“Doing ethnography” in another culture involves first and foremost field
work, including observing, asking questions, participating in group activities,
and testing the validity of one’s perceptions against the intuitions of
natives. Research design must allow an openness to categories and modes
of thought and behavior which may not have been anticipated by the investigator.
The ethnographer of communication cannot even presuppose what
a speech community other than his own may consider to be “language,” or
who or what may “speak” it: “language” for the Ojibwa includes thunder;
dogs among the Navajo are said to understand Navajo; the Maori regard
musical instruments as able to speak; and drums and shells are channels
through which supernatural forces are believed to speak to members of the
Afro-Cuban Lucumí religious cult.