Ethnography has a long history and was first used by the early anthropologists at the back end of the 18th and early 19th centuries. Urban ethnography was made popular by researchers from the Chicago School of the 1930s. Most early ethnographers studied families and children in what were then referred to as primitive societies. Nowadays ethnographic researchers may study children from other countries but are more likely to undertake studies in their own countries.
An ethnographer works within a community and may participate in what that community is doing, or they may sit on the sidelines and observe what is going on. Ethnographers make notes of what they see and how they see it; they may also speak with or interview some of the children they are observing. Ethnographers sometimes spend years in the field observing different groups. In a longitudinal study, they might go back into the field at a later date to observe what changes have occurred in the lives of the groups they were studying. While some ethnographers still prefer a notebook when they are in the field, most will transfer these notebooks to computers to sort into analytical files.
The purpose of ethnographies is to gain greater understanding of specific groups. Ethnographies of children may be undertaken to see how they interact within a classroom or playground environment. Or an ethnographer might be looking for data on how children fare in a hospital and how it affects them being away from the family home.
Ethnographies of children have contributed to our knowledge of how children react in certain situations and what might affect their progress in schools. Some ethnographies have looked at how working-class teenage boys have more problems in schools than those from middle-class homes, and what leads them into crime.
There are some serious problems for researchers wishing to undertake ethnographies of children. In some countries, particularly the U.K. and the U.S., researchers have to undergo criminal background checks; in the U.K. they have to have a certificate to prove they can work with children. Problems of researcher entry can happen in any field, but it is always difficult to get into schools and areas meant for children. The background checks and access difficulties are in place out of concern for children's safety and to ensure that those people who have access to children will not do them physical or sexual harm.