Ethnomethodology

From Geography

Ethnomethodology is an approach in the sociology introduced by the American sociologist Harold Garfinkel. It also find its origin in Talcott Parsons's functionalist sociology. Max Weber, Alfred Schütz, Émile Durkheim and Aron Gurwitsch were other important people which helped to develop ethnomethodolgy. The term 'ethnomethodology' was introduced by Garfinkel when he was preparing one ofhis journals (Hilbert, 1997).

Theory

Ethnomethodolgy is an effort to study the methods in and through which members collaboratively produce and assemble the features of everyday life in any actual, concrete setting. The idea of ethnomethodology is that there is a selfgenerating order in concrete activities, an order that is not something which depends on a scientific criterium. As Garfinkel said: ´members of society must have some shared methods that they use to mutually construct the meaningful orderliness of social situations´ (Rawls, 2002). Members of society achieve this intelligible organization through actual, coordinated, concerted, procedural behaviors or methods and practices.