Changing ethnographic mediums: the place‐based contingency of smartphones and scratchnotes

Abstract

The medium by which ethnographic notes are taken within the field is changing. Increasingly researchers are turning to jotting short notes using smartphone notation apps, leaving pen and paper behind. While this has practical benefits, there is a need to recognise explicitly how the medium by which notes are taken can influence the content, style and practice of contemporaneous ethnographic note‐taking. There is a place‐based contingency to the acceptability of the smartphone as a research tool; phones carry different social connotations to paper notebooks, and can act to reinforce difference, making statements of privilege, power and culture. The medium by which fieldnotes are taken actively impacts the field and is capable of influencing relationships with participants and altering the power dynamic of research. The changing tools of note‐taking also result in a changing visibility of the act of writing, bringing additional challenges to managing consent and ensuring the ethicality of research.

“You don't want to peer over people's shoulders, it feels too rude!” The moral geographies of using participants’ personal smartphones in research

“…There has been a recent drive to adopt emergent mobile technologies, such as smartphones and tablets, into contemporary geographical research practice (DeLyser & Sui, ; Gorman, ), both in terms of self‐directed research (Neff & Nafus, ) and research[ing] with others (Brown et al., ; Laurier et al., ). Yet while advocates argue for the benefits of mobile technologies in generating understandings of, among other things, how people relate to technology, how technology might affect relationships with places and how researchers might capture “new” data in real time, the ethics and moralities of adopting technologies into research remain unclear.…”

The emotional entanglements of smartphones in the field: On emotional discomfort, power relations, and research ethics

“…We found participants expressed feelings of discomfort, extending to anxiety, circulating through moments of encounter when using the smartphone visibly and actively to collect visual data. When shooting videos, the local and place‐based context emotionally affected participants’ performance (see also Gorman, ). By design, the study app allowed participants to refrain from taking videos at any time, according to the specific situation and their own feelings.…”

“…Smartphones have extensively permeated various parts of our lives, including research practices. In social science, they have become increasingly used as research instruments for data collection (e.g., Gorman, ; Kuntsche & Labhart, ; Mitchell et al., ; Raento et al., ; Wilkinson, ). They are convenient and within a single multi‐media device replace diverse instruments such as pen and paper, dictaphones, and photo and video cameras.…”

“…They also facilitate interactive contact between researchers and participants (Kuntsche & Labhart, , ; Laurier et al., ). While the benefits of smartphones have been amply discussed as augmenting and refining research practices, more critical methodological discussions have recently arisen (e.g., Ergler et al., ; Gorman, ; Holton & Harmer, ). For example, Gorman (, p. 226) argues that smartphones are not “isolated artefacts” when used in fieldwork.…”

Smelling therapeutic landscapes: Embodied encounters within spaces of care farming

“…Such involved moving from seeing space as simply a backdrop or container within which disease and treatments occurred, to instead recognising space as being an active agent in itself, capable of transforming and contributing to health experiences (Kearns and Joseph, 1993). The conceptual framework of The apeuti La ds apes has esulted in a large and fruitful area of research which has critically explored the links between health and place in a wide variety of contexts, from beaches (Collins and Kearns, 2007) to baths (Gesler, 1998), hot springs (Serbulea and Payyappallimana, 2012) to hospitals (Kearns and Barnett, 1999). Milligan et al (2004) have noted that the opportunity for sensory experiences is particularly significant in enacting a therapeutic engagement with place.…”