Key academics in ethnomethodology bring together one of the most important bodies of research into people's working practices to develop in the social sciences over the past fifty years.Although volumes have sought to bring some of these materials together before, none have sought to systematically provide for the serious reader and researcher the precise contribution of this literature to sociological studies of work. This book addresses this absence by outlining the specific character of the ethnomethodological approach to work, providing an introduction to the key conceptual resources ethnomethodology has drawn upon in its studies, and a set of substantive chapters that examine how people work from a foundational perspective.Academics in the field including Graham Button, John Hughes and Wes Sharrock contribute to the volume and demonstrate the important contribution that ethnomethodological studies have so far made, and will continue to make, to understandings the ways in which people actually accomplish work from day to day and moment to moment. The volume concludes with a review of the specific value offered by ethnomethodological studies of work in relation to other approaches. The book is indispensable to ethnomethodologists and scholars and students alike interested in the sociology of work.
Industry Reviews
'When students and other researchers ask me how to go about doing an ethnomethodological study of work, there is no simple answer to give. With this collection, what I can now do is help them see why there is no simple answer while, nevertheless, getting them started on pursuing their first studies in ethnomethodology.' Eric Laurier, University of Edinburgh, UK 'Ethnomethodology, unlike most of sociology, looks at social conduct and such things as how people use talk to organise workplaces and how the examination of code in software engineering entails particular types of reading. Because of its remarkable concern for the empirical, ethnomethodology has been widely used outside sociology, in computer science and related disciplines especially, which need such evidence to make better designs. Who the human is and what they do matters to these disciplines.' Richard Harper, Microsoft Research Cambridge, UK 'Pugnacious yet inviting, this book will be an invaluable guide for those interested in the ethnomethodological perspective on work, but also why it has proven to be so influential in the study and design of technology. The book expertly balances empirical study with theoretical sophistication.' Barry Brown, University of California, San Diego, USA 'This is an accessible, engaging and rather provocative introduction to ethnomethodological studies of work. Key topics in organisational sociology are artfully re-examined as practical concerns and achievements of engineers, bankers, and more. Mark Rouncefield and Peter Tolmie deserve thanks for crafting a collection that delivers such a distinctive contribution to the sociology of work.' Jon Hindmarsh, King's College London, UK 'Some sociologists may sigh "grow up" to the "grumpy old men" who put their unruly ethnomethodological orientation to work here. But their impatience with "conceptual", "visionary", "fictional" interpretive sociology is incisively productive for sociology today (as well as practical endeavo