Ethnography in ESL: Defining the Essentials

Ethnography has recently become fashionable in ESL, second language classroom, and educational research. But many studies bearing the name ethnographic are impressionistic and superficial rather than careful and detailed. This article addresses two questions: What is ethnography? And what can it do for us in ESL? Ethnography is defined, and some principles of quality ethnographic work are discussed, including the focus on behavior in groups, holism, emit-etic perspectives, comparison, grounded theory, and techniques of data collection and treatment. The promise of ethnography for research and for improving teaching and teacher training is then addressed.