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‘But Anyway … You Know How It Is, How Things Go’: The Value of Group Interpretation Settings in Understanding Researcher Positionality During Insider Research

image of ‘But Anyway … You Know How It Is, How Things Go’: The Value of Group Interpretation Settings in Understanding Researcher Positionality During Insider Research

Drawing on my semi-structured interviews and ethnographic participant observation, this paper is a methodological musing on a research project examining the musical practices of cover bands and how they balance values of creativity and professionalism in their performances and “behind the scenes” management. The core of this chapter focuses on the development of a systematic approach to exploring the insider researcher's subjective positionality as a researcher and vocalist. With the aim of uncovering “blind spots”, such as preconceived assumptions, I advocate group interpretation settings as a methodical tool for strengthening (self-)reflexivity in qualitative ethnographic research ‘from the inside’. I explain and demonstrate how during group sessions I analyse interview transcripts and practice self-observation together with interdisciplinary peers who are not insiders to this field. This layered, analytical approach opens up possibilities for alternative, even contradictory, ways of interpreting my data and positionality.

Keywords: cover bands ; creativity ; ethnography ; group analysis ; group interpretation settings ; insider research ; jazz studies ; music-sociology ; musical practices ; participant observation ; popular music studies ; professionalism ; qualitative interviews ; researcher positionality

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References

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References

  1. Adler, Patricia A. and Adler, Peter (1987), ‘Membership roles in field research’, Sage University Paper series on qualitative research methods, series 6, Newbury Park: Sage.
     [Google Scholar]
  2. Appen, Ralf von, Doehring, André, Helms, Dietrich and Moore, Allan F. (eds) (2015), Song Interpretation in 21st-Century Pop Music, Farnham, MD: Ashgate.
     [Google Scholar]
  3. Barz, Gregory F. and Cooley, Timothy J. (eds) (2008), Shadows in the Field: New Perspectives for Fieldwork in Ethnomusicology, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  4. Becker, Howard S. (1951), ‘The professional dance musician and his audience’, American Journal of Sociology, 57:2, pp. 136–44.
     [Google Scholar]
  5. Becker, Howard S. (1963), Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance, New York: The Free Press of Glencoe.
     [Google Scholar]
  6. Becker, Howard S. (1974), ‘Art as collective action’, American Sociological Review, 39:6, pp. 767–76.
     [Google Scholar]
  7. Bennett, Andy (2017), ‘Ethnography, popular music and religion’, in C. Partridge and M. Moberg (eds), The Bloomsbury Handbook of Religion and Popular Music, London: Bloomsbury Academic, pp. 13–22.
     [Google Scholar]
  8. Bergen, Nicole and Labonté, Ronald (2020), ‘“Everything is perfect, and we have no problems”: Detecting and limiting social desirability bias in qualitative research’, Qualitative Health Research, 30:5, pp. 783–92.
     [Google Scholar]
  9. Bergmann, Jörg (2004), ‘Ethnomethodology’, in U. Flick, E. v. Kardorff and I. Steinke (eds), A Companion to Qualitative Research, London: Sage, pp. 72–80.
     [Google Scholar]
  10. Born, Georgina (2012), ‘Music and the social’, in M. Clayton, T. Herbert and R. Middleton (eds), The Cultural Study of Music: A Critical Introduction, 2nd ed., Abingdon: Routledge, n.pag.308
     [Google Scholar]
  11. Buscatto, Marie (2021), ‘Practising reflexivity in ethnography’, in D. Silverman (ed.), Qualitative Research, Los Angeles, CA: Sage, pp. 147–62.
     [Google Scholar]
  12. Charmaz, Kathy (2014), Constructing Grounded Theory, 2nd ed., London: Sage.
     [Google Scholar]
  13. Chou, Chiener (2002), ‘Experience and fieldwork: A native researcher's view’, Ethnomusicology, 46:3, pp. 456–86.
     [Google Scholar]
  14. Cohen, Sara (1991), Rock Culture in Liverpool: Popular Music in the Making, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  15. Cohen, Sara (1993), ‘Ethnography and popular music studies’, Popular Music, 12:2, pp. 123–38.
     [Google Scholar]
  16. Doehring, André (2015), ‘Andrés's “New For U”: New for us. On analysing electronic dance music’, in R. v. Appen, A. Doehring, D. Helms and A. F. Moore (eds), Song Interpretation in 21st-Century Pop Music, Farnham: Ashgate, pp. 133–55.
     [Google Scholar]
  17. Doehring, André and Ginkel, Kai (2019), ‘Musicological group analysis (MGA): Conceptional basics and rough guide’, unpublished working paper in the context of the research project Popular Music and the Rise of Populism in Europe, VW-Project Funding Reference: 94 754, Graz.
     [Google Scholar]
  18. Doehring, André, Ginkel, Kai and Krisper, Eva (2021), ‘Remixes. Remix. Popular music research. Potentials for methodological redesign’, in K. Kärki (ed.), Turns and Revolutions in Popular Music. Proceedings from the XX Biennial Conference of IASPM, Canberra, Australia, 24–28 June 2019, Turku: International Institute for Popular Culture, http://iipcblog.wordpress.com/publications/. Accessed 23 October 2021.
     [Google Scholar]
  19. Faulkner, Robert R. and Becker, Howard S. (2009), Do You Know …? The Jazz Repertoire in Action, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  20. Fine, Gary A. and Abramson, Corey M. (2020), ‘Ethnography in the time of COVID-19’, Footnotes: A Publication of the American Sociological Association, 48:3, pp. 8–9.
     [Google Scholar]
  21. Finnegan, Ruth (1998), The Hidden Musician: Music-Making in an English Town, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  22. Flick, Uwe (2005), Qualitative Sozialforschung. Eine Einführung, Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt.
     [Google Scholar]
  23. Frith, Simon (2014), ‘Musical creativity as a social fact’, in A. Barber-Kersovan, V. Kirchberg and R. Kuchar (eds), Music City: Musikalische Annäherungen an die ‘kreative Stadt’, Bielefeld: Transcript, pp. 45–59.
     [Google Scholar]
  24. Garfinkel, Harold (ed.) (1986), Ethnomethodological Studies of Work, London and New York: Routledge.
     [Google Scholar]
  25. Geertz, Clifford (ed.) (1973), ‘Thick description: Toward an interpretive theory of culture’, The Interpretation of Cultures, New York: Basic Books, pp. 3–30.
     [Google Scholar]
  26. Haraway, Donna (1988), ‘Situated knowledges: The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective’, Feminist Studies, 14:3, pp. 575–99.
     [Google Scholar]
  27. Hesmondhalgh, David and Baker, Sarah (2011), Creative Labour: Media Work in Three Cultural Industries. Culture, Economy, and the Social Series, London: Routledge.
     [Google Scholar]
  28. Hirschauer, Stefan (2001), ‘Ethnografisches Schreiben und die Schweigsamkeit des Sozialen. Zu einer Methodologie der Beschreibung’, Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 30:6, pp. 429–51.309
     [Google Scholar]
  29. Holmes, Andrew G. D. (2020), ‘Researcher positionality: A consideration of its influence and place in qualitative research – A new research guide’, Shanlax International Journal of Education, 8:4, pp. 1–10.
     [Google Scholar]
  30. Kaden, Christian and Kalisch, Volker (eds) (1999), Professionalismus in der Musik: Arbeitstagung in Verbindung mit dem Heinrich-Schütz-Haus Bad Köstritz vom 22. bis 25. August 1996 (= Musik-Kultur 5), Essen: Die Blaue Eule.
     [Google Scholar]
  31. Merton, Robert K. (1972), ‘Insiders and outsiders: A chapter in the sociology of knowledge’, American Journal of Sociology, 78:1, pp. 9–47.
     [Google Scholar]
  32. Moore, Allan F. (2012), Song Means: Analysing and Interpreting Recorded Popular Song, Farnham: Ashgate.
     [Google Scholar]
  33. Nettl, Bruno (ed.) ([1983] 2015a), ‘You will never understand this music: Insiders and outsiders’, in The Study of Ethnomusicology: Thirty-Three Discussions, 3rd ed., Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, pp. 157–68.
     [Google Scholar]
  34. Nettl, Bruno (ed.) ([1983] 2015b), ‘You call that fieldwork? Redefining the field’, in The Study of Ethnomusicology: Thirty-Three Discussions, 3rd ed., Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, pp. 199–210.
     [Google Scholar]
  35. Pfadenhauer, Michaela and Dieringer, Volker (2019), ‘Professionalität als institutionalisierte Kompetenzdarstellungskompetenz’, in M. Pfadenhauer and C. Schnell (eds), Handbuch Professionssoziologie, Wiesbaden: Springer, pp. 1–21.
     [Google Scholar]
  36. Reckwitz, Andreas (2002), ‘Toward a theory of social practices: A development in culturalist theorizing’, European Journal of Social Theory, 5:2, pp. 243–63.
     [Google Scholar]
  37. Reckwitz, Andreas (2012), Die Erfindung der Kreativität: Zum Prozess gesellschaftlicher Ästhetisierung, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp.
     [Google Scholar]
  38. Reichertz, Jo and Bettmann, Richard (2018), ‘Interpretationsgruppen oder: Gemeinsam interpretieren als komplexer Kollaborationsprozess’, in R. Keller and A. Poferl (eds), Wissenskulturen der Soziologie, Weinheim and Basel: Beltz Juventa, pp. 289–301.
     [Google Scholar]
  39. Schatzki, Theodore R. (2002), The Site of the Social: A Philosophical Account of the Constitution of Social Life and Change, University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press.
     [Google Scholar]
  40. Stock, Jonathan P. J. and Chou, Chiener (2008), ‘Fieldwork at home’, in G. F. Barz and T. J. Cooley (eds), Shadows in the Field: New Perspectives for Fieldwork in Ethnomusicology, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 108–24.
     [Google Scholar]

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