“I insisted earlier that researchers must learn to question, not accept blindly, what the people whose world they are studying think and believe. Now I have to say that at the same time they should pay attention to just that. After all, people know a lot about the world they live and work in. They have to know a lot to make their way through its complexities. They have to adjust to all its contradictions and conflicts, all the problems it throws their way. If they didn’t know enough to do that, they wouldn’t have lasted there this long. So they know, plenty.”

Howard Becker, 1998, Tricks of the Trade: How to Think about Your Research While You’re Doing It, University of Chicago Press.