AJS CONFERENCE Invitation

Causal Thinking and Ethnographic Research

March 8-9, 2012

The American Journal of Sociology, the Department of Sociology, and the Universityof Chicago Urban Network are sponsoring a conference, “Causal Thinking and Ethnographic Research,” devoted to understanding the contributions of ethnographic research to contemporary causal thinking and scientific inference.  Is counterfactual thinking useful to ethnographers?  Does ethnographic research help identify its flaws?  Are the deductive methods underlying QCA appropriate to a research endeavor primarily driven by induction and abduction?  Do mechanism-based explanations simply push the difficulties of causal inference deeper?  What approaches to inference in ethnographic research would constitute a better alternative?  Many of the most interesting and promising ethnographers in sociology will be addressing these and other questions.  

The conference will be held on March 8-9, 2012, on the University of Chicago’s Hyde Park campus.  Attendance is free, but space is limited, so registration is required.  Questions? Contact Patrick Reilly at preilly@uchicago.edu.