This is the second and comprehensively revised and greatly expanded edition of the best selling book on methods and methodology written by members or associates of the Department of Sociology, Goldsmiths College, University of London. All of the acknowledged strengths of the first edition have been retained and improved. There are completely new chapters covering audio recordings, the Internet, visual materials, focus groups, grounded theory, combining qualitative and quantitative methods, using data archives for statistical analysis, doing a dissertation, ethics, doing a literature review and more. A brand new section 3 provides case studies.In addition, this volume comes with:- Comprehensive bullet points and text boxes to facilitate study- A glossary of key terms- Web pointers in most chapter, to indicate relevant internet resources- A guide to further reading- A list of Key Terms at the end of each chapter- An associated web site with regularly updated live links to pointers, workshop and discussion exercises at www.rscbook.co.uk

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Bringing together many of the core classic and contemporary works in social and cultural research methods, this book gives students direct access to methodological debates and examples of practical research across the qualitative/quantitative divide. The book is designed to be used both as a collection of readings and as an introductory research methods book in its own right. Topics covered include: research methodology research design, data collection and preparation analyzing data mixing qualitative and quantitative methods validity and reliability methodological critique: postmodernism, post-structuralism and critical ethnography political and ethical aspects of research philosophy of social science reporting research. Each section is preceded by a short introduction placing the readings in context. This reader-text also includes features such as discussion questions and practical exercises. (view table of contents)

Product Description: Experiencing and Explaining Disease examines the different accounts of disease causation produced by research in epidemiology, biology and sociology, and the different meanings attached to states of illness by doctors, patients and the media...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: Praise for Health and Disease: A Reader:"An extremely useful book - covering a wide variety of health-related topics from several perspectives...makes available many of the research findings, ideas and analyses that influence current thinking and debates in the field of health and disease...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: `Apart from its inherent readability, I found three other attractive features about the book: First is the use of exemplars based on case studies from qualitative studies, including Whyte's Street Corner Society; second, is the quotes from key methodological texts reflecting on a range of qualitative research traditions; and third, is the use of philosophical argument and reference in the book which provided an added depth to the debate, often lacking in more practically oriented books...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: Constructing Death reviews sociological, anthropological and historical studies of death, grief and mourning in order to illuminate present-day experience. It is both an introduction to the sociological study of death, dying and bereavement, and an original contribution to death studies and social theory, combining a theoretical argument with original research material...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: This work reports the findings of a study of the last year of people's lives, based on a representative sample of 600 people dying in 1986. It involved interviews with the relatives, friends, doctors, nurses and others who knew and looked after the people who had died.

Product Description: In this book, medical knowledge comes under scrutiny from an interdisciplinary team of authors that includes sociologists, historians, epidemiologists and human biologists. They begin by examining modern culture and the coexistence of lay beliefs, alternative and complementary therapies, and orthodox scientific views of health and disease...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)