Ethnographic Approaches to Literacy Research DAVID BARTON The Development of Ethnographic Approaches to Literacy In the past 30 years new ethnographic approaches to literacy research have been developed, and a wide range of studies of the role of reading and writing in society have been carried out. Historically, the study of reading and writing in applied linguistics drew upon psy- chological approaches to the “skills” of reading and writing, but the field has more recently drawn its inspiration from anthropological traditions. Early on, Basso (1974) referred to the ethnography of writing. A few years later, when providing an overview of the socio- linguistics of reading and writing, Stubbs argued for the need for ethnographic studies as so little was known about people’s uses of literacy (Stubbs, 1980, p. 164). In the United States a key foundation of literacy studies was the work of Shirley Brice Heath (1983) research- ing the disjuncture between family and school ways of using language and literacy in Appalachian communities in the United States. Heath’s use of the concept of “literacy event” became central to literacy research and was partly developed in parallel with the notion of “speech event” used in research on the ethnography of communication. The other key idea for literacy research alongside literacy events is that of “literacy practices,” stressing the idea that reading and writing are located in social practices. Applying the term “practices” to literacy has its roots in the work of the British anthro- pologist Brian Street. His research in Iran (1984) provided a broader theory of literacy based on social practices, which was taken up by applied linguists developing the field of what is referred to as (new) literacy studies. Literacy practices and literacy events comple- ment each other: Practices refer to the general cultural ways of using reading and writing, and literacy events are particular instances of people drawing upon their cultural know- ledge (Barton, 2007, pp. 35–7). The hallmark of much literacy studies research has been detailed investigations of particular situations. Identifying the literacy events often provides a good starting point for a research study. Researchers then identify particular configurations of literacy practices in different contexts, which can be referred to as different literacies. The concept of literacy practices provides a way of bringing broader cultural and structural aspects into a specific situation, and linking literacy practices to issues of power. Practices can be seen as theoretical, describing regularities and patterns which are abstracted from particular events. Ethnographic approaches examine people’s practices in particular contexts, and they provide both a framing theory and a methodology. Overview of Studies There has now been a range of ethnographic studies of literacy reported in books, articles, dissertations, and conference papers over the past 30 years, covering home and community life, workplaces, and educational settings. In examining these studies, at the outset we need to distinguish the idea of “doing an ethnography” from using “ethnographic approaches.” Historically, anthropologists carried out long-term intensive studies of a whole culture and then wrote “an ethnography.” Many of the studies of literacy are narrower and more focused, and they can be described as drawing upon ethnographic approaches without being full ethnographies (as discussed in Bloome & Green, 1992). 10-0180Ethnographic Approaches.indd 1 10-0180Ethnographic Approaches.indd 1 1/29/11 6:09 PM 1/29/11 6:09 PM