The methodology Mitchell-Walthour used in her research for this book was a “mixed-method approach using original survey data collected in 2005-2006 and original survey data collected in 2008. She also used survey data collected from the Latin American Political Opinion Project from 2010 and 2012, which included 1,500 respondents each. The author relied on surveys and in-depth interviews, in which the surveyor allowed the respondents to self-identify themselves through open-ended questions as preto or pardo. In order to efficiently and properly facilitate the survey data collection, Mitchell-Walthour hired and trained Brazilian students from São Paulo and Salvador to conduct interviews in neighborhoods. These neighborhoods were chosen from professors at the Federal University of Bahia and the University of São Paulo because they had detailed knowledge of the landscape of heterogeneity of the Brazilian class. Mitchell-Walthour also employed a skip-number method that consisted of her interviewing every fifth house or third house in certain neighborhoods. By obtaining a map of the neighborhoods in the aforementioned cities, Mitchell-Walthour hired interviewers informed the respondents that personal information was not required for the survey. The first necessary component needed was to ensure that the respondent was of African-descent or Afro-Brazilian descent. The interviewers made sure to avoid invoking any racial group or colors upon vetting the respondent, but they did certify that the respondents were of voting age. During the last set of interviews in the aforementioned countries as well as Rio de Janeiro, Mitchell-Walthour and her research assistant traveled through several public locations to interview 76 people. They asked people “What is your color of race?” and used their “skin tone, education, self-identification, age, and hairstyle to give a fuller description of respondents” (Mitchell-Walthour, 2017). Through these methodological approaches, the author was able to gain the necessary elements to pursue to help answer her research goals that were mentioned in the theories component.
Methods Mitchell-Walthour
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Very good synopsis.
Everyone:
What do you see as the strengths and weaknesses of the methods used in the book?
Dr. Manning,
As I stated in my discussion in the empirical claims made by Mitchell and Gladys, I see the strengths of their methodology in the identification of three distinct cities, one being Salvador (the greatest income inequality in Brazil) to aid in their analysis. By selecting key cities for comparative analysis, the authors are able to capture a part of the population and dissect its racial issues without having to interview the entire country. I believe they also do well in how they create their mixed-method study to understand how Brazilians view themselves compared to the binary view of race held by other countries. However, the limited survey of 1500 people and the 76 public area surveys are too small for broader analysis. They would need to conduct more surveys for more people over a greater period of time to gain better data for their hypothesis. The empirical claims they make do have merit from their study, however the scope/range of these claims remains in question.