Ethnography is fundamentally the practice of seeing and thinking critically. While ethnography is conventionally imagined as a method confined to purely academic endeavors, ethnographic skills — understanding the impact of systems and structures on individual behavior, assessing cultural similarities and differences of people and places, and uncovering overlooked details — are not just useful but highly sought-after skills across industry, non-profit, advocacy, research, policy, and government roles. Yet for ethnographic practitioners, particularly students, it can be difficult to see and articulate the opportunities and uses of qualitative skills.

In the Thick of It — the newest project from the Public Ethnography Lab — seeks to fill this gap. We explore and highlight possible trajectories for anthropological, ethnographic, and qualitative work beyond purely academic roles. In each episode, our host sits down with one researcher to understand how they approach and deploy qualitative methods in their day-to-day work. Listeners will get a behind-the-scenes picture of applied anthropology and learn about the choices, challenges, and creativity that go into qualitative methods.