ABSTRACT

First published in 1985, this book provides a descriptive study of social activities in a neurosciences laboratory. Based on fieldwork conducted by the author in the laboratory during 1975 and 1976, and taking an ethnomethodological approach, it focuses on the phenomenon of the social accomplishment of natural scientific order. Through the examination of shop work and shop talk in this environment, it identifies an analyzable social basis in the local production of accounts of natural objects in laboratory research.

This work will be of interest to students and scholars of ethnomethodology and sociology.

part I|118 pages

Ethnographic accounts of shop work

chapter 2|28 pages

The lab setting

chapter 4|60 pages

An archeology of artifact

part II|133 pages

Agreement in laboratory shop talk

chapter 8|23 pages

Conclusion