Garfinkel

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Harold GarfinkelPROFESSOR EMERITUS at UCLAPh. D., Harvard UniversityClass WebsitesOffice: A83 HAINES Phone: 3108253328 Fax: 310-206-9838 E-mail: garfinkel@soc.ucla.edu Mailing Address:UCLA Department of Sociology 264 Haines Hall - Box 951551 Los Angeles, CA 90095-1551 SubfieldEthnomethodologyResearch InterestsClassic studies of social order and ethnomethodological studies agree that the animal they are hunting is the production and accountability of the phenomena or order, reason, logic, etc. in, about, and as the great recurrences of immortal ordinary society, really, actually, evidently, distinctively, and in detail. A selected corpus of ethnomethodological studies offers evidence for locally produced, naturally accountable phenomena of order, logic, reason, meaning, method, objective knowledge, evidence, detail, structure, etc., in and as of the unavoidable and irremediable haecceity of immortal ordinary society. These results are collected by and come to a head in ethnomethodological studies of discovering work in the natural sciences. The results are contrary to the classic policies, methods, claims, and findings of professional sociology and the world-wide social science movement.Selected Publications"The Work of a Discovering Science construed with Materials from the Optically Discovered Pulsar," (with Eric Livingston and Michael Lynch), Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 11(2):131-158, 1981. "Evidence for Locally Produced, Naturally Accountable Phenomena of Order*, Logic, Meaning, Method, etc., in and as of the Essentially Unavoidable and Irremediable Haeceeity of Immortal Ordinary Society: (I of IV) An Announcement of Studies," Sociological Theory '88, (6)1: 103-109, Spring 1988.
Harold Garfinkel (born 29 October 1917) is Professor Emeritus in sociology at the University of California, Los Angeles. Garfinkel took his PhD in 1952 from Harvard University, where he was supervised by Talcott Parsons. His thesis was titled "The Perception of the Other: A Study in Social Order"; it remains unpublished but highly influential, especially on the early years ofethnomethodology.EthnomethodologyGarfinkel is the originator of the ethnomethodological approach to sociology and, alongside Aaron Cicourel and Harvey Sacks, he is often cited as having been a major contributor to its development, articulation and spread. However, these three progenitors have each carved their own path. Until his death, Sacks focused on conversation analysis, a strand which has virtually cut loose from its ethnomethodological roots to become a free standing sociological method. Cicourel pioneered what he termed "Cognitive Sociology".Early ethnomethodological work was initially distributed via mimeographs. Garfinkel’s groundbreaking monograph "Studies in Ethnomethodology" was not formally published until 1967 and contains a series of essays concerning a number of distinct research projects. These essays pursue the ethnomethodological theme of the production of social order. His subsequent development of ethnomethodology has followed this pattern in that it is best seen as programmatic rather than theoretical. Garfinkel does not articulate a social theory as much as a sociological stance.Although his work is a radical rethinking of how to do sociology, he has acknowledged his intellectual debt to the more traditional figures of Émile Durkheim and Parsons, as well as to the phenomenological approach of Alfred Schütz.[1] Through his understanding of phenomenology, Garfinkel has sought to "respecify" traditional readings of Durkheim’s aphorism. Durkheim suggested that "[t]he objective reality of social facts is sociology’s fundamental principle." In an alternate formulation, he suggested that social facts should be understood as sociology’s fundamental phenomenon. Garfinkel prefers this reading and suggests a move toward a recognition that sociological facts are "locally endogenously produced, naturally organized, reflexively accountable, ongoing, practical achievement[s]."[1]Garfinkel emphasizes the indexicality of language and the difficulties this creates for the production of objective accounts of social phenomena. However, his notion of indexicality is much broader than the philosophical or linguistic concept. For Garfinkel, all talk is indexical to the context in which it takes place and/or refers. Garfinkel rejects the representational view of language, preferring the more Wittgensteinian or Austinian account of speech act theory. This means that language, speech acts and social accounts are reflexive to the settings in which they are produced: they depend upon that setting for their meaning and the setting’s meaning depends on reflexive articulation. In recognizing this, Garfinkel’s concept of the incarnate accountability of social action can be seen. All social situations are accountable by, and to, its participants in that participation in the situation itself is to produce and respond to context relevant information and cues.Ethnomethodological studies come in a wide variety of forms, including the sequential analysis of conversation; the study of social categorization practices (membership category analysis); studies of workplace settings and activities (studies of work).InfluenceGarfinkel has had a major influence on the Social Studies of Science and Science and Technology Studies. In particular, his ideas have influences initial "laboratory ethnographies" and the work of such major figures as David Bloor, Steve Woolgar, Bruno Latour and Karin Knorr-Cetina. A major recent ethnomethodology in the field isMichael Lynch's Scientific Practice and Ordinary Action: Ethnomethodology and Social Studies of Science.Psychiatrist R. D. Laing cited Garfinkel's "Conditions of Successful Degradation Ceremonies" in several of his books; he considered the psychiatric interview to be an example of a degradation ceremony. This meant, in Garfinkel's terms, that the psychiatrist officially denounces (labels) a patient as mentally ill, which reduces the patient to a lower level in the scheme of social types, i.e., "separated from [and opposed to] a place in the legitimate [social] order."An excerpt from "Studies in Ethnomethodology" was included in the 1973 anthology Rules and Meanings: The Anthropology of Everyday Knowledge, edited by Mary Douglasand published by Penguin Books.Selected WorksMoon, B., ed (1946). "Color Trouble". Primer for White Folks (New York: Doubleday Doran): 269–286.(1956). "Conditions of successful degradation ceremonies".American Journal of Sociology 61: 420–424.(1956). "Some sociological concepts and methods for psychiatrists". Psychiatric Research Reports 6: 181–198.Harvey, O.J., ed (1963). "A conception of, and experiments with, 'trust' as a condition of stable concerted actions".Motivation and Social Interaction (New York: Ronald Press): 187–238.(1967) "Studies in Ethnomethodology". (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall)Shneidman, E., ed (1967). "Practical sociological reasoning: Some features in the work of the Los Angeles suicide prevention center" Essays in Self-destruction (New York: Science House): 171–186.Hill, R.; Grittenden, K., eds (1968). "Discussion: The origin of the term 'ethnomethodology'". Proceedings of the Purdue Symposium on Ethnomethodology(Institute Monograph Series #1): 15–18.With Sacks, Harvey (1970); McKinney, J.; Tiryakian, E., eds. "On formal structures of practical actions". Theoretical Sociology: Perspectives and Developments (New York: Meredith): 337–366.(1972). "A Comparison of Decisions Made on Four 'Pre-Theoretical' Problems by Talcott Parsons and Alfred Schultz" (first published in 1960).Sudnow, D., ed (1972). "Studies in the routine grounds of everyday activities". Studies in Social Interaction (New York: Free Press): 1–30 (first published in 1964).Manis, J; Meltzer, B., eds (1972). "Conditions of Successful Degradation Ceremonies"Symbolic Interactionism (New York: Allyn & Bacon): 201–208.(1976). "An introduction, for novices, to the work of studying naturally organized ordinary activities".(1981). "The Work of a Discovering Science Construed with Materials from the Optically Discovered Pulsar". Philosophy of the Social Sciences 11: 131–158.(Spring 1988). "Evidence for Locally Produced, Naturally Accountable Phenomena of Order, Logic, Meaning, Method, etc., in and as of the Essentially Unavoidable and Irremediable Haeceeity of Immortal Ordinary Society: (I of IV) An Announcement of Studies" (also known as "Parson's Plenum").Sociological Theory '88 (6) 1: 103–109.(2002). "Ethnomethodology's program: Working out Durkheim's aphorism" (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield).(November 2005). "Seeing Sociologically: The Routine Grounds of Social Action".(December 2008). "Toward a Sociological Theory of Information".(August 2010). Studies in Ethnomethodology: Expanded and Updated Edition.[edit]ReferencesHarold Garfinkel at UCLAPhotos of Harold Garfinkel at the conference "Orders of Ordinary Action" in Manchester, UK in 2001.