Driving home with a friend one afternoon (we'll pseudonymise him as 'Mike'), we fell into one of those common discussions that mark a high point of a lazy graduate student afternoon: should academic writing be entertaining to read? I asked him what he thought of the position of another friend of mine (we'll pseudonymise him as 'Andrew'), who (in a similar conversation) argued that academic writing is not intended to be entertaining. Rigorous and meticulous analysis, Andrew said, are antithetical to entertainment, and those who criticise it as boring are missing the point. Citing Goffman, Mike argued that he found Goffman endlessly entertaining and tended, as a result, to read more thoroughly and ultimately make better use of the material. We came to no conclusions, of course - that would be dreadful, we'd never be able to waste further afternoons talking about it! Thinking about it later, though, I came to appreciate that while I could see where Andrew's position came from--so many social science and humanities disciplines desperately long for the credibility of science--I wanted to believe in Mike's position. I wanted to feel so strongly about research that I "made better use of it". Entertainment, of course, is one of several motivators of strong feelings, so I hoped I would find some entertaining sociological research. It was through Clifford Geertz's writing that I first came across the field called "ethnography", and found a field, particularly recently, has come to value entertaining writing. And so it is that I had the distinct pleasure of reviewing an entertaining book about popular entertainment: Karaoke Nights: An Ethnographic Rhapsody, by Rob Drew.

Perhaps one shouldn't be surprised that Karaoke Nights is, as Henry Jenkins and Andrew Goodwin have already written, a satisfying page-turner. After all, it is part of the Ethnographic Alternatives series which values experimental, boundary-blurring material. Furthermore, Drew himself spells out that his preferred mode of work is "Ethnography with a passion" (24-30), and, as I have already mentioned, modern ethnography has embraced the interpretive vignette as a critical part of its methodology, both in fieldwork notes and later writing up. Nevertheless, it is a refreshing experience to read honest and appealing narratives interwoven with enough theory to remind you that this is, in fact, nice work if you can get it.

Karaoke Nights is about the performance of the social self. While this is a theme common to ethnography, most sociological explorations of self-performance are at some level metaphorical. Karaoke Nights has the interesting twist of having to deal with intensely literal performances. After a brief prologue ("Give it a shot") and chapter one's introduction to the situation ("Karaoke Stateside"), Drew takes us through four chapters analysis ("What Would You Think if I Sang Out of tune", "Singing the Self", "Relating in the Limelight", and "The Authority Song"), and, a conclusion ("Good, Old Karaoke"). Each analysis chapter is an exploration of a different aspect of Karaoke performance, covering performance styles, performers, audiences, and emcees. Such a dry description of the structure of the book, though, does not do justice to its rich descriptive style, which is its strongest point.

Drew's time as a participant-observer and interviewer rewards the reader with an enormous tapestry of personal, observed, and reported experiences. I think that the sign of a good ethnography is that the experiences described are not stranded blocks of indented text among dry analysis, but that the exposition is so strong that data and analysis merge into interpretation, such that once you have read through a section there is that feeling of "Oh, I see why they do that now." A reader will never approach the feeling of a member, but surely the point of ethnography is to bring us very close. Drew's expository structure is very good, building each kind of performance aspect thoroughly, and each of the aspects into a larger whole. Drew's autobiographical comments, which permeate the book, play an important role in helping the reader identify with Karaoke performers and communities, and Drew is to be commended for his bravery in using them. Auto-ethnography has a tendency to be cloying, but Drew is canny, often using autobiographical excerpts to introduce sections of analytical points, or to act as signposts between analytical points. One of my favourite parts of the book is his section on self-deprecation (42-46). The section begins with an autobiographical account of car journeys with his father and brother, and his brother's amazing talent for rap. This history is used to make sense of the actions of his brother, many years later, when a Karaoke version of "Rapper's Delight" fails to match his brother's memory of the song, sending his brother spiralling into self-deprecation, only to be 'saved' by the crowd.

If I have any bones to pick with Karaoke Nights, they would be on Drew's use of and approach to theory. First, while Drew skilfully blends data and analysis, theory is less well integrated into the work. References to other authors are usually to be found at the end of paragraphs, usually in the form of short quotations, rather than being paraphrased and analysed in exposition. As such, I felt that most references were used as 'mere support', and were very subsidiary to Drew's project. Indeed, that they were commonly used to support one of Drew's points brings me to my second criticism. Drew uses theory only to support his argument. Rarely, if ever, does he explicitly disagree with another researcher. This is somewhat worrying, as it makes it difficult to place this work among current ethnographic debates. While I certainly do think that ethnographies must, first and foremost, capture the feel of a particular social situation, it is also critical that researchers address one another, argue, disagree, and demonstrate how they are a part of the research community. This is, indeed, what separates academic ethnography from journalism.

Those criticisms aside, Karaoke Nights is well worth reading, and Drew's amusing, accessible, and amiable style ensures that it is readable many times and at many levels.

Details

Karaoke Nights: An Ethnographic Rhapsody
Rob Drew
Altamira Press
September 2001
160pp
ISBN 0-7591-0046-2
Paper back $21.95