# TPS Coffee Chat

## Defining Institutional ethnography


Nader, Laura. 1969. “Up the Anthropologist: Perspectives Gained from Studying Up.” In Reinventing Anthropology. D. Hymes, ed. Pp. 285--‐311. New York: Pantheon Books.

Smith, Dorothy E. 2005. Institutional ethnography: a sociology for people. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press. Introduction

### Notes
- Definitions of ethnography
- Autoethnography --> applying ethnography for the self
- Institutional ethnography --> applying ethnography in the context of an institution (studying 'up' vs studying 'down')
- But what kind of institution are we talking about?
- Social norm that is an institution?
- A social grouping or classical understanding
- Can ethnographers be a part of every institution?
- You're not always going to discover what you want to discover...
- Participant observation
- Balcom, S., Doucet, S., & Dubé, A. (2021). Observation and Institutional Ethnography: Helping Us to See Better. Qual. Health Res., 31(8), 1534. doi: 10.1177/10497323211015966
- Ethnography of algorithms (algorithmic systems have a culture, have norms and values and ways of operating)
- Nick Seaver - https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2053951717738104
- https://socialmediacollective.org/reading-lists/critical-algorithm-studies/
- https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3357236.3395425 - autoethnographic work on algorithms and data
- The ethnographer and the algorithm: beyond the black box: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11186-020-09411-3
- Revolutionary mathmatics: https://www.versobooks.com/books/3897-revolutionary-mathematics
- Seaver, Nick. "What Should an Anthropology of Algorithms Do?". Cultural Anthropology 33, no. 3

**Part 2... Ethnography of algorithms!**

### Examples
* Regina F. Bendix. “The Power of Perseverance : Exploring Negotiation Dynamics at the World. Intellectual Property Organization.” In The Gloss of Harmony : The Politics of Policymaking in International Organizations, ed. Birgit Müller. London, Pluto Press, 2013.
* Bruno Latour. [Laboratory Life: The Social Construction of Scientific Facts](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_Life)
* Sheila Jasanoff, Designs on Nature: Science and Democracy in Europe and the United States. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005.
* Mosse, David. “Politics and Ethics: Ethnographies of Expert Knowledge and Professional Identities.” In, Cris Shore, Susan Wright, and Davide Però. Policy worlds: anthropology and the analysis of contemporary power. Eds, New York: Berghahn Books, 2011
* Knorr-Cetina, Karin. Epistemic Culture: How the Sciences Make Knowledge. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003. Chapter 3, “Particle Physics and Negative Knowledge.”
* Strathern M. 2000. Audit cultures : anthropological studies in accountability, ethics, and the academy. New York: Routledge. Introduction.
* Satu Teerikangas and Olivier Irrmann [Cultural Change Following International Acquisitions: Cohabiting the Tension Between Espoused and Practiced Cultures](https://www.jstor.org/stable/44985687)
* Gabriella Coleman( 2013). Coding freedom : the ethics and aesthetics of hacking (PDF). Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-14460-3.
* David Graeber. Direct Action: An Ethnography. Edinburgh; Oakland: AK Press. 2009. ISBN 978-1-904859-79-6.
* Karen Ho. Liquidated: An Ethnography of Wall Street.
* Christopher M. Kelty Two Bits: The Cultural Significance of Free Software and the Internet Durham: Duke University Press, 2008.

### Link List from chat
* https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/20/amanda-gorman-poem-biden-inauguration-transcript
* https://www.unhcr.org/uk/news/stories/2021/11/6188e6a44/poet-activist-emi-mahmoud-brings-voices-refugees-cop26.html
* [Against Method](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_Method) by Paul Feyerabend
* [Removal as a method](https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3357236.3395425) - understanding the impact of data/algorithms on the individual, using period tracking as an example
* Trust in numbers - Porter