Immersion: A Writer’s Guide to Going Deep

183 Pages·2016·1.002 MB·English

by  Ted Conover

ImmersIon
Writing for Social Scientists
Howard S. Becker
The Craft of Research
Wayne C. Booth, Gregory G. Colomb, Joseph M. Williams,
Joseph Bizup, and William T. FitzGerald
The Chicago Guide to Fact- Checking
Brooke Borel
Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes
Robert M. Emerson, Rachel I. Fretz, and Linda L. Shaw
Getting It Published
William Germano
From Notes to Narrative
Kristen Ghodsee
Storycraft
Jack Hart
The Chicago Guide to Collaborative Ethnography
Luke Eric Lassiter
The Subversive Copy Editor
Carol Fisher Saller
A Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations
Kate L. Turabian
Tales of the Field
John Van Maanen
I m m e r s I o n
A Writer’s Guide to Going Deep
VVV
VV
V
T e d C o n o V e r
The UniversiTy of ChiCago Press
Chicago and London
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2016 by Ted Conover
All rights reserved. Published 2016.
Printed in the United States of America
25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16  1 2 3 4 5
isBn- 13: 978- 0- 226-4 1616- 8 (cloth)
isBn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 11306- 7 (paper)
isBn- 13: 978- 0-2 26- 11323- 4 (e- book)
Doi: 10.7208/chicago/9780226113234.001.0001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Conover, Ted, author.
Title: Immersion : a writer’s guide to going deep / Ted Conover.
Other titles: Chicago guides to writing, editing, and publishing.
Description: Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2016. | Series:
Chicago guides to writing, editing, and publishing | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCn 2016015885| isBn 9780226416168 (cloth : alk. paper) |
isBn 9780226113067 (pbk. : alk. paper) | isBn 9780226113234 (e-book)
Subjects: LCsh: Reportage literature–Authorship. | Participant observation. |
Investigative reporting. | Creative nonfiction.
Classification: LCC Pn3377.5.r45 C66 2016 | DDC 808.02–dc23
LC record available at https:// lccn .loc .gov /2016015885
♾ This paper meets the requirements of ansi/niso Z39.48- 1992
(Permanence of Paper).
For Asa and Nell

Contents
Introduction / 1
i. Why immerse? / 7
ii. Choosing a sUBjeCT anD gaining aCCess / 32
iii. onCe insiDe / 49
iv. UnDerCover: moving BeyonD sTUnT / 88
v. WriTing iT / 112
vi. afTermaTh / 145
Acknowledgments / 153
Annotated Bibliography / 155
Index / 165

Go talk with those who are rumored to be unlike you,
And whom, it is said, you are so unlike . . .
. . . Let the new sound in our streets be the patient sound
Of your discourse.
riCharD P. WiLBUr
(from the poem “For the Student Strikers,”
written for the Wesleyan Strike News,
Spring 1970)