I recently visited the Portland, OR offices of Intel. There are a million fascinating things I learned but before I get into all the cool technology and inspiration, I want to share an amazing person named Genevieve Bell. She came to Intel after serving as a guest lecturer at Stanford University. She leads Intel’s social sciences research team. I was instantly impressed. Watch and see why.

Genevieve Bell spoke with us about her ethnography research and Intel’s TV obsession. Listening to her talk so passionately about what TV does for and with humans is fascinating!

What is Ethnography?

Ethnography (Greek ἔθνος ethnos = folk/people and γράφειν graphein = writing) is a research strategy often used in the social sciences, particularly in anthropology and in some branches of sociology.^[1] It is often employed for gathering empirical data on human societies/cultures. Data collection is often done through participant observation, interviews, questionnaires, etc. Ethnography aims to describe the nature of those who are studied (i.e. to describe a people, an ethnos) through writing.^[2] In the biological sciences, this type of study might be called a “field study” or a “case report,” both of which are used as common synonyms for “ethnography”.^[3]

Read More about Genevieve Bell here:

100 most creative people in business from Fast Company.

Intel’s Genevieve Bell: An Anthropologist at the Cutting Edge of Technology and Society

What do you think? What do you think of the importance of TV in human culture?