Hi Erik,

I used Facebook for an undergraduate paper investigating the way in which university students use Facebook as a way to create and maintain social relationships (friendships, acquaintances, contacts). I interviewed students about their use of Facebook in creating and maintaining friendships, such as when they would/would not add somebody, how many interactions would be necessary before adding them, whether meeting face-to-face was necessary or whether it could be used just as a contact machine (similarly to LinkedIn), who they thought they spoke to the most and for what reasons (finding out location of friends, discussing work, procrastinating, sharing articles, social chat, etc). I then used an app within Facebook itself called Message Counter (which records how many messages you have sent to different friends) to compare the results of who informants thought they spoke to the most and who they actually spoke to the most. I then used a programme called Wolframalpha which analyses Facebook profiles to see which words are most commonly used (eg. if an informant reported talking to most people about work but the most common words were about sports) and their activity patterns of posting/friend adding/etc.

Consent was required before the interview to discuss the project, and again before the informant's profile was run through the Wolframalpha and Message Counter programmes.

I would say Facebook has a huge potential for ethnographic research as it's a platform of communication used by millions of people daily. There's huge potential for excellent studies into the impact of online communication:

• interpersonal communication - damaging or transformative? Now if someone writes a letter, it is considered a personal and meaningful act because it takes so much longer and much more consideration than an email. Facebook is a great platform to arrange social events, but also reduces the necessity to physically interact with people such as making a phone call or talking over the fence.
• social practice theory - how Facebook is becoming part of a daily routine for some people (student procrastination; morning check of messages alongside emails and news...)
• 6 degrees of separation - probably far smaller
• cyberbulling and the assumption of invincibility through apparent anonymity
• the paradox between becoming physically distant from neighbours but can communicate with people on the other side of the world at any time
• the blurred lines between public and private lives on the internet
• Etc.

Feel free to use my comments - let me know if I can help further.

Kirstie Bransfield-Garth

Please Kirstie Bransfield-Garth would like to send me your paper it seems very interresting

Hi Kirstie,

Thanks so much for your reply! Could you post a copy of your paper, I would love to get a copy. I will definitely include your reply in my workshop presentation and make sure to cite you.

All the best,

Erik

Hi Kirstie,

As Erik and Tarek, I would love a copy of your paper, if possible.  I am researching a group of baby-boomers who use Linkedn instead. Nevertheless, your paper will provide me with useful concepts on how they make decisions online. Yours would for sure be in my bibliography.  You could contact me at [email protected]

Best regards

Jaime

Hi Erik, I have recently been completing a PhD about complementary medicine use among poor/low-income people in a rural community, who couldn't afford practitioner fees (in the private sector), in contrast to public funded biomedicine. I did a lot of anthropological "participant observation" methodology, as well as quite a lot of interviews, and found that Facebook was a really fantastic way of keeping up with local events that a lot of my potential interviewees would attend. This was particularly good because a lot of single mums in the area, and people in general with alternative worldview as well, use Facebook regularly and maintain quite a few of their social connections by chatting with friends on Facebook (Australians seem to be more into Facebook than Twitter, although both Twitter and LinkedIn are growing). It was also good because people who convene or coordinate public events (e.g. green forest meetings/protests) and community arts events (e.g. choirs, community celebrations and anniversaries, dramatic performances, alternative film screenings, etc), advertise mainly on Facebook in addition to local posters, etc. I didn't include information from Facebook in my thesis, and didn't seek ethics clearance to use it, but I did mention/acknowledge it as a source of information, and did find it very helpful for keeping up with local goings-on in a relatively quiet community situated in a usually cool climate place, where many people are unemployed and often just stay at home a lot. Also, I feel that many of the research participants I was aware of who used Facebook tended to cultivate local and/or like-minded friendships via this medium, and didn't just have distanced relationships all over the globe. It appeared to be a very positive medium for most of them, despite some grumbles about Facebook policies or the time they'd wasted on there (they weren't teenagers, and usually were not employed, so in both cases it couldn't be said to have caused them to be excessively distracted or procrastinating in order to avoid their workload). I hope this helps a bit!

I know these works: 

http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/274/601

http://www.cuhk.edu.hk/ant/hka/vol2/Chapter2_2008.pdf

http://www.digital-ethnography.net/storage/MIA_ED_intro%201.pdf

Hi, I have this publication on RG, it´s in spanish but could be useful. If you need help with the translation, let me know. 

Best Regards 

Chapter Consideraciones a la Ciberetnografía: Una propuesta para el ...

Thanks Jorge for the links and Christian for your publication!

Hi Eric,

I have used Facebook as my fieldsite to study how individual users use the site in the context of cosmopolitan interactions and engagement. This is for my PhD research (Durham University) titled – “Rooted Muslim Cosmopolitanism: An Ethnographic Study of Malay Malaysian Students’ Cultivation and Performance of Cosmopolitanism on Facebook and Offline”. I was interested in finding whether cosmopolitanism can be cultivated and developed on Facebook and if so, how openness, flexibility and tolerance to cultural others are expressed on the site. I conducted observation on my participants’ open Facebook profile and those who have given me access to their Facebook as Friend. I found Facebook to be very useful not just as a research tool but as a research site too but there are a number of dilemmas associated with conducting research using/ on Facebook such as issue of privacy and positionalities. I have experienced these first hand. Hope this helps!

I had a student who did a paper on the performativity and negotiation of gender identity on Facebook. It was a great venue for research with extremely interesting results. The issue of consent has already been mentioned. Another important point to consider is a multi-methods approach that combines discourse analysis of Facebook content with in-depth interviewing via Skype or other platforms. Surveys via email also complement this nicely.

Hi Siti, Thanks so much for posting in response to my question. Your Ph.D. research sounds fascinating, I would love to read your dissertation. Were you interacting with Malay Malaysian students in Malaysia or more widely geographically distributed?

Hi Katya, Thanks so much for your reply and description of your student's research. How did they address issues of consent.

I agree that a multi-methods approach is probably best in using Facebook. I used focus groups to complement our on-line interaction. For me distance was not a challenge, since I was working with Kazakhs living in California. I just found Facebook a helpful way to join their network and interact with them.

My pleasure Erik: basically my student used an electronic billboard to announce his research plans and recruit participants. He was working on a very specific topic so he was able to go into discussion forums on this topic where he posted his call for research participants. Once he did this people contacted him via an email he created for the research project, and then he asked them to sign informed consents electronically (email is legally valid). Wishing you all the best with your project

I have not tried yet. Currently I am doing a study on Research Capabilities for undergraduate students in tertiary institutions, and I have thought of using face book in addition to my field work of meeting students in various tertiary institutions. Perhaps i will be able to send my face book experience in due course. 

I use it like Tass mentioned above -- great for keeping up with goings on at my field site and also for finding events/meeting people there as well as closer to other homes. I'm also thinking about doing something in my hometown, and the facebook activity I'm seeing there sounds a lot like Tass describes.

Will have to look up your workshop in the AAA schedules. My fieldsite is in Outer Mongolia (literally) so I would like to think more about using facebook/internet as a fieldsite more rigorously!

Hi Kathleen,

Thanks so much for your input. I am actually doing a workshop at the AAA Conference on Friday morning 9-11 a.m. I will talk about the topic, handout an annotated bibliography with a table of current research using Facebook, and then have participants share their plans with time allowed for feedback. A colleague has encouraged me to publish an article based on the workshop material.

May I include a summary of your research in my handout for the workshop?

Thanks again for your input!

Erik

I'm designing an intro course with some fieldwork exercises included... has anyone had students use social media for something like that?

Hi Kathleen,

Thanks for the complete citation. I will include it in the bibliography.

I am drafting my table of current and recent use of Facebook for the workshop. Which complementary ethnographic methods did you use in doing the field research?

Hi Marissa,

I would like to include your current research in my table for the "Utilizing Facebook for Ethnographic Research" Workshop. Can you provide more details about your research such as the topic and the methods that you are using. Also did you include use of Facebook in your IRB? Thanks!

Thanks for all who responded to my question! The workshop that I did at the American Anthropological Association went very well. We are considering organizing a panel on effective uses of Facebook for research for next year's conference.

Hi Erik,

I am happy to hear that your workshop was a success! I recently published a piece looking at the Facebook interactions of gay men and their religious family allies--it focuses on how Facebook can help facilitate the creation of a family of choice for those seeking social support.

I have attached it to this response for easy access--please dont hesitate to reach out with any questions!

Etengoff, C. & Daiute, C. (In Press). Online Coming Out Communications between Gay Men and their Religious Family Allies: A Family of Choice and Origin Perspective, Journal of GLBT Family Studies. doi: 10.1080/1550428X.2014.964442

CFP for American Anthropological Association Conference 2015: Effective Use of FaceBook for Ethnographic Research.

I need one more panelist who is doing IRB approved ethnographic research. If you have someone who might be interested, send them my way. Thanks!

Our panel of use of Facebook for ethnography was excellent. I plan to revise and post my conference paper soon. We are currently exploring publication options for our panel papers. I would welcome any suggestions.

Here is a description of the panel:

8:00 AM

Discussant

Heather A Horst (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology)

8:15 AM

The New Face of Ethnography: Utilizing Facebook As a Study Site on Adoptee Identity

Karen Lisa Deeming (University of California, Merced)

8:30 AM

Networking Boundaries: Facebook Practice and Otherkin Identity

Devin Proctor (George Washington University)

8:45 AM

Alterity and Narrative in Focus Groups and Follow up on Facebook

Erik A Aasland (Azusa Pacific University)

9:00 AM

Uncanny Seduction: Masculinity, Pickup Artists, and the Uses of Social Media in Social Skills Training Communities

Anders A Wallace (CUNY Graduate Center)

9:15 AM

More soon,

Erik

I have a copy of my presentation on FaceBook and sociality with my publications: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/301545381_Hospitality_is_Not_Sociality_Focus_Group_Follow_up_on_FaceBook.

Conference Paper Hospitality is Not Sociality: Focus Group Follow up on FaceBook

Great to hear that your workshop was a success!  I´m definitively going to read your conference paper. 

I have attached to this a paper that may be of interest to you. 

I'd like to know the results of Kirstie Bransfield-Garth research...seems like to be very interesting.

Regards