Transforming Ethnography : User Experience Methods & Practices

Different from the social science tradition, ethnography today increasingly means different things to different people, depending on their disciplinary backgrounds, since this strategy is increasingly used by many practitioners in varied contexts and for varied purposes. Design ethnography and human factors engineering provide good examples in this context. This book will focus on discussing the notion and practice of ethnography, how it has evolved in the years and the differences for practitioners with different disciplinary backgrounds, especially in a context where ethnography exits academia to enter industry contexts. The book is divided into three sections. The first section provides the history, features, and trends in the area of ethnography. The second section elaborates on the different definition of ethnographic practices through applications and industry case study. And finally, the third section gives an overview of some of the advance practices in ethnography that are shaping the future. The book would be of use to engineers interested in advancing the understanding, design and implementation of concepts to investigate human-computer interaction, to psychologists seeking to understand human judgement in dynamic environments, and to computer scientists interested in understanding requirements for building hybrid systems. This book is also targeted for industry practitioners, product incubators, and entrepreneurs who are thinking of new business initiatives. These methods and case studies can help them in the strategic planning of their business. Exposing early on, the new workforce and students to other discipline methodologies and approaches would help in understanding the nuances between the disciplines and more importantly how to work in a collaborative way with other disciplines.