SO492      Half Unit
Qualitative Social Research Methods

This information is for the 2025/26 session.

Course Convenor

Availability

The course introduces students to the theory and practice of qualitative research methods in sociology. The seminars address issues of research design, data collection and analysis in relation to qualitative research methods, including ethnography, in-depth interviewing, and textual analysis. Taking these methods together, we will build toward an understanding of best practice in qualitative inquiry. Based on the principle that doing is one of the best means of learning, this course is highly interactive and requires ‘hands-on’ participation in a series of practical exercises and project work throughout the term. A digital Research Diary detailing course objectives on a week by week basis will be distributed at the beginning of the term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Autumn Term.

This course is usually delivered through a combination of lecture, small group and large group work. There will be two hours or more of teaching each week in AT.

Proposal

The formative assessment will be an ethics review in preparation for the summative research report, to be submitted in the AT.

• Mason, J., & Dale, A. (Eds.) (2011). Understanding social research: Thinking creatively about method. 
• Luker, Kristin. Salsa Dancing into the Social Sciences: Research in an Age of Info-Glut.
• Law, J. (2007). Making a mess with method.
• Tuhiwai Smith, L. (1999) Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples. 
• Lareau, A. (2021). Listening to People: A Practical Guide to Interviewing, Participant Observation, Data Analysis, and Writing it All Up.
• Timmermans, S and Tavory I. (2022). Data Analysis in Qualitative Reserch: Theorizing with Abductive Analysis.
• Small, M and Calarco J. (2022). Qualitative Literacy: A Guide to Evaluating Ethnographic and Interview Research.
• Pardo-Guerra, J. P. (2025). The Oxford Handbook of the Sociology of Machine Learning. Oxford University Press.
• Keller, R. (2013). Doing discourse research. 
• Rose, Gillian, Dr. Visual Methodologies: An Introduction to the Interpretation of Visual Materials, SAGE. 
• Pink, S. (2015). Situating sensory ethnography. 

Research report (100%) in January

The assessment consists of an individual qualitative research report due in January.

Attendance at all classes and submission of all set coursework is required.