Going There is not Being There

Here’s a wonderful little primer from students at ITT Institute of Design on how to do consumer ethnographic interviews, from on-the-street stops to on-site visits. Among a few other “pro” speakers, it features Dori Tunstall, an associate prof of Design Anthro at U of Chicago-Illinois. I’ve never met Dori, but am somewhat familiar with her from postings on the Anthro Design list. (As a side note, I’m still pissed at the list’s moderator for incorrectly suggesting that recruiting ethnographic subjects doesn’t validly fall into the domain of designing anthropology). It’s a pleasure to see Dori speak about ethnographic interviews with the ease of those profs I remember from my university days (David Turner, Ivan Kalmar, Richard Lee and a few others) whose knowledge of and empathy for their subject matter just rolls off the tongue. Too many university professors just straight up suck as teachers and, instead, collect their cheques on the merit of research and publishing. Dori sounds like the kind of prof that’s a pleasure to sit in on week after week. Anyway, enough about her. I was interested in the video, which is 30+ minutes long (yes, ethno takes time YouTube gen), for a number of reasons, some of which I can’t remember because the page of notes I took this week are sitting on my desk at work with other ethnographic ramblings I’m working through right now on kitchens, storytelling, life stages, wine and other client-centric musings. But what I can remember that I wanted to comment on was this:

1. Listening
It’s the most underrated skill there is in any kind of interview. Sure, you can go into the field with a list of questions in your head or on paper (my kitchen talk had over 33 themes to cover), but in the maelstrom of the process it all comes down to when they start talking you shut up and occasionally lead when there’s a noticeable pause. My dad was an award-winning journalist who interviewed Prime Ministers, Presidents, drug dealers, atheletes, priests, rich people, poor people and everyone in between because he knew how to write, how to ask and how to listen. From him I hope I’ve inherited the gift of limited gab.

2. The Philosophy
Near the front of the vid there’s mention of a philosophy behind ethnography. Unfortunately, the directors don’t really pursue this in any meaningful way, something I’m beginning to suspect many (if not most) of those in Design and Consumer Anthropology don’t have the time, leisure, inclination or, perhaps, moxy to address. Perhaps paying informants and having them sign a consent form is, in the minds of those pursuing design and consumption, all it takes to erase what academic anthropologists have been wringing their brains over since the post-colonial angst trend hit it big. (Then again, informants – and recruiting them – don’t seem to count for much in the way of designing anthropology for some, do they?) Anyway, I am worried about those practitioners who spend their time focusing so heavily on ethnography as a set of methods (good for adoption across disciplines, maybe bad for the subjects in question) at the expense of ethnography’s most philosophical intersections. It makes me wonder if Grant McCracken isn’t dead on when he promotes anthropology or bust. I mean, think about it. If I told Carl Craig that techno was 1. Detroit music 2. Inspired by mechanization and 3. Somewhere in the 125BPM range and higher, wouldn’t he just think I was a total knob. Techno, like ethnography, is the sum of its parts and so much more. Right Carl?

3. Being There vs. Going There
The field for cultivating consumer insights is littered with best practices, from focus groups to surveys to interviews to scanning brains. Everyone has to put on their best hustle to convince clients that what they do is the most nuanced, scientific, valuable, actionable and insightful. But let’s not fool ourselves. Dropping in to someone’s house for a few hours and interviewing them once or picking through their garbage to discover that they do indeed shop online (when they said they really didn’t) isn’t Being There. It’s Going There. For the life of me I couldn’t find the notes on my computer or a listing through Google or university library sites, but there’s an excellent ethnography of music by an anthropologist (whose name I can’t remember) who did his fieldwork on (I think) Ndembu drumming. If I remember correctly (and if you do, please remind me) it’s a very post-Victor Turner analysis that drives home the point that Being There (as Peter Sellers will tell you in the film) is not about physical space but psychological, social, personal self identification and immersion in process. In short, it’s about Becoming, Knowing, Feeling etc. I know it’s difficult with client budgets and multiple field sites on the go, but I’m not sure how many insights anyone is really providing clients on a project if everyone is convincing themselves that they somehow Become, Know or Feel their ethnographic subjects by sitting on their couch for an afternoon. That said, I’ve sat on a dozen or so couches this season trying to understand a single subject. The trick of cultivating real insights from such a series of experiences? I guess that’s a subject for another student video. This one, for all my bitching, is a great intro, well produced and, god forbid, will be ripe for the picking for all those focus group bitches trying to step up their game.

 

Sweet Spots

One of my ‘bosses’ (he’ll probably shudder when he reads that) is fond of referring to someone’s particular interest zone-cum-skill set as “your sweet spot.” Kinky, huh? Recently, he’s been luring me ever deeper into a few projects at Idea Couture Inc. with the temptation, “Morgan, this is really your sweet spot.” As someone who based his start-up partly on hiring an eclectic group of creatives, he definitely knows the value of drawing projects into our space (he’d definitely shudder if I called it an ‘office’), giving them a custom makeover and then harnessing the right person to lead them into development with the Charles Darwin treatment.

In the rapidly evolving and prototyping realm of Interaction, Innovation and Incubation (and the design, research, experience, interaction, strategy etc. etc. that bind its molecules), you might say that the sweet spot is akin to - if not the inspirational core of - the ‘creative type’ banter currently making the rounds in the current cultural cocktail party that bloggers in this sphere are attending to refashion the future of branding, advertising, stragegy, yadda yadda yadda.

In fact, I’d say the sweet spot (and you’ve got to be able to conjure something from your interests and passions, not just ramble on about them after hitting the Volcano for the night) is so important it should be part of every job hiring. Imagine Sweet Spot being the first section on your CV - not your x-amount of years in Experience Design or your grad studies in anthropology or the million dollar start-up you just sold off or that collection of Boy Scout badges gathering dust in a garbage bag somewhere in your basement. Instead, what are the passions and interests that drive you? That you’ll work double on?

Funny how, in your typical HR interview, interests and ‘hobbies’ are almost an after thought. Before starting at the space with the ‘boss’, I’d gone through a brief tour of duty searching for and courting other job offers. I have to thank him (and the other two ‘bosses’) for letting me into the space because I can’t imagine what a dark night of the soul it might have been had I been offered and/or taken those gigs where I would have been figuring out tribal cultures for the military  (yes, a Canadian spin on Human Terrain was a possibility), spying (whoops, I mean ‘researching’) on corporate execs for investors (very Human Terrain-ish), fighting the qualitative fight on  the quantitative battelfield and such. Imagine stealing fleeting moments in my cubicle penning odes to the sweet spot that might never have been.

To that end, a tribute to the sweet spot, a Top 5 if you will.

#1: TWEEN CULTURE

In my day I was into the Bay City Rollers, the Bee Gees, Earth Wind & Fire, Rush, Captain Stubing, Herve Villachez and Cher. I tell my daughter about the dark days of TV, when Sunday afternoons were limited to Davy & Goliath’s barely concealed Christian propaganda.

Today, Tween Culture is arguably so much more robust than it was in the 1970s that it has become the most powerful driving force in pop culture. Case in point: Miley above. Who’s one of the biggest selling artists today, if not the most ‘popular’? Her. Why? Lots of reasons.

First, Disney had to get its shit together after all that Princess crap it was coasting on through the 90s. They stumbled on (or strategized or hired the right person) a formula that has served them well across their spectrum of Suite Life, Corey In The House, Raven and so on: Neil Simon goes kid. That’s right - the recent Disney show formula isn’t a sitcom, it’s a Neil Simon play on TV for kids. Don’t believe me? Drop by your local high school for the year-end drama presentation and you’ll see.

Second, music. For all the pain & suffering the industry has gone through over the past few years, music is alive, well and thriving as the pop culture engine it has been since the Fab Four invaded North America. Hannah/Miley taps into that tween pop pleasure in a way that Britney Spears only imagined. The lip synching and singing to back-tracks isn’t my thing (us adults are too hooked on that authenticity thing), but given my own tween guilty pleasures of Donny & Marie I can let it slide.

And third? The Christian thing. Yup, it’s like Davy & Goliath are back to haunt me. It’s not big on the show (and the Hannah show is where’s it really at!), but every time Miley gets in front of a TV camera she never fails to thank the good Lord for all the shit he’s done for her.

Disclaimer: it’s one of my sweet spots because of my daughter’s age. Can’t wait for the teen years. Until then, thanks to the ‘boss’ for the first tweeny project.

#2: SEPARATIST VIOLENCE & ISLAMIC MILITANCY

Gotta love that segue, huh? Having written my MA thesis on the campaign against India waged by Kashmiri separatists and pre-Qaeda Islamic militants I’m still very much hooked on the theme. The photo above is, I believe, from a Hizbul Mujahideen web site. That’s an interest-work conversion right there, because the first time I was in Kashmir there was one working phone accessible to foreigners to call out of the state. The second time I was there it had been bombed. And the third time I didn’t even waste my time trying to call home. That HM has web sites calling for actions, posting photos of militants killed in battle etc. is a testament to the speed at which the technology I took for granted in the early 1990s has become accessible. That, and the fact that my friend can now call me from his cell phone up in the Himalayas from a village that had electricity 2 hours per day back then!

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your take on the client), this particular sweet spot likely won’t get flushed out in the work space.

#3: WINE

I still can’t really afford the super-good stuff, but I’m always willing to make budgetary room for something I can’t totally resist. I bought this Viognier in Vancouver while I was out doing a client ethnography. I walked into the shop, asked the clerk for something I couldn’t buy in Ontario, and this was one of my scores. Still haven’t had it yet, but it might make a great intro to the Oregon Pinot Gris my buddy Stanley brought me back from his third or fourth trip into Nike HQ.

Wine is, as I’m finding out, such a rich terroir for Interaction, Innovation and Incubation. This sweet spot is getting sweeter.

#4: DANCEHALL

I’m still waiting for the Miley Cyrus/Ninjaman combination on the “Cherry My Baby” riddim, but until then I’ll tribute this sweet spot for: being a favourite musical genre (less of a 45 buyer now, but still a fan); being a favourite performative genre (rich anthropological territory for understanding culture, language, gesture, membership, conflict etc.); and being a hotly contested cultural domain. Recent controversy revisited has once again positioned dancehall as violently homophobic. No dispute there. In addition to rampant  hyper-sexualization and a mythologizing of gun culture, Jamaican music of late (and much of past too, lest we forget) has been full of calls to bun down the batty man. Like much of the Rasta business, I don’t cater to this. But I will say that this latest spin on the ‘clash of civilizations’ theme that the media tends to fall back on when it’s too lazy to truly investigate a culture is, like Pad Anthony’s “Conference Table,” a great place to meet and discuss/debate ideas about cultural autonomy, expression, appropriateness etc. etc.

#5: ADVERTISING

Yes, I’ve heard the bells tolling for this industry across the blogzone, but I still can’t resist the call. I agree that so much is changing because of 2.0, TV’s cancer, the death of print; advertising is not only transforming right now but will continue to do so in order to deliver whatever it does to its clients (and, by the way, to pop culture - because it will always be relevant in whatever shape or form). To that end - and in typical 2.0 fashion - I’d like to suggest that while the interactive renegades, boutiques and start-ups poach all sorts of business from the lethargic monster firms, why can’t we do the same with the ad agencies?  Creative is as creative does, right?  Find somebody else to do your buying etc. But when brands with age-old presences are ready to have some real fun (and it can still be had on TV) at a slice of the usual agency cost and are ready to make themselves culturally relevant again, hit me up. I’ve got some sweet (spot) ideas

 

What about jocks & cheerleaders?

Anyone who appreciated the skills that the crew from Revenge of the Nerds had beyond the football and dating fields knows that geeks always had a cool quotient, albeit one that was very covert in the 1980s. That characters like Lamar have since gone on to play a huge role in defining our culture’s assumptions and aspirations regarding what is currently cool is something of a table-turning victory celebration: injecting archetypes into the realm of stereotypes, it’s now common practice to credit nerds with everything that’s evolved in the hip intersections between society and technology since their boners first saluted the Commodore 64. (See: Bill Gates).

Today’s matrix of technology, interactive, design, strategy, research, interactive, innovation etc. is brimming with folks who probably didn’t score touchdowns and date cheerleaders in high school. Many of them – like the former and/or practicing DJs, rave promoters, comic artists, font freaks, and connoisseurs of tea, wine and chocolate who populate this realm and generally stand united against the alpha-male jock villains of 80’s cinema – have some degree of coolness under their belt. Some of them are even designing the next application, device, site or campaign you will think is cool.

As an anthropologist, that interests me. My apologies in advance for raising the specter of such an over-haunted theme, but I have to wonder if this professional matrix has become so enraptured by its own culture of cool that it has spawned an ethnocentricity that’s now reaching full maturity.

Case in point #1: I’ve recently been involved with an industrial designer in a single volley debate over the value (or meaning?) or ‘ordinariness’ on Idris’ blog. I understand that few, if any, designers strive for the ordinary; however, having done the ethnography, I am very familiar with those ‘consumers’ who prefer, if not thrive on, the ordinary.

Case in point #2: a recent posting on Dino’s blog led me to a Slide Share by Paul Isakson. Two of the slides read: “Great. But my product isn’t cool. What can I do?” The answer – and its simplicity isn’t that surprising considering Paul is one of those hailing the impending (if not accompli) ‘death of advertising’ - is “Well, frankly you’re screwed.”

I’m not so sure – about being screwed or about what ordinary is. Designers chasing the next iWhatever can’t be faulted for wanting to create the next cool thing. But who decides what cool is? And when did ordinary get set in stone?

The many on-screen humiliations suffered by the Lamars of pop culture served to dramatize our rooting for the underdog and the stark demographic reality that most of those watching are more like the pocket protector crew than the alpha-male jock villains of 80’s cinema. And while it’s far sexier to conduct ethnographies on the cool, I’d just like to stick up for the voice of those poor jocks and cheerleaders who might be forgotten as they shop for tube socks, bath mats, paper towel and all those other products that have slipped through the cracks of cool. Roland Barthes would not be pleased with this exnomination of the nerds.

 

The smart

I like smart people, especially people who are smarter than me. Not smarter than me in terms of ties and slacks, but smarter (not that I’ve got some quantitative stick in my pocket) than me in that sense of, when you read their writing or hear them speaking, you feel like drowning your PhD in a case of Beck’s. Sometimes it happens when I watch a great TV show (The Wire, Kalifornication, that hidden motel room show) or read a great book (Lawrence Hill’s The Book of Negroes, Norman Stolzoff’s Wake The Town, anything by Victor Turner). I’m writing this ode to the wise because, recently (and since being hired on by two dudes who have me deep in Bremen’s finest), I signed up for Twitter. Put my non-early adopter status down to a flair for the social reluctance of many anthropologists (sometimes we get so hooked on other’s sociality that we ignore our own. Don’t expect the regular updates on What I’m Doing). In doing so (thanks, again, to a brother) I came across the new fact that Mark Ury has a blog. Check it here. Mark works as an Experience Architect at Blast Radius in Toronto. I had the pleasure to work in a room with him last year for two days. I hope some of his mojo rubbed off on me, because he is, for lack of accoladed wording, smart. (He can probably do Ikea furniture with his eyes closed). Just read his posting on why Apple is successful. And no, it’s not design. In scrolling through Mark’s blogroll I was reminded to catch up on postings by Grant McCracken. I hope his middle-ageness doesn’t flinch in referring to him as one of the granddaddies of anthropology for business (?, I flinch at ‘consumer anthropology’), but there’s rarely a post that goes by in his musings on work, ethnography etc. that doesn’t have those of us less jet-setting-than-he looking to get some game. Needless to say, he’s smart - and his recent post aimed at ethnographic pretenders must have stung many.

That’s all, that’s it. Just looking to big up the smart.

 

Of mice, men, women and children

Even when it’s anthropology for commercial/business purposes, let’s not call ‘them’ subjects, case studies, consumers, users or - worse yet - cohorts. As ethnography, design, strategy and innovation become more public about the ever-ripening fruits of their increased collaboration, let’s hear it for….people. I’m nearing the middle phase in a series of cross-Canada ethnographic home visits and I have yet to sit at the kitchen table of a subject, case study, consumer, user or cohort. In Toronto they’re men, women and children. In Montreal they’re men, women and children. And unless something’s gone awry that I missed on the news, I expect they’ll be men, women and children in Vancouver, Calgary and the Maritimes.

Sound like a picky point? It’s not. Any organization that is working (or hoping to) beyond ‘the box’ should be talking their walk which, I guess, is my way of saying that when the research firm you’ve contracted to conduct that qualitative study throws up a Power Point on the subjects, case studies, consumers, users and cohorts they’ve ’sampled’ it might be time to cut your losses and run.

 

Ethnography unleashed!?!

Maybe a pen doesn’t quite free those of us who have toiled under 125 years (I’ll carbon date anthro to Lewis Henry Morgan, but entertain arguments from those in favour of Ibn Khaldun) of oppression in the field, but the folks at Live Scribe are about to drop a new tool on to the market that could unleash as-yet untapped ethnographic potential.

In a nutshell, the Live Scribe Pulse Smart Pen records audio while you’re taking notes. Then, when you go over your notes with the pen it plays back what was recorded at this word, that word, the next word and so on.

Details available at www.livescribe.com include:
-Samsung ARM 9 (32-bit, 150 MHz) processor
-high-speed infrared camera (over 70 images/sec)
-1 GB NAND (100+ hours of recording time or 16,000 pages of digital notes)
-2GB NAND (double that, baby!)
-300 mAH rechargeable lithium battery (but you can’t remove it)
-dual embedded, mono-recording mics
-embedded speaker for audio playback and an audio jack for 3D recording headset
-USB mobile charging cradle
-250 MB online storage
-My Livescribe Account
-and, of course, the must-have ‘community’ for posting and sharing content

For those who might take notes and want to check them for more detail, context or language, target customers like students (professors) and business people (clients) are obvious. But who knows what possibilities could open up for consumer researchers and ethnographers? As Rob Tannen, who maintains the www.designingforhumans.com blog for the Human Factors Professional Interest Section of the Industrial Designers Society of America (whew!) says, “Audio recording can be more than just a means of documenting what was said in an interview. It can provide high fidelity reproduction of an environment effective for communicating a situation or developing a solution.”

What does that mean? Well, surveys could be conducted in tandem with ‘interviews’. You could play back user/customer talk to clients in presentations. Field notes could be written and then framed in some (the audio) of the context in which they were written, adding new layers of narrative to analyses. The audio-visual spaces in which anthropology is presented could be enhanced. And then, of course, there are issues of accountability and consent.

Few, if any, anthropologists would go into the field and engage informants in any formal inquiry without requiring their consent. Yes, participant observation might lead you towards experiences and data that weren’t exactly negotiated at the beginning. And yes, had I had something like the Live Scribe during my informal fieldwork in Kashmir I might have returned with more ‘hard’ field data. But the Live Scribe could open up the research game to the grey-area rules of covert ops. It will, after all, be easier to conceal than a police wire, iPod or micro-cassette recorder. If researchers use it, I hope they remember to also carry the ethics of informed consent. Or lyricists penning their next ode to the Canadian tundra while on a noisy tour bus.

Then again, researchers, students and business people probably won’t even get close to cracking the potential of this simple little tool. Imagine recordings of the busy market place somehow encoded into the hand-written manifestos of the next Mao Tse Tungs of the world.