Ethnographic fieldwork and formal linguistic analysis have traditionally been thought to be diametrically opposed. In this provocative analysis Peter Manning argues that these methods of qualitative research are complementary. After examining the potential benefits and limitations of each method of analysis, the author shows how a synthesis of the two is more powerful than either alone.

Peter K. Manning holds the Elmer V. H. and Eileen M. Brooks Chair in the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University, Boston, MA. He has taught at Michigan State, MIT, Oxford, and the University of Michigan, and was a Fellow of the National Institute of Justice, Balliol and Wolfson Colleges, Oxford, the American Bar Foundation, the Rockefeller Villa (Bellagio), and the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, Wolfson College, Oxford. Listed in Whös Who in America, and Whös Who in the World, he has been awarded many contracts and grants, the Bruce W. Smith and the O.W. Wilson Awards from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, and the Charles Horton Cooley Award from the Michigan Sociological Association. The author and editor of some 20 books, including Privatization of Policing: Two Views (with Brian Forst) (Georgetown University Press, 2000), his research interests includes the rationalizing and interplay of private and public policing, democratic policing, crime mapping and crime analysis, uses of information technology, and qualitative methods.

Introduction
The Fieldwork and Its Traditions
Semiotics
Semiotics and Fieldwork
Some Examples
Reflections