This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Springwood, C. F. Articles by King, C. R. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                   What's this?

Unsettling Engagements: On the Ends of Rapport in Critical Ethnography

Illinois Wesleyan University

C. Richard King

Drake University

The authors attempt to frame the essays in this issue of Qualitative Inquiry by arguing that an increasing emphasis on forms of "critical ethnography" in a variety of ethnographically informed disciplines has significantly complicated the notion of ethnographic rapport. Rapport, as a methodological trope and relational strategy of the ethnographic habitus, has, in some circles, already been undergoing reconsideration and revision. But too often, it has simply been ignored. This refusal to locate rapport has been particularly problematic for ethnographers informed by technologies of critical theory. Critical ethnographers, including the contributors to this issue, inscribe a range of contrasting perspectives variously regarding the (im)possibility, desirability, ambiguity, and legitimacy of rapport. This issue allows ethnographers of human practice and meaning to seriously ponder the suggestion that they must indeed "forget" rapport.

Key Words: critical ethnography • rapport • informant • methodology • knowledge

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				B. Gaglio, C. C. Nelson, and D. King The role of rapport: lessons learned from conducting research in a primary care setting. Qual Health Res, May 1, 2006; 16(5): 723 - 734. [Abstract] [PDF]