Ethnographic Methodology

I finished my first assignment for Ethnographic Methodology. I like it so much!
I wrote in the last paragraphs:

During last week I have thought about how I should organize my report on this exercise. Now, I see that it is 3501 words and much more than necessary. Why I am writing these seemingly useless words?! Because during this exercise I have found out how much the researcher, her background, her emotions, her knowledge, and her experiences can shape the nature of the research in participatory observation. I feel guilty a little bit because I think I have not observed my sites very well and seemed I have observed myself, as a researcher, rather than my sites! And I have collected data about myself rather than the observed. This exercise is really helping me to discover myself rather than “others”. Maybe I have done wrong in the process of doing exercise. But I have never known that to be dominant on the new place is so much important to me!

In other hand, there are some unanswered questions in my mind. Is knowledge production in Ethnography, especially in this method, dependent on the researcher’s life, emotion, knowledge, experience, etc. so much? The process of the research has been wonderful for me, as a researcher. I actually feel that I have done something inner and valuable for my exercise and I have learned many new points during this practical work. I will follow this method for my future real researches undoubtedly. But am I eligible to be in the center of the research? Can I say it was my first experience and I was excited more than usual in using a new method? Can I imagine that passing time and dominating to mechanisms of this method will help me in the future?

I finish this report which this concern; Maybe I have not applied the true principles of participatory observation methodologically but I cannot deny my great pleasure in experiencing a qualitative method which “respect and value” me as a researcher personally…