Metropoems: Poetic Method and Ethnographic Experience

Marechal, Garance ORCID: 0000-0001-7134-081X and Linstead, Stephen (2010) Metropoems: Poetic Method and Ethnographic Experience QUALITATIVE INQUIRY, 16 (1). pp. 66-77. ISSN 1077-8004, 1552-7565

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Abstract

Discussions of the use and significance of poetry as a research tool have raised the question of poetic technique and craftsmanship in ethnographic poetic outputs. In this article, the authors look explicitly at a contemporary poetic form, the "metropoem" originated by French Oulipian poet Jacques Jouet,¹ arguing that it presents a potentially valuable new tool for qualitative research for four reasons. First, the "metropoetic" form enables the taking of a position that neither turns inward toward the ethnographer's self nor outward toward an empathic relation with the ethnographic other, but is focused in the moment, in place, and in motion-which resists the temptations of nostalgia and Romanticism that have attracted criticism of "research poetry." Second, it imposes a discipline that is derived from a specific activity, which embodies the rhythms, time, and space of that activity, distinguishing metropoems from poetry that recollects or represents. Third, it demands attention to technique, to poetry as a craft, which underscores calls made by recent critical work in this area. Finally, despite being practically, empirically, and metaphorically enformed by the mobility of contemporary urban social experience, it offers a method that can usefully be adapted to encapsulate other forms of social life. © 2010 SAGE Publications.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	## TULIP Type: Articles/Papers (Journal) ##
Uncontrolled Keywords:	research poetry, poststructuralism, ethnography, poetic form, creative constraints
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	22 Sep 2015 10:41
Last Modified:	16 Jun 2026 17:28
DOI:	10.1177/1077800409349757
Related Websites:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/2027364
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