CASE STUDIESchanged through language use. The emphasis has
given rise to new orientations to traditional areas
of sociological research, such as science. Until
recently, sociologists of science have treated scien-
tific work as a simple, noninterpretive process
centered in scientists’ adherence to the rules of the
scientific method, which emphasizes how ‘‘facts’’
and ‘‘truth’’ emerge from observations of the ‘‘re-
al’’ world. Viewed this way, scientific facts are not
matters of interpretation or social constructions.
This view of science has been challenged by case
studies of scientific work that focus on the ways in
which scientific facts are socially produced based
on scientists’ interpretations of their experiments
(Latour and Woolgar 1979).
A major branch of ethnomethodology is con-
versation analysis, which focuses on the turn-by-
turn organization of social interactions (Sacks,
Schegloff, and Jefferson 1974). For conversation
analysts, social reality is collaboratively construct-
ed within turn-taking sequences, which may be
organized around such linguistic practices as ques-
tions and answers or charges and rebuttals. A
major contribution of conversation-analytic stud-
ies has been to show how IQ and other test results
are shaped by the ways in which test-givers and
test-takers interact (Marlaire and Maynard 1990).
Also, sociologists influenced by conversation analy-
sis theory have considered how power and domi-
nance are interactionally organized and accomplished.
Some qualitative sociologists have extended
and reformulated ethnomethodological case stud-
ies by analyzing the relationships between the
interpretive methods used by interactants in con-
crete situations and the distinctive meanings they
produce in their interactions. This approach to
case studies focuses on the practical and political
uses of meanings in social institutions. These
ethnographers analyze meanings as rhetorics which
interactants use to persuade others and to assign
identities to themselves and others. An important
contribution to this approach to case-study re-
search is Donileen Loseke’s (1992) study of deci-
sion making and social relations in a shelter for
battered women. Loseke details the practical con-
texts within which shelter workers, shelter resi-
dents, and applicants to the shelters encounter
each other and manage their social relationships.
It is in these encounters, Loseke states, that shelter
workers and residents give concrete meaning to
the abstract cultural category of battered women.Two other important, and related, trends in
case studies of reality construction involve com-
parative analysis of two or more cases, and the use
of new theoretical perspectives in analyzing case-
study data. One example is Jaber Gubrium’s (1992)
comparative analysis of two different family thera-
py sites. Gubrium uses observational data from the
sites to show how different therapy approaches are
organized to ‘‘detect’’ and remedy different kinds
of family and personal problems. He also shows
how aspects of Weberian theory may be used in
analyzing the sociological significance of family
therapy. Gale Miller and David Silverman (1995)
have also contributed to this development by com-
paratively analyzing social interactions in two dif-
ferent counseling centers located in the United
States and England. This study is based on the
ethnography of institutional discourse perspective
(Miller 1994), which is a strategy for developing
general theoretical statements from case-study
research.THE POLITICS AND POETICS OF WRITING
CASE STUDIESWhile some qualitative sociologists focus on the
folk methods of description and interpretation
used by others in creating realities, other sociolo-
gists are reconsidering the reality constructing
methods used by sociologists in writing case stud-
ies. Their interest centers in the question, How do
we do our work? The question raises issues about
the relationships between qualitative researchers
and the people they study. For example, is it
enough that case studies inform the public and
sociologists about aspects of contemporary socie-
ty, or should they also help the persons and com-
munities studied? A related issue involves editorial
control over the writing of case studies. That is,
should the subjects of case studies have a voice in
how they are described and analyzed?Such questions have given rise to many an-
swers, but most of them involve analyzing case
studies as narratives or stories that sociologists tell
about themselves and others. For example, John
van Maanen (1988) divides ethnographic writing
into several types of ‘‘tales’’ involving different