The Uses of Observation in French Sociology

Abstract

Until quite recently, questionnaire surveys, semi‐structured interviews and the gathering and interpreting of various documents have been the main kinds of empirical research to be found in French sociology. Observation plays a leading role in none of them, even in the latter. The researchers who use it do not seem convinced of its legitimacy, because what can be expected from systematic observation does not fit the prevailing purpose of developing abstract, general theories. After having sketched out the institutional and intellectual background, this paper examines a few examples of French studies using observation. Most of them fail to clearly distinguish between indirect evidence and direct observation, between meaning as construed by the observer and that experienced by the people observed; they rarely report dated and situated facts (even more seldom behaviors than settings), and they replace the expected analyses of these missing facts with the interpretation of would‐be typical or usual facts.

La infancia contemporánea: Sociologie de l’enfance y Childhood Studies Introducción, antología de textos, conceptos fundamentales y entrevistas

“…Para abordar a este niño y captar su agency, los métodos son claramente, en un primer momento, prestados por la antropología; dado que la sociología se encuentra desprovista cuando la infancia llega a sus terrenos y, aún más, cuando la observación en esta área fue, durante mucho tiempo, considerada como carente de un papel primario o ancilar de delimitación del terreno o de ilustración (Chapoulie y Briand, 1991;Peneff, 2010;Sirota, 2010) con relación a una verdadera administración de la prueba. Doble dificultad, doble indignación a vencer; método menor yobjeto menor se conjugaron en la ignorancia sociológica sobre la infancia.…”