Abstract
This book presents the results of a participant observation study carried out into the occurrence, frequency and organisation of political talk in everyday ordinary conversations in a small town (Ann Arbour) in Michigan USA during the later stages of Clinton's presidency from 1997 to the aftermath of Bush's election in 2000/01. Defined as ‘middle America’ the research explores the way politics and political issues feature as a routine and significant part of people's everyday conversations. The author suggests that in order to understand the contemporary political landscape in the USA attention needs to be paid to the way politics gets discussed in ordinary and mundane conversations where political awareness is expressed, opinion is formed and politics negotiated.
The research data comes mainly from hanging out at a corner store with different groups of people who gathered for morning coffee as well as members of a woman's guild located elsewhere. The main focal point of the research is on one particular group of ‘old timers’ who are predominantly white (there is one Mexican American) middle class, retired, conservative, republican, men who gather regularly at the store before presumably going off and doing their own thing. This group, who perceive of themselves as normal everyday (middle) Americans, is then contrasted with a number of the other groups, mostly defined in relation to the old timers as categories different from themselves such as black, young, women, homosexual, Democrats, and even people from a different town. Within this environment the significance of personal and group identity and geographical and social place as experienced and expressed by members of different groups becomes a central concern of the research locating the notion of identity in how the members of the groups see themselves and see themselves in relation to others and the wider political sphere.
The book is organised into eight chapters plus appendices but can really be seen to involve three main areas of differing emphasis. Chapters 1 and 2 lay out the groundwork for the study in terms of context, method and theory, sensitising the readership to the level of interactional detail and the importance of data not collected in a laboratory. Clearly the audience here is political science as much time is spent justifying the use of the qualitative method of content analysis and arguing for the importance of observing what people actually do and say in their natural environments. The next section, chapters, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, discuss the various findings building a picture of different aspects and contents of the conversations including, how social and political identity is used in various ways to achieve understanding of oneself and others, how events in the media are used or discussed and how sense is made of the debacle and eventual result of the 2000 USA election of George Bush. In the last section an appendix is given over to a methodological discussion in which more background detail about the process of research is given. Here, as well as survey information and samples of questions there is a discussion about the evolution of the Walsh's relationship with the old timers, of how the old timers might have adjusted their behaviour when she was there as they undoubtedly did but more interestingly how she evolved within their presence.
As a case study the work is interesting not only by what is being reported or described but also by emphasising the importance of ordinary interaction as a site of importance for understating the interplay and dynamics of social knowledge, identity and politics. As a personal research journey the work is engaging as Walsh reflects upon the changes of her perception and perspective over the years and the implications this evolution had on the research process. But the real strength of the book is as a way of understanding the media reporting of the 2004 USA (and Australian) election, of the failure of the political media, along with political advisors, commentators, academics including political scientists, to understand the world beyond their self-referential sphere. In this sense the work simply allows the reader to reflect upon their understanding of the political landscape by placing the routine, mundane ordinariness of conversation and interaction with one's friends as an essential part of the formation and evolution of social and political identity and indeed political action.
Overall by focusing on people chatting the book demonstrates that political talk is not confined to the elites, media, or specific political environments but that people talk about politics all the time and at different levels according to topics-at-hand. However, whilst opening the door a little the work seems a little hamstrung by the perceived audience. At the beginning the author situates the research as the first study by a political scientist of informal talk as it occurs in natural settings within groups not formed specifically for experimental purposes (p. 9). One can imagine that the rather startling revelation for political science is that it is not only political scientists who sit around and put the world to rights outside work and that this might actually be interesting and have consequences. On a more critical note this means there is an underlying preoccupation throughout the work with justifying and explaining the use of qualitative methods which leads to emphasis being given to how content analysis can inform survey research rather than being able to take further the initial observations to develop a more sophisticated understanding of how members of the group construct, negotiate and generally handle their political and social identity in relation to their local environment.