While studying for my MA in Visual Sociology at Goldsmiths, I was tasked with creating a fictional research proposal. I ensured that the proposal was designed in a realistic format, adhering to the structure and standards of professional academic research.
Interviewing shoppers through audio diaries: How to listen to cultural diversity in the social marketplace?
Introduction
For my research proposal, I am motivated to capture this social research through sonic ethnography by undertaking a unique theoretical and creative approach to gathering empirical findings of inhabitants performing intercultural practices in Camden Town Market. I hope to figure out how to use listening as the sociological method of distinguishing cultural diversity in the social marketplace.
Mimi literature review
I am keen to study social taste concerning how people navigate cultures in the marketplace. Wise, A. and Velayutham, S. (2009): stated: “This is an everyday multiculturalism not steeped in tension, hostility or complex power relations. Rather what is performed in this space are casual encounters and ‘rubbing along’ in this rather ramshackle but richly diverse commercial space (p.137).“ As there can be a convivial atmosphere in the multicultural market, I believe that individuals negotiate between particular happenings when emersed in multiculturism as Rhys-Taylor, A. (2017) stated: “The identification of a “stink,” is, in this sense, also the delivery of a moral judgment against the people or space from which it arises. Likewise, rotting fruit has long provided a metonym to talk about individuals or groups that pose threats to the production and maintenance of a community’s moral order, or a normative sense of propriety (p.100).” Interestingly, Rhys-Taylor is pointing out how people set cultural boundaries upon normative prepositions of taste when navigating the Ridley Road market.
My research method is to use sound recording as a qualitative approach to capture and document other experiences. The trouble with this is that other experiences could be too invisible from my own experience. My empirical investigation will likely rely on studying inter-experiences happening in the marketplace. Laing, R.D. (1967) stated “The task of social phenomenology is to relate my experience of the other’s behaviour to the other’s experience of my behaviour. Its study is the relation between experience and experience: its true field is inter-experience (p.15)”. I would explore inter-experiences when situated and engaging the marketplace interculturally by my own field relationship where other person's behaviour is an experience of mine when near particular practices.
Method
I will be listening as an empirical method to investigate the multicultural marketplace by recording social interactions within sonic ethnography. Bull, M. and Back, L. (2015) stated: “Through digital enhancement the sound record in the field need not only be simply facsimiles of what we hear, but can also provide an opportunity for de-tuning, sculpting, amplifying, enhancing and increasing the volume of the background so that we can listen to what is contained within it (p.5)” It’s better to understand the multicultural marketplace through listening method because there is a deep research scope into analysing empirical data from sound recordings through digital enhancement.
Conducting this experimental method involves producing audio diaries enacted as a form of journaling, but my objective is to be inventive with my sociological approach. I aim to document my construal knowledge and navigate this within situated experiences – a multicultural marketplace – by expanding my empirical method. Thus, avoiding the limitation of being selective in recording qualitative interviews with shoppers.
I can represent my social position and perspective as a researcher by sharing sociological findings towards presenting what I have been listening to in the multicultural marketplace. It is self-reflective for understanding my social trajectory and cultural habitus through audio diaries. I am developing an empirical research perspective to approach sociological relationships within the multicultural world when interacting with shoppers.
Qualitative Interviews
I wish to speak with shoppers about their experiences visiting a multicultural marketplace by asking semi-structured interview questions. I am aware of how shoppers are limited in their sense of time and attention when positioning myself as a researcher because I may not be able to ask all my questions from one person as I can continue to interview other people. The qualitative research is an attempt to be semi-structured by recording my process with conducting interviews within sonic ethnography.
Here are examples of simple questions that I may ask respondents:
How did you get here?
Who are you going with?
What are your favourite places to visit?
Do you come here often or is it your first time?
What do you avoid?
Aim
I aim to visit Camden Town Market by conducting sonic ethnography in audio diaries to understand how we come to the symbolic order of its social world. I am keen to distinguish what we hear from the London marketplace by questioning how we can listen to multiculturalism when shopping, eating, and socialising by identifying the underpinning of symbolic interaction.
I decided to conduct my empirical research in Camden Town Market because of its diversity of people and territories within a multicultural locus. I do not believe multiculturism is a status thing because I find it fascinating to learn about social interaction between cultures and how society deals with multiculturalism. But how is the market position multicultural? When social conditioning of multiculturalism has coexistence between different people and things within its social world: I think Camden Town Market is more a social capitalist community than a national government.
When listening to Camden Town Market, I am listening to social capital. I am motivated to learn how people resemble the sociality of multiculturalism. I will undertake a phenomenological and interactionist approach as sociological theories because exploring the social and cultural diversity of simultaneous happenings in Camden Town Market: will enable me to receive empirical findings of performative experiences that justify my sociological hypotheses.
Objectives
I will be visiting Camden Town Market for a series of weeks. For equipment, I am bringing a zoom recorder to sound record my experiences of navigating the marketplace. Also, I am going to conduct semi-structured interviews with shoppers. I will capture situated knowledge of my social position to approach various locations in the market by testing sociological hypotheses if linking to empirical findings.
I am keen to meet with shoppers than traders in Camden Town Market because I am more curious about what attracts people to come to the marketplace through asking questions like how they individually or collectively spend their time and resources when going into various outlets. Interestingly, I can explore from my semi-structured interviews and sound recording of my experience navigating Camden Town Market. I can learn about the biographical history of how shoppers preferentially mobilise towards going places and how shoppers engage in sociocultural processes from that location or within a liminal space.
To elaborate on what I mean. I may un-deliberately follow the crowd of shoppers through sound walking on the same pathway as me. I notice the change where shoppers perform social actions that contradict reciprocal behaviours. I can examine the social distinctions between individuals and their situations by adopting the inter-experiment perspective by gathering sonic data when capturing it in a sound recording.
Limitations
I can discuss the limitations of a sound recording by producing audio diaries. We lose the visual/vision perspective to using listening as a sociological method. Empirical research aims to conduct qualitative interviews with shoppers in Camden Town Market: why the need to record the whole experience of my social position as a researcher navigating the marketplace to speak with shoppers. If the audio diary is a form of documenting, how can we make it into an ethnographic medium? There are ethical considerations on how recording is construal through representing limited situations than the whole story.
The goal is to interview shoppers in Camden Town Market, so why miss out on the opportunity to capture sociological soundscapes? I will focus on listening to the socialisation of Camden Town Market. But it isn’t necessary to record the landscape when positioning myself towards becoming receptive to the shoppers when selecting respondents to conduct interviews. The constant I will have with sound recording involves becoming limited by the quantity of file memory and battery life while on fieldwork. I may not be authentic in capturing the lived experience of navigating the wholeness of the marketplace while conducting qualitative interviews with people. I can say that I can try my best to proceed with sonic ethnography by becoming equipped with a good amount of memory files and battery life when carrying out social research in Camden Town Market through the coming weeks.
The last main issue is how to examine audio diaries to analyse sociological data. Aware that it might be self-explanatory to re-listen to the sound recordings by writing transcriptions about how these social properties occur from how I approach my empirical research. But as explained, I plan to sound record the entire experience to navigate through conducting qualitative interviews in Camden Town Market. It would involve constantly re-listening to audio diaries for lengthy periods; I critically analyse interview conversations. I wonder if I would be socially constructing when selecting parts of the recording, I am not editing the duration of audio diaries. It is questionable to listen to all audio diaries by becoming self-reflective by listening to my own experience carrying out empirical research. I am motivated to undertake inventive methods by experimenting with how ambitious I can go with conducting sonic ethnography.
Ethical information
When visiting Camden Town Market, I would be audio recording public communication and the soundscape of the marketplace by producing audio diaries. My research enquiries will focus on meeting with people in public by asking them to answer questions for my empirical research. To prove the verifiability of my sociological findings: I led by audio recordings, so people could presume that I made my recordings in another marketplace. It might be silly to consider this, but I can present photographic evidence of being there.
I will ask for permission to record our conversation if respondents decide to accept or decline the offer. I would state that sonic ethnography would be anonymous and confidential when self-reflectively navigating Camden Town Market to document my audio diaries. I only allow my empirical research to be known to respondents and people who noticed my equipment to gain their consent to record their conversations. I wouldn’t specifically spy on anyone or a group to gather confidential information unless to receive approval to conduct empirical research questions. According to online sources like recordinglaw.com, it is legal to make recordings in a public place for non-commercial purposes. I may need permission from Camden Town Market to conduct empirical research on their premises because it is a privately owned public space. I can submit Ethics Case Study to British Sociological Association to learn if my sociological method is appropriate for empirical research. I am open to altering sociological methods if they appear unsuitable under ethical guidelines. I can instead conduct the listening by writing inscriptive field notes for my qualitative interviews.
A Dissemination Plan
I would propose my empirical research benefits the Goldsmiths Sociology department by demonstrating that I conducted sonic ethnography off-campus but critically evaluate a contemporary debate on how we can ethically use audio dairy as a sociological method. I can consider this empirical research as work experience because it can be beneficial for me by showcasing to potential clients and employers within either academic or industrial sectors how I learned to carry out sonic ethnography in public. When completing audio diaries, I can write transcriptive reports about methodological experimentation. I can publish audio diaries on websites like SoundCloud to share my research with other sociologists.
Research Background
I plan to read these sociological texts to develop theoretical considerations when implementing qualitative interviews and observing empirical data. I have located these texts through recommendations from Goldsmiths reading lists and some personal research online. There are links between the selected readings towards empirical research to help me broaden my knowledge of my research position and interaction when learning about multiculturalism and sonic methods.
The research gaps of sociological texts are historically different, but I am keen to understand the practical and theoretical approaches of following sociologists to help examine my sociological findings. I will be specific to focus on seeking relevant information that can help me contribute to the existing body of knowledge. I can draft the research report into a self-reflective summary linking my research background with empirical research.
Biography
Wise, A. & Velayutham, S. (2009) Everyday Multiculturalism, Palgrave Macmillan, London.
Rhys-Taylor, A. (2017) ‘Coming to Our Senses’ in Food and Multiculture: A Sensory Ethnography of East London, Bloomsbury.
Laing, R.D. (1967) ‘The politics of experience; and the bird of paradise.’ Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.
Bull, M. and Back, L. (2015) The auditory culture reader. London: Bloomsbury Academic.