I agree with you Carol. In addition what I see in Ed's post/response to me is an unexplored "ethnocentrism" of culture and behaviour - a universalizing of a (socio-culturally) located individual's idea of social ettiquette and feeling of "private space" (whether audio, visual or otherwise). And the ethnocentrism is an issue because when the research is written up, it will no doubt be written up as "objective" - a view from nowhere (but as we can see from this post quite clearly the starting point is *some* where). (note - ed - that was a public post - I as a researcher am free to analyse it out of context as I please - based on your own logic:)) Feminists and critical theorists have critiqued this approach to researching the Other for years. Further - an egocentric trap ALL of us researchers seem to frequently fall into is - to think that the researcher's notion (situated in a particular academic-temporal-cultural episteme of knowledge production) of the lone researcher out to excavate the TRUTH and validate/prove it by pointing to so-called empirical "data". Thus the overheard conversation is transformed into data to be used to elsewhere to justify some other policy for buying or selling or whatever. .... ... radhika At 10:03 PM 5/10/2004 -0500, you wrote:
ed wrote
I've always let the test be that I, as researcher, am out in the open in the plain view of the subject. If they are speaking loudly enough that I can hear without any special equipment, or effort, I treat the conversation as public talk freely available for analysis (and recording). In the case of the cell phone, I am not "tapping" the phone call illegally cause I can't hear the other side of the conversation. On May 10, 2004, at 6:35 AM, Radhika Gajjala wrote:
but you'd be amazed at how shocked they would be if they then saw their words quoted in a public(ation) text. But you'd be amazed at how shocked I am to have to listen to their talk in the first place. If the talk IS private, I should not be able to hear it without special equipment. If I can, it's not private talk, no matter what "they expect." The subjects set the expectations themselves. If they talk in a way that others in public can't hear . . . it's private. If they don't, it's public.
Please pardon what is probably a naiive comment, but it appears that the concepts of ethics are here conflated with an expectation of _politeness_ and an understandable annoyance at the intrusiveness of this rude public behavior. I am reminded, reading this very interesting discussion, of Japanese practices wherein one pretends not to hear. In fact, talking with a South Korean friend, she tells me that when two people are speaking, and one other enters the area, it's quite common that this third person would receive no greeting, and nor would one be expected. Space is so limited that this mutual pretense is (or had been) employed as a virtual wall of privacy. There appears to be a similar expectation in some areas of the web.
What is invaded is the Individual's *sense* of privacy - whatever the medium used.
Again. The sense of privacy has already been invaded. Not by the researcher . . . but by the subjects, themselves who have taken a private matter into the public domain. I agree that the medium doesn't matter . . . the fact that they are holding a small plastic device to the side of their head doesn't mean that I've got to go suddenly deaf and and become unable to write. But their carrying on their private business loudly in my knowing presence means that they have included me in the talk, albeit as audience, but as approved participant nevertheless.
I cannot agree with this. That we can hear it is annoying - but that we can record it appears intrusive. Using this argument, if I observed my neighbor telling off his kid - loudly - in the kitchen next door with the windows open, I should feel completely justified in doing what I wished with what I heard. Analysis is another story. All is setting, right? And certainly it would inform our more formal inquiry.
------------------------------------------------------------------- Carol Perryman Graduate School of Library & Information Science University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign cp1757@hotmail.com
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