Different stances in participant observation. As I was positioned in various locations during the 94 hours and 45 minutes of participant observation at Hoshūkō, the participatory stances I adopted were not fixed and stable. They changed according to the context and the relationship between myself and the other social actors present. Xxxxxx (1960) cited in Xxxxx (2004, p. 229) outlines four stances66 in participant observation: complete participant, complete observer, participant as observer and observer as participant. Complete participant implies covert observation; the researcher is carrying out research without anyone being aware of this. This could be a class teacher researching her own class without informing the students. According to Xxxxxxxx (1993, cited in Xxxxx et al., 2000, p. 314) covert participant observation has become a largely unacceptable research method because it violates the tenets of informed consent, invades the privacy of individuals and the places they inhabit, treats the individuals as research objects and places the researcher in a misrepresented position. Although it is considered to be unacceptable, it can generate a complete understanding of the situation (Xxxxx, 2004). It could be argued that when I was in the library my research was to some extent covert. Only the head of the library knew that I was a PhD student, the other mothers saw me as a volunteer. I was also a covert observer when I was observing my younger son’s class and the cultural events as I was positioned as a parent and not as a researcher. Although it was relatively easy for me to adopt this positioning, it was impossible for me to become fully integrated in the group because I was a White British mother and all the other mothers with whom I came into contact were seemingly Japanese, so I stood out both racially and linguistically. The second stance is that of complete observer. This means that the researcher observes people without any social interaction with those being observed in order to reduce the possibility of reactivity. An extreme example of this would be to observe students through a one way mirror (Xxxxx, 2004). However, this quasi-scientific stance has serious limitations as the observer may not be able to understand the meanings of the people being observed and, therefore, an alien framework of meaning could be imposed on the events (Xxxxx, 2004). Moreover, it would also be problematic in terms of understanding what the people being researched made of their world due to a lack of social int...
