HISTORICAL ORIGINS Early period: 1890–1930

HISTORICAL ORIGINS Early period: 1890–1930

During the last years of the nineteenth century and the first decades of this century, as social issues became topics of academic study, virtually all research was qualitative in nature. This is evident in early classic works by Weber, Durkheim, Simmel, and others (for references to key texts, see Berger and Berger, 1976:26–55). As academic specializations were defined and university departments created, qualitative methods gained a solid foothold. Several factors may explain this emphasis. First, there was still a strong affiliation of social science with the mode of investigation utilized in philosophy and the humanities. Second, the social sciences were young and searching for global, overall perspectives; the essay format was more suitable to this task than that of the contemporary research article. Finally, what eventually became known as “the scientific method” had yet to be fully developed and applied to the social sciences.

The emphasis on qualitative research was especially evident in anthropology. Although methodological diversity in the discipline has since developed (see Sanday, 1983), the qualitative emphasis has continued to this day. The contributions of Malinowski (1922), Boas (1940), and Radcliffe-Brown (1952) were particularly influential in determining how field studies were conducted. Malinowski (1922:25) is credited with encouraging first-hand observation in an effort “to grasp the native’s point of view, his relation to life, to realize his vision of his world,” even though, on later publication of Malinowski’s diaries, it appeared that he himself had difficulty putting this principle into practice (Malinowski, 1967).

In this early period, qualitative field research was introduced to sociology in the USA, and pioneering work was conducted at the University of Chicago. Founded in 1892, the sociology department there—then combined with anthropology—came to be known as the “Chicago School.” In the early decades of this century, it was to have major impact on the discipline. Under the influence of W.I. Thomas, Ernest Burgess, and Robert Park, a concerted academic enterprise developed around the study of urban life. Early Chicago studies concentrated on deviant groups in the city: hobos (Anderson, 1923), gangs (Thrasher, 1927), criminals (Sutherland, 1937). Other scholars at the university introduced community studies, later known as urban ethnography. Polish immigrants to the city were the subject of a

Social science inquiry 47

momumental study (Thomas and Znaniecki, 1918–20), and the structure of small-town community life was also explored (Lynd and Lynd, 1929). A third, later cluster of studies examined professional life—the police (Westley, 1951), businessmen (Dalton, 1959), teachers (Becker, 1951), and doctors (Hall, 1944).

The Chicago School was the home of a long list of prolific sociologists, but the contributions of one stand out: Robert E.Park. Having worked for some time as a journalist, he retained interest in the media as institutions within society. In a collection of essays on the city (Park et al., 1925), Park contributed a piece entitled “The natural history of the newspaper” (reprinted in Schramm, 1960). Although without empirical data supporting his interpretation of the place of print media in a historical process, the piece does exemplify Park’s concern for newspapers in the context of city and community. This concern was also evident in his study of the immigrant press (Park, 1922) in which

he examined the function of newspapers among European immigrants. Frequent reference has been made to Park’s recommendation that social scientists imitate the work routine of newspaper reporters. His instruction to a student about to begin a research project was, “Write down what you see and hear; you know, like a newspaper reporter” (quoted in Kirk and Miller, 1986:40). Implicit in this recommendation is the assumption that the discernment of “facts” is unproblematic, and that facts can be gathered and analysed straightforwardly. This position, not surprisingly, has since been challenged and modified, emphasis now being placed on the social construction of “facts” (see van Maanen, 1988:18).

Another bit of advice Park is said to have stressed was to leave the protected confines of the university and to explore the city:

Go and sit in the lounges of the luxury hotels and on the doorsteps of the flophouses; sit on the Gold Coast settees and on the slum shakedowns; sit in the Orchestra Hall and in the Star and Garter Burlesk. In short, gentlemen, go get the seats of your pants dirty in real research.

(quoted in McKinney, 1966:71)

Park’s emphasis here on first-hand observation is often taken as evidence that the Chicago School practiced what is currently known as participant observation. Even though many Chicago sociologists became intimately familiar with the cultures studied, they seldom

48 A handbook of qualitative methodologies

participated in those cultures as researchers. Most early Chicago studies relied on document analysis. In only two studies—Cressy’s (1932) on dance halls and Anderson’s (1923) on hobos—is there explicit reference to participant observation as a method of data collection, and even then there is limited explication of how the method was employed (Hammersley, 1989:1–84). Harvey (1987:50) suggests that it is misleading to consider these studies forms of participant observation as the term is now employed. (For another perspective on the place of participant observation in Chicago School research, see Chapter 3, note 2, by Tuchman in this book.)

Members of the Chicago School also conducted communication research on the effects of films on children. In the late 1920s, Herbert Blumer and Philip Hauser were commissioned by the Motion Picture Research Council to investigate the relationship between film and delinquency. As part of the so-called Payne Fund Studies (the agency which financed the research for the Council), two monographs were produced (Blumer, 1933; Blumer and Hauser, 1933; see also Blumer, 1935, reprinted in Short, 1971). This work exemplifies several aspects of the Chicago heritage. Both research projects were intended to “capture the attitudes or perspectives which mediate the effects of objective factors, in this case of films” (Hammersley, 1989:89). The studies were exploratory in nature, with minimal methodological explication. There was heavy use of interviews and life histories, and little attention was given to data collection through participant observation.

The debate on social-scientific methodologies in the USA in the 1930s and 1940s also came to include a number of immigrants from Europe, representing different theoretical and political orientations. One group included refugees from the Frankfurt School (see Jay, 1973); their approaches comprised particularly qualitative textual analysis and historical studies (see Chapter 6 by Larsen in this volume). Another orientation was later to be developed into a mainstream of American communication research methodology by Paul F.Lazarsfeld and his collaborators, thus superseding the positions both of the Chicago School and of critical theory.

Indeed, during the period of these debates and studies, the application of quantitative methods increased. As others have noted (Bulmer, 1984; Harvey, 1987), there was never antipathy toward statistics at Chicago; quantitative methods were often employed alongside qualitative ones. But, by the 1930s a separate division with

a quantitative orientation had developed at Chicago, and the

Social science inquiry 49

methodological debate then emerging across the nation began to take explicit and emotional form.