Ethonography in Education: methodologies & epistemologies

Abstract

Ethnography in education: methodologies and epistemologies is the topic of this dossier of the journal Cadernos de Pesquisa from the Graduate Program in Education, Federal University of Maranhão. The subject of this set of articles is the discussion of the tensions between method and epistemology in ethnographic research. In the constant crisis of legitimacy in the field of education, ethnography has been widely used as a methodology in different fields of knowledge. Ethnography is increasingly explored in education, and the topic needs to be understood more clearly by researchers and scholars in the area. The dossier therefore faces this challenge by bringing into the light of academic knowledge a set of eight articles and an interview. The articles originate from research that was prepared to conceptualize, analyze, and describe different faces of ethnography mediated by the interconnection of these two dimensions, which, in principle, are taken as antagonistic but are faces of the same coin. The set of articles presented ranges from thematic nuances relevant to classical ethnography, such as the field of research and the participative research, to current and controversial topics such as autoethnography and netnography. The authors are former members of the Nucleus of Ethnography in Education of the State University of Rio de Janeiro (NetEdu/Uerj) as well as some prominent international consultants associated, among them, we highlight the presence of Frederick Erickson, a distinguished representative of ethnography in education. This dossier aims to enquire deeper into the topics and renewed the reader’s interest in them through innovative and creative approaches.