Sociologists Backstage by Sarah Fenstermaker Nikki Jones

Author:Sarah Fenstermaker, Nikki Jones [Sarah Fenstermaker, Nikki Jones]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780415870931
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Published: 2010-11-08T00:00:00+00:00

The Tenth Question

What was the worst (or most difficult, or most embarrassing) interview/ field encounter you’ve had?

There was one particular individual who deteriorated on crack while I knew him, until he eventually died. I liked him and thought he had some admirable qualities. He was a valuable informant whom I interviewed several times over a period of several years, first about crime and then about fatherhood. We both enjoyed the interviews and he used to take copies of my reports and show them to his girlfriends. He told lots of detailed and interesting stories, and they checked out with other sources. He had been finished with crime and steadily employed for 2 or 3 years before he got caught up with crack. Then he started getting extremely unreliable. He still told very interesting stories but I no longer knew what to believe. When I heard he had died, I felt a loss.

What did you really want to do for a living? What were you afraid you might end up doing?

Music, always. When I was in graduate school, I was also studying to be an opera singer. I still keep that up on weekends as a paid singer in an Episcopal Church in New Jersey where I have been cantor, tenor soloist, and section leader for the last 20 years. I also like to play jazz on the guitar with friends in a network of like-minded amateurs who come from many walks of life.

I was afraid I would end doing something I found boring, just to make money. Now I worry I should have made the money.

What’s the study you never pursued, but always wanted to?

I think Loic Wacquant is essentially on the mark when he asserts that we disproportionately ethnographize poor people. I would like to help redress this imbalance in the ethnographic record by conducting a participant-observation study of the decadent lifestyles of the rich and famous. This could add a new and valuable comparative dimension to my work, but I have not yet found a funder for this important and neglected line of research.

I can’t say I have enduring frustrations about not being able to study a particular thing. I could be interested in doing any number of different things, including musicological studies of the jazz world and studying changing sex roles and behaviors. What I am interested in lately and starting to do some work on is learning more about how gang members distance themselves from gangs over time.

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