Expert writing advice from the editor of the Boston Globe best-seller, The Writer's Home Companion
Dissertation writers need strong, practical advice, as well as someone to assure them that their struggles aren't unique. Joan Bolker, midwife to more than one hundred dissertations and co-founder of the Harvard Writing Center, offers invaluable suggestions for the graduate-student writer. Using positive reinforcement, she begins by reminding thesis writers that being able to devote themselves to a project that truly interests them can be a pleasurable adventure. She encourages them to pay close attention to their writing method in order to discover their individual work strategies that promote productivity; to stop feeling fearful that they may disappoint their advisors or family members; and to tailor their theses to their own writing style and personality needs. Using field-tested strategies she assists the student through the entire thesis-writing process, offering advice on choosing a topic and an advisor, on disciplining one's self to work at least fifteen minutes each day; setting short-term deadlines, on revising and defing the thesis, and on life and publication after the dissertation. Bolker makes writing the dissertation an enjoyable challenge.

Drawing on more than four decades of experience as a researcher and teacher, Howard Becker now brings to students and researchers the many valuable techniques he has learned. Tricks of the Trade will help students learn how to think about research projects. Assisted by Becker's sage advice, students can make better sense of their research and simultaneously generate fresh ideas on where to look next for new data. The tricks cover four broad areas of social science: the creation of the "imagery" to guide research; methods of "sampling" to generate maximum variety in the data; the development of "concepts" to organize findings; and the use of "logical" methods to explore systematically the implications of what is found. Becker's advice ranges from simple tricks such as changing an interview question from "Why?" to "How?" (as a way of getting people to talk without asking for a justification) to more technical tricks such as how to manipulate truth tables.
Becker has extracted these tricks from a variety of fields such as art history, anthropology, sociology, literature, and philosophy; and his dazzling variety of references ranges from James Agee to Ludwig Wittgenstein. Becker finds the common principles that lie behind good social science work, principles that apply to both quantitative and qualitative research. He offers practical advice, ideas students can apply to their data with the confidence that they will return with something they hadn't thought of before.
Like Writing for Social Scientists, Tricks of the Trade will bring aid and comfort to generations of students. Written in the informal, accessible style for which Becker is known, this book will be an essential resource for students in a wide variety of fields.
"An instant classic. . . . Becker's stories and reflections make a great book, one that will find its way into the hands of a great many social scientists, and as with everything he writes, it is lively and accessible, a joy to read."—Charles Ragin, Northwestern University

《质的研究方法与社会科学研究》是国内第一部系统评介“质的研究方法”（qualitative research）的专著，对目前国际社会科学界提出的有关理论问题以及新近发展出来的操作手段进行了深入的探讨，并结合有关西方学者以及作者自己的研究实例对其进行了生动的展示和说明。“质的研究方法”目前在社会科学研究领域是与“量的研究方法”相提并论、交相辉映的一种研究方法，它要求研究者深入社会现象，通过亲身体验了解研究对象的存在方式和意义解释，在原始资料的基础之上建立相关理论。

您将在教学专家和学术畅销书作者艾尔·巴比（Earl Babbie）的指导下，学习社会科学研究的逻辑和技巧，并真正了解量化和质化研究的本质。作者通过幽默的话语和生动的比喻，特别是当今社会生活中各种触手可及的具体例子，深入浅出地讲解了社会研究的基本过程和各种具体的研究方法，带领初学者在不知不觉间进入社会研究的广阔天地。社会研究由此注定是一种需要与时俱进的实践。作为介绍和传授社会研究实践知识和技能的教材，本书的一再修订，正是社会研究方法中这种变与不变的特点的体现。 本书主分四部分。第一部分为社会研究绪论；第二部分介绍社会研究的设计问题；第三部分是对各种具体研究方法的介绍；第四部分介绍各种数据分析和处理方法。 拥有这本讲授研究方法的畅销书，社会科学研究将不再可望而不可及。