and J. C. observations’, Stil Prychalegy Quarterly Heritage, (eds), Pale and Work. 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