Enthnography And Ethnomethodology (Brief Introduction)

Varieties of Talk
The study of language comes broadly into the wider area. After investigating such number of language varieties, the various ways people communicate through language is also explored. The point we should slightly understand is that communication is not only the matter of transferring messages through spoken language, but also what it might be said as ‘the absence of talk’ or silent way and body movement. This second term particularly take us into the deep inside of language world. The deeper the more complicated. That is why the investigation about varieties of talk then apparently well-expanded.



Since the two varieties of talk; that are the talk (talkative) and the absence of talk (silent) found, Marshal (1961) did such field research concerning those two ways of talk. He clearly figured out that The Ikung, a bush-dwelling people of South West Africa, used language talkatively in consideration of avoiding such friction among groups in their community. Being known that hunters and gatherers are primarily their occupation, therefore cooperation and companionship must be built strongly by keeping communication open among them. However, there may particular vocabularies which often spoken by; such as about foods and gift-giving. In other case, the discussion about sexual matter, mentioning the name of Gods loudly is regarded to be taboo.
Just in contrast, The Western Apache of East Central Arizona as viewed bay Basso (1972) had extremely different way in expressing uncertainty and ambiguity. They expected to be silent when they meet strangers as well as the strangers do too. Consequently, they are difficult to adapt to the new relationship. This way also considerably to avoid any conflicts, that is why keeping silent on ‘the curse of all sorts’ is better than responding.
Garderner (1966) found out that The Puliyanese uniquely has both characteristics. In some ways they are cooperative that refers to much to talk about, but in other ways they are competitive in which they do not need to talk at all. Such societies, let’s say The Roti in The Southwestern Tip of Timor in Eastern Indonesian considered talking is only for pleasure. The Araucranian men of Chile are explicitly more talkative, while women re not. And so many examples of societies with their own characteristics in talking spread all over the world that are supposed to be different each other. Anyway, those differences arise from particular needs of societies, since language is arbitrary.

The Ethnography of Communication
Ethnography refers to the factors which mainly support a certain communicative event to attain its purposes. It can also simply be defined as the description of communication in particular culture. Hymes (1974) had already pointed out the 8 relevant factors of ethnography.
1.The setting and scene of speech. Setting derives from the truly physical condition in which speech occurred such as time and place. While scene refers to the abstract psychological setting. And it tends to be more culturally.
2.The participants. It refers to the 'doer', such as speakers-listeners who play the interchangeable role in conversation. However, there might be possibly more than just two person communications. Let's have a look to the classroom activity where the teacher delivers questions and the student should responds, while the rest of class member may become an audience.
3.Ends. It goes to the personal goals that are expectedly the out come of such exchanges. Different people may vary in the way they decide their own goals, since it takes very personal 'business'.
4.Act Sequences. It exposes the form and content of certain speech. For examples; word choices, ways of using, and the connection between particular content and the actual topic. Different setting will influence the form of speaking. People speak in the academic event will be completely different with the cocktail party chatter, for instance. Different people potentially have different ways of interaction and interpretation.
5.Key. It goes to the tone, manner, gesture, speech behavior, or spirits which are entirely contributed to the message sent. The key sometimes included to nonverbal element of speaking, for instance; serious, humorous, pedantic, ironic, hyperbolic, symbolic, etc.
6.Instrumentalities. It tends to be the choice of channel or style of communication, such as; oral, written, or graphic. It may also refer to the forms of speech, for instance languages, dialects, codes, etc.
7.Norms of Interaction and Interpretation. This term goes to the specific behavior of speaking and how do people interpretative it. Let's see how the church services have a certain norms of interaction. However because societies naturally vary their interpretation toward the social phenomenon, consequently there will be some groups who are considered to abnormal, unacceptable, middle class-society, 'high' class, so on.
8.Genre. It is kind limitation of such expression. The form of poems, prayers, editorials, ceremonial events, casual speech and any other different forms are the reflection of the culturally different way of expression.
These 8 factors are factually the proof that talk is kind of complex activity. It needs 'hard' work to be apparently presented. That is why speakers and listeners should be in ' good partnership' to make up the communication run smoothly. However, since communicators have different ability in communication, consequently there may be some misinterpretation which potentially disturbs the interaction of society.
Anyway, 3 linguists; Jakobson (1960), Halliday (1973), and Robinson (1972) figured out the different function of language in communication. These are such function that been listen by Halliday; instrumental, regulatory, interactional, personal, heuristic, imaginative, and representational. While these are Robinson's; avoidance, conformity to norm, aesthetic, encounter regulation, perfomative, regulation, affective, marking of emitter, role relationship making, referential, instruction, inquiry, and metalanguage function.
What should learn form language according to Gumperz (1972) are the communicative competence and the linguistic competence. In this term, Hymes tried to clarify by arguing that we learn both what language is and how to use it. The underlined point from this discussion is that learning to speak means learning to talk.
Ethno methodology
This term come from the body of sociology which concerns about talk-viewed. The expert of this study stands for investigating processes and techniques of world interpretation that done by people in their daily living, how people formulate their interpretation toward their real world In this case, the Ethno methodologists focus only on the phenomena of everyday existence. When people interact socially, they concern much in meaning and meaningful activity which mostly expressed verbally. Therefore language takes the very significant role in building up the relationship to one another.
Ethno methodologist mentioned the term commonsense knowledge as the variety of things. It can be a kind of things (fruits, vegetables, meals, etc), particular different things (water and fire, sun and moon), types (people, occupations, objects, events), or abstraction such as principles, understandings, objectives, definitions, etc. The general truth such as; the earth that goes around the sun, the life as the series of ups and downs, the children who will grow up gradually, etc. are also kind of commonsense knowledge. People acquire that knowledge through experience, during these processes people may acquired differently to one another because of different circumstances, goals, times and places, basically needs, and so on. Some people are excellent in comprehending world view but some people are not.
Well, then practical reasoning become the way they make a use of their commonsense knowledge. How they start questioning, reforming logical thinking, investigating such things, testing such hypothesis, solving problems, finding the knowledge, applying particular knowledge in everyday life, and so on.
In conclusion, the Ethnography and Ethno methodology broaden our mind into the very wide world phenomenon. What our life is and how it should be.