Ethnography and Virtual Worlds: Report on Online Ethnographic Study

This report provides an overview of the study of ethnography in virtual worlds, focusing on the application of ethnographic methods to online environments, particularly in gaming and non-gaming contexts. It references key literature, including Boellstorff et al. (2012) and Caliandro (2014), and discusses the challenges and opportunities of conducting ethnographic research in virtual spaces. The report highlights the importance of understanding online cultures and social interactions, emphasizing the use of participant observation and the integration of traditional and virtual methods. It addresses common myths about ethnography, research design, and ethical considerations, and it also touches on the complexities of online communication and interviewing techniques. The report concludes by emphasizing the significance of studying virtual worlds using ethnographic tools to study cultures and the social groups formed within these environments.

Running head: ETHNOGRAPHY AND VIRTUAL WORLD
ETHNOGRAPHY AND VIRTUAL WORLD
Name of the Student
Name of the university
Author’s note

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ETHNOGRAPHY AND VIRTUAL WORLD
ETHNOGRAPHY AND THE STUDY OF VIRTUAL WORLD
Ethnography and the virtual world provide a concise and a comprehensive guide for the
students who are interested for studying the online virtual worlds for the game and the non game
environments (Caliandro, 2014). Although it can be tempting to depend on the quantitative and
the qualitative methodologies for studying the online gaming system as detailed information can
be brought about the devices they use or how long they play. However there is more to a group
of human beings than a statistical data can tell. Chapter three of this book has exclusively
discussed about the 10 myths related to ethnography (Boellstorff et al. 2012). Students working
on the ethnographic study might have confusion about ethnographic researches as it deviates
from the conventional qualitative, science based researches that were normally taught in schools.
The chapter has pointed out some of the associated myths like lack of scientific base, lacking
validity as quantitative researches, anecdotal characteristics, intuitive, is mainly based on self
reported experience and is always undermined by the subjectivity and that the ethnographers
contaminate the site by their presence, ethnography and grounded theory is same, ethnography
and ethno-methodology are similar and that ethnography will become obsolete.
The chapter 4 of this book have described about the different research design and
preparation for the ethnographic study. This chapter shared anecdotes from the own experiences
of the author studying about online worlds and showcasing the challenges of conducting research
in the gaming world. Chapter 5 deals with participants’ observation in virtual world. These
chapters provided suitable information about how the participants are monitored in the virtual
world and what they admit about what they can do from the interviews. It provides with an

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account of the procedures to be done when there is a breach of the research ethics during
participants’ observation and the proper time management skills that are required to do the
participant observation in the online gaming worlds. It can be understood that integration of the
traditional and the virtual ethnographic methods can help the researcher in developing
understanding about the various relationships between the offline and the online cultural life.
According to Boellstorff, Nardi, Pearce & Taylor (2012), an ethnographic method is particularly
suited for studying the virtual worlds. Since, humans are continuously crafting themselves
through culture; hence they had always been virtual. This provides the rationale that the online
virtual world can also be studies by using the same ethnographic tools to study cultures in the
reality. It is the collective and the interactive nature of the worlds that enables the development
of the social groups having specific regulations and practices (Morgan, 2014). Hence, life in the
virtual world is social, collective and cultural which increases the chance of applying the
ethnographic methods for understanding the action and the interaction of human in this world.
One of the appreciable thing in this book is that the author have also reminded that there are also
presence of significant complications for interviewing the people over the phone over text based
media like lack of facial expressions.

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References
Boellstorff, T., Nardi, B., Pearce, C., & Taylor, T. L. (2012). Ethnography and virtual worlds: A
handbook of method. Princeton University Press.
Caliandro, A. (2014). Ethnography in digital spaces: Ethnography of virtual worlds,
netnography, & digital ethnography. Handbook of anthropology in business, 738-761.
Morgan, R. (2014). Virtual Reality: An Ethnographic Study of Sociality, Being, and Money in a
Multi-player Online Game-world (Doctoral dissertation, James Cook University).