This book outlines the specific character of the ethnomethodological approach to 'play'; that is, to everyday sport and leisure activities that people generally engage in for enjoyment, at home or as a 'hobby'. With chapters on cooking, running, playing music, dancing, rock climbing, sailing, fly fishing and going out for the day as a family, Ethnomethodology at Play provides an introduction to the key conceptual resources drawn upon by ethnomethodology in its studies of these activities, whilst exploring the manner in which people 'work' at their everyday leisure. Demonstrating the breadth of ethnomethodological analysis and showing how no topic is beyond ethnomethodology's fundamental respecification, Ethnomethodology at Play sets out for the serious reader and researcher the precise contribution of ethnomethodology to sociological studies of sport and leisure and ordinary domestic pastimes. As such this groundbreaking volume constitutes a significant contribution to both ethnomethodology and sociology in general, as well as to the sociology of sport and leisure, the sociology of domestic and daily life and cultural studies.

Phenomenological analyses of the orderliness of naturally occurring collaboration.

Since the 1967 publication of Studies in Ethnomethodology, Harold Garfinkel has indelibly influenced the social sciences and humanities worldwide. This new book, the long-awaited sequel to Studies, comprises Garfinkel's work over three decades to further elaborate the study of ethnomethodology. 'Working out Durkheim's Aphorism, ' the title used for this new book, emphasizes Garfinkel's insistence that his position focuses on fundamental sociological issues--and that interpretations of his position as indifferent to sociology have been misunderstandings. Durkheim's aphorism states that the concreteness of social facts is sociology's most fundamental phenomenon. Garfinkel argues that sociologists have, for a century or more, ignored this aphorism and treated social facts as theoretical, or conceptual, constructions. Garfinkel in this new book shows how and why sociology must restore Durkheim's aphorism, through an insistence on the concreteness of social facts that are produced by complex social practices enacted by participants in the social order. Garfinkel's new book, like Studies, will likely stand as another landmark in sociological theory, yet it is clearer and more concrete in revealing human social practices.

This book offers a rich and detailed empirical account of children's play and interaction in the school playground. Drawing on the approaches of ethnomethodology and conversation analysis, 'Talk and Social Interaction in the Playground' examines the organisation of membership and social action in a game created by a group of children. It offers rich insights into the methods and practices used by children to produce play and social order, making a significant and substantial contribution to the study of talk-in-interaction, as well as to studies of children's play, competencies, and social interaction. The book demonstrates the importance of putting aside preconceived assumptions about how children talk and interact in order to reveal the situated methods and practices that children use - not because they are children, but because they are social beings. As well as appealing to scholars of ethnomethodology and conversation analysis, ’Talk and Social Interaction in the Playground’ will be of interest to students and researchers in a range of disciplines, including child studies, developmental psychology, education, applied linguistics, and sociology.

This book offers a new and rigorous approach to observational sociology that is grounded in ethnomethodology and conversation analysis. Throughout the authors encourage the reader to explore the social world at first hand, beginning with the immediate family context and then moving out into the public realm and organizational life. Examples of observational analysis are given with reference to topic areas such as family life, education, medicine, crime and deviance, and the reader is shown how to conduct their own inquiries, using methods and materials that are readily and ordinarily available. Drawing on both original material and published studies, Francis and Hester demonstrate how observational sociology can be carried out with an attention to detail typically overlooked by more traditional ethonographic approaches.

This collection of new studies in ethnomethodology addresses sociology's classical questions by developing that strand of ethnomethodological inquiry dealing with membership categorization. This book provides detailed studies of members' use of membership categories across various settings from the O.J. Simpson trial, via TV commercials and news headlines, to school staff and referral meetings.

Exploring communication with children born deaf-blind.