Martyn Hammersley (born 1949) is a British sociologist whose main publications cover social research methodology and philosophical issues in the social sciences.[1][2]
He studied sociology as an undergraduate at the London School of Economics (1967–70), and was subsequently a postgraduate student in the sociology department at the University of Manchester, obtaining an MPhil and PhD with a thesis reporting an ethnography of an inner-city secondary school.[3] At that time Manchester was a major centre for ethnomethodology, where it was in tension with symbolic interactionism and Marxism, and his work was influenced by all of these approaches.[4][5]
After a research fellowship and temporary lectureship at Manchester, he obtained a permanent position at The Open University in 1975. He was recruited to work on E202 Schooling and Society, a course that was subsequently embroiled in a public controversy about 'Marxist bias'.[6] He remained at the Open University until retirement in 2015, when he became Emeritus Professor of Education and Social Research.[7]
Hammersley's early research was in the sociology of education, with a particular focus on processes of classroom interaction in secondary schools.[8] He joined the Open University at a time when it was one of the leading centres for the 'new sociology of education',[9] and was involved in subsequent debates about the character and value of the various kinds of work coming under this heading.[10][11]
Many of his publications have been concerned with methodological and philosophical issues arising in sociology, and across the social sciences generally. These issues have included: the nature and role of theory, the criteria by which qualitative research should be evaluated, and the issues of objectivity and value neutrality.[12][13] He wrote a book on Herbert Blumer's methodological ideas, locating these in historical context.[14] He has written a number of articles on analytic induction (an approach developed by Florian Znaniecki), examining its history. In What's Wrong with Ethnography?, he advocates what he referred to as "subtle realism",[15] as opposed to various forms of relativism and scepticism.[16][17][18][19] With Paul Atkinson, he wrote an introduction to ethnography, now in its fourth edition.[20]
He has also examined issues surrounding the qualitative-quantitative divide, and the nature of qualitative research.[21][22][23]
More recently he has co-authored a book on ethics and qualitative research.[24] He is a critic of ethical regulation, in other words of institutional review boards and research ethics committees,[25] and has sought to clarify the concept of academic freedom.[26][27]
Hammersley has been involved in a series of controversies, for example over feminist methodology,[28] about racism and anti-racist research,[29] and concerning the character of qualitative research and the criteria of validity appropriate to it.[30][31] He has also questioned the arguments of the evidence-based practice movement.[32][33][34][35][36] In The Limits of Social Science, he argued that social science is limited to the discovery of value-relevant explanations for social phenomena, a position that is at odds with the grandiose claims frequently made for its potential contribution to public policy making and to transformative political action.[37]
He has written about ethnomethodology, assessing its radical claims.[38] He has produced books about the concept of culture and about other key sociological concepts.[39] Most recently, he has written articles about the sociologist Karl Mannheim,[40] and a book on Methodological Concepts.[41]
