Synopses & Reviews
Family and Work in Everyday Ethnography exposes the intimate relationship between ethnographers as both family members and researchers. The contributors to this exciting volume question and problematize the “artificial divide” between work and family that continues to permeate writing on ethnographic field work as social scientists try to juggle research and family tensions while “on the job.” Essays relate experiences that mirror work-family dilemmas that all employed parents face, and show how deeply personal experiences affect social scientists’ home life and their studies. Bringing together voices of various family members—pregnant women, mothers, fathers, and children—Family and Work in Everyday Ethnography demonstrates how the mixture of work and family in this particular occupation has raised questions—both practical and theoretical—that relate to race, class, and gender. Contributors include: Chris Bobel, Erynn Masi de Casanova, Randol Contreras, C. Aiden Downey, Tanya Golash-Boza, Steven Gold, Sherri Grasmuck, Barbara Katz Rothman, Jennifer Reich, Leah Schmalzbauer, Gregory Smithsimon, and the editors.
About the Author
Tamara Mose Brown is Assistant Professor of Sociology and Program Director of Caribbean Studies at Brooklyn College, City University of New York. She is author of Raising Brooklyn: Nannies, Childcare, and Caribbeans Creating Community. Joanna Dreby is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University at Albany, State University of New York. She is author of Divided by Borders: Mexican Migrants and their Children.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments I Parenting and Fieldwork: Introduction 1. Work and Home (Im)Balance: Finding Synergy through Ethnographic Fieldwork Joanna Dreby and Tamara Mose Brown 2. Theorizing the Field: Beyond Blurred Boundaries and into the Thick of Things Barbara Katz Rothman II Experiences of the Expecting 3. Sociological Pregnancy: On Gestating Research, Writing, and Offspring Erynn Masi de Casanova 4. Emerging Breasts, Bellies, and Bodies of Knowledge: How Pregnancy and Breastfeeding Matter in Fieldwork Jennifer A. Reich III Managing Mothers 5. The Intimate Ties between Work and Home Joanna Dreby 6. Motherhood and Transformation in the Field: Reflections on Positionality, Meaning, and Trust Leah Schmalzbauer 7. Parents and Children, Research and Family, Life and Loss: Living the Questions of Doing Ethnography Chris Bobel IV Tentative Fathering 8. Passing as a Parent: Playground Fieldwork in the Shadow of the World Trade Center Gregory Smithsimon 9. Making Up for Lost Time: My Son, My Fieldwork, My Life Randol Contreras 10. Kids Change Everything: How Becoming a Dad Transformed My Fieldwork (and Findings) Charles Aiden Downy V Challenging Children 11. Fourteen Months, Four Countries, and Three Kids: Tales from the Field Tanya Golash-Boza with Raymi Boza, Soraya Boza, and Tatiana Boza 12. Reflections on Ethnographic Childhoods Steven J. Gold 13. Just Dont Take Notes at Any of My Games or Do Anything Weird”: Ethnography and Mothering across Adolescence Sherri Grasmuck Contributors Index