is an interesting starting point for another type of SAC observation, it does not work for
the present research, which calls for the collection of different kind of data and a deeper
description and analysis of it.
I strongly believe that ethnography allows for more than observations of the
world (be this participant or non-participant observation). Clifford has stated that
"ethnographic experience and the participant-observation ideal are shown to be
problematic" (1986,14). Moreover, he believes that the role of the ethnographer is no
more that of the "experienced" observer and calls for a discursive rather than a visual
paradigm. He says
Once cultures are no longer prefigured visually -as objects, theaters, texts- it
becomes possible to think of a cultural poetics that is an interplay of voices, of
positioned utterances. (1986,12)
Let me now consider another applied linguistics ethnographic approach and the
way it contrasts with van Lier,s.
5.2.1.2 Holliday
There are two points in which van Lier and Holliday do not coincide. These are
the classification of methods and the discussion of emic∕etic issues. Adrian Holliday
(1994, 1996, 1997) has often carried out and written specifically about ethnography in
language education research. According to him, ethnography is a branch of anthropology
that "studies the behaviour of groups of people", and agrees that it is very suitable for the
investigation of the teacher, the student and the classroom (1994,163). Being very
concerned about cultural issues, he also calls for a methodology "which must by nature
be culture-sensitive" (ibid, 160). Holliday states that through ethnography, people who
work within international English language education, can achieve what he calls a
"sociological imagination...(which) is essential if (we) are to understand and negotiate
the complexities of a cosmopolitan environment" (1996,250).
Unlike van Lier, Holliday does not draw a line between ethnography and action
research. On the contrary, he calls for an ethnographic action research, which according
to him takes the form of a spiral relationship between research and action:
To be realistic, this spiral has to begin with teaching, during the process
of teaching the teacher Ieams about the classroom, this learning gives rise to
an adaptation of the teaching methodology; the learning process continues
to evaluate the changes to the teaching methodology, which in turn requires