Introduction:
The articles collected in this special issue are based on papers presented at the Yale Urban Ethnography Conference, ‘Urban Ethnography: Its Tradi- tions and Its Future’, held at Yale University in the spring of 2008. That conference has grown continuously from the initial gathering, held at the University of California, Los Angeles in 2002, and the University of Pennsylvania in 2003 and again in 2005. At the initial meeting, Jack Katz and Robert Emerson honored the traditions of the Chicago School and underscored the vital importance of fieldwork for understanding the social conditions of people living in cities, setting the stage for future conferences. Over the years, these conferences have been bringing together up-and- coming sociologists and seasoned scholars who bond through sharing the craft of ethnographic fieldwork. Our recent conference at Yale was a continuation of these efforts. More >>