• Social anthropology methods analyze image and content.graffiti 1 image by jeanphilippe delisle from Fotolia.com
  
  Though the discipline has been around since the colonial period, modern social anthropology as a discipline has adapted to the 21st century. According to The University of Manchester, social anthropologists in 2010 undertake research in violence and conflict resolution and the social implications of new forms of technology. The research methods used by social anthropologists are both adapted from old methods that began hundreds of years ago and rooted in new technologies and phenomena such as advertising and the Internet.
  
  

Participant Observation

• Practitioners of participant observation study a culture or cultural group through active participation in the daily life of that culture. In their essay, "Ethnography and Participant Observation," professor Paul Atkinson and Martyn Hammersley assert that many social anthropologists see participant observation as a humanist approach to the field. The method is purported to encourage cultural interpretation and empathy. Atkinson and Hammersley also argue that all anthropological research is to some degree participant observation, as it is impossible to observe without participating to some degree.
  
  

Visual Anthropology

• Visual anthropology is a method of social anthropological research built on gathering visual information on a culture or society. International consulting bureau ,gtASA, specializes in social anthropology, communication, and development, and uses visual anthropology as one of its three methods. According to gtASA, images and iconography such as graffiti, religious representations, and advertising campaigns are used to study forms of communication in societies and cultures. Another aspect of visual anthropology entails studying the significance of an image through the eyes of its creator and intended audience.
  
  

Ethnography

• Ethnography refers both to a social anthropology method and a written portrait of a culture or cultural group. Often, the former is undertaken in order to achieve the latter. Experts such as gtASA consider ethnography and participant observation to be one in the same. Atkinson and Hammersley, however, argue that the two are different. According to the authors, ethnography is an open-ended approach to research that involves gathering unstructured data through fieldwork. Where participant observation is a single mode of immersion and participation, ethnography constitutes any and all research done on site. University of Southern California professor Michael Genzuk reiterates this by designating participant observation as a form of ethnography.
  
  

Anthropology of Communication

• The anthropology of communication is another method of social anthropology cited and used by gtASA. A course on the anthropology of communication at Columbia College in Chicago defines the method as the study of a culture or society through verbal communication such as stories, jokes, and gossip, and non-verbal communication like dance, gestures, and silences. Tools used in studying the anthropology of communication are television, the Internet, advertising, animation, and first-hand observation.