Stephen Hester Livres

"The Montreal Massacre: A Story of Membership Categorization Analysis adopts an ethnomethodological viewpoint to analyze how the murder of women by a lone gunman at the Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal was presented to the public via media publication over a two-week period in 1989. All that the public came to know and understand of the murders, the murderer, and the victims was constituted in the description and commentaries produced by the media. What the murders became, therefore, was an expression of the methods used to describe and evaluate them, and central to these methods was membership category analysis - the human practice of perceiving people, places, and events as "members" of "categories," and to use these to explain actions."--Jacket

Focusing on membership categorization, this collection of studies in ethnomethodology explores how individuals utilize membership categories in diverse contexts. Analyzing settings from the O.J. Simpson trial to television commercials and school meetings, the book delves into the implications of these categories on social interactions. It addresses classical sociological questions by emphasizing the nuances of how people identify and categorize themselves and others in everyday situations.

Focusing on ethnomethodology, this collection of original research studies by prominent scholars explores how it redefines sociological phenomena as actions performed by individuals within their local contexts. The contributions highlight the potential of this approach to uncover and investigate aspects of social life that are often overlooked in traditional sociological theories, offering fresh insights into everyday activities and interactions.