Return to Teamsterville: A reconsideration and dialogue on ethnography and critique

ABSTRACT

As the places of monuments are reconsidered today in light of social justice concerns, the authors revisit a “monument” of language and social interaction (LSI) research. Philipsen’s foundational work published nearly 50 years ago, “Speaking ‘Like a Man’ in Teamsterville,” thus becomes a starting point for dialogue among four scholars with diverse views on the critical voice in ethnography of communication research. When read today, the homophobic speech of Teamstervillers is shocking. Also surprising by present standards is that such speech passes unremarked and does not figure in the analysis. In the present essay, the authors—an LSI scholar, discourse studies scholar, critical rhetorical scholar, and an LSI doctoral student—review early debates on the critical voice, relate individual narratives of their experiences in either reading “Teamsterville” again after a long hiatus or encountering the work for the first time, and then conduct a joint dialogue on the question: What is the ethnographer’s obligation when harmful and oppressive speech is observed? Though their views remain diverse, the authors advocate for a disciplinary consensus: that the present moment calls for renewed discussion—and, even if differently practiced, affirmation—of the critical voice in the ethnography of communication.

KEYWORDS:

• Language and social interaction
• ethnography of communication
• speech codes theory
• critique
• ethics

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mark Ward

Mark Ward Sr. (Ph.D., Clemson University) is an associate professor of communication at the University of Houston-Victoria.

Leland G. Spencer

Leland G. Spencer (Ph.D., University of Georgia) is professor and chair in the Department of Interdisciplinary and Communication Studies at Miami University.

Craig O. Stewart

Craig O. Stewart (Ph.D., Carnegie Mellon University) is an associate professor of communication at the University of Memphis.

Elisa M. Varela

Elisa M. Varela is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Communication at the University of Colorado, Boulder.