Volleyball – An Ethnographic Drama

Through this amazing and engaging feat of verbal ballet, Blackledge and Creese don’t just help readers understand the complex, multisemiotic play of social interaction — they make them feel it. This play will change the way you think about reporting research findings. It will also change the way you watch or participate in sports, or any other embodied collective undertaking. * Rodney Jones, University of Reading, UK *

This book pushes for alternative representations of research in a refreshing and entertaining way. By highlighting 'difference within repetition', the authors address aspects of research data that usually get lost in traditional ethnographies. The play script culminates in an increasing overlap between participants' and researchers' voices, showing how a well-oiled team ethnography becomes an act of coordination.

* Annelies Kusters, Heriot-Watt University, UK *

Wonderfully critical and creative, this ethnographic drama on volleyball puts in the limelight the conditions and consequences of scientific knowledge production. At the same time, it is a compelling example of how to do it differently. This book gets a standing ovation.

* Sari Pietikäinen, University of Jyväskylä, Finland *

I applaud the innovative method used by Blackledge and Creese to write a theatrical play where the coaches and players of a volleyball team are the stars [...] What makes this a good read for those interested in ethnography, is how the sport examples are recorded, analyzed, and then the accurate communicative and sociocultural rituals and patterns of volleyball players are presented as conclusions. I can’t wait for the curtain to open on the stage
version of this book.

-- Frederick L. Battenfield, North Greenville University, USA * International Journal of Sport Communication, 2022 *

...the authors make an interesting point about the use of the body as means of communication...to play the game in the case of volleyball players and the coach, in particular when people have different linguistic backgrounds...These practices, the authors show us, have a particular rhythm, they occur under certain circumstances, and even though they are not entirely the same, we notice they go through a process of ritualisation as they are produced and circulated in specific times and places.

-- Rommy Anabalon Schaaf, IOE, UCL, UK * Journal of Sociolinguistics, 2022 *

Adopting the principles of ethnographic research in combination with those of drama (for instance, dancing, rhythmic discourse, or simultaneous talk and movement), the authors allegorically illustrate mundane issues of social life in their attempt to move away from the traditional ways of conducting ethnographic research. Hence, their perspective opens new avenues for the future of ethnography.

* Anastasia Stavridou, University of Manchester, UK, Language in Society 52 (2023) *