An extension of basic ethnographic research principles that focuses intentionally on everyday concrete social relationships is called what?

• A. Institutional ethnography
• B. Ethnography
• C. Field study
• D. Participant observation

Answer: (A)

This question tests understanding of a research approach that moves beyond simply describing daily life to examining how everyday social actions are organized by larger institutions and their rules. The approach being described is institutional ethnography. It starts from people’s routine work and experiences and then traces how institutions—through policies, forms, text, and administrative procedures—coordinate and constrain those everyday activities. In practice, researchers might interview workers about their day-to-day tasks and follow the flow of instructions, paperwork, and bureaucratic processes to map how ruling relations shape what people do, when they do it, and with whom they interact. This focus on how concrete social relations are organized by institutional structures is what sets institutional ethnography apart from traditional ethnography, field study, or general participant observation, whose primary aims are more about describing culture, setting, or phenomena without that explicit emphasis on institutional coordination of daily life.