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Doing qualitative research in the UK publishing sector – an ethnic minority’s experiences
Author(s)
Date Issued
2007
Conference
Citation
Lau, P. Y. (2007). Doing qualitative research in the UK publishing sector – an ethnic minority’s experiences. Exploding Method: A New Scholars Symposium, UK.
Type
Conference Paper
Abstract
This paper aims to discuss the relations between researcher and researched. My doctoral
project is to study the role of social networking in labour recruitment in the UK publishing
sector. The methods I used are semi-structured interviews and participant observation. I
interviewed forty publishing staff in various roles such as editorial and design during mid
2005 and early 2006. I also participated actively in a UK publishing association and organized
events and annual conference during the above period.
In this paper, I will focus on how my ethnic identity influenced the relations with my
interviewees. I am an ethnic Hong Kong Chinese who has just stayed in the UK for study for
four years. The UK publishing sector is predominately a white middle classes sector. It is not
difficult to imagine that I encountered some special experiences during the fieldwork (despite
the fact that people in publishing are generally very friendly). These experiences are as
follows. Firstly, it is access gaining. I did not know anybody in this sector before the
fieldwork. The way I got into the field was to make use of my ethnic minority identity and
participated in a couple of diversity programs. Secondly, I needed to develop a sense of trust
with the interviewees within a very short period of time. Friendly body gestures such as smile
and being attentive helped to overcome my accented English, which could be a barrier in the
fieldwork. Thirdly, I realize that being an ethnic minority could be an advantage during
fieldwork since my interviewees were open to tell me a lot of tiny details (such as office
politics). Some of them said it was because to a very large extent I am an outsider to UK
publishing, they felt safe to tell me everything.
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