Description: In The Poverty of the Ethnography of Poverty, Loïc Wacquant dissects how sociologists who carry out field studies of the poor write about race, class, and morality in the city's underbelly; the blinders and biases that affect their research and how to overcome them; and how to become aware of these biases and develop a better meshing of theory and research.
Review Quotes: "This is tour-de-force Wacquant at the height of his maturity, erudition, and analytical brilliance, mixing fireworks, reflexivity, humor, and empathy. Dive in headfirst and you will emerge smarter, more alert, and energized to carry out theoretically rich and empirically rigorous fieldwork." -- Philippe Bourgois, author of In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio
"The Poverty of the Ethnography of Poverty makes a compelling case for the power of ethnography for understanding the richness, complexities, and messiness of the social world. Wacquant offers a thoroughly sourced, impressively capacious, and engagingly written history of the method--an invaluable resource for students and practitioners of the craft." -- Cecilia Menjívar, author of Enduring Violence: Ladina Women's Lives in Guatemala