USA

This work is an interdisciplinary intervention into ethnographic research which addresses two levels. The first of these is methodological, concerning the manner in which social science is conducted. The second is practical, attempting to illustrate how the methodological issues uncovered by the application of phenomenologically-based abject communication theory can be circumnavigated by a program of reflexive involvement in a community through social action research. Based on methodological issues, the case study location was Isla Mujeres, Quintana Roo, México, an small island located off the Yucatan coast of Mexico, eight miles northeast of Cancun. The study focuses specifically on. the on-going creation of the identity of the island as a home and as a site of tourism, as communicated through promotional texts and through personal interaction between tourists and islanders.