Agar makes one very important point regarding train of thought during an ethnographic project. I think that it has a lot to do with ethnocentrism as well. He says to attempt a clear mind when studying the "other" and to try and disregard the way you have always thought and interpreted in everyday life: "...if you just listen and struggle with what patterns and passions drive their ralk, you get a glimmer of a different kind of life. And that glimmer, brief and fragmentary though it might have been, hints that what you thought you knew was way off base".(p.38).
If this is a mind set that one can tackle to the best of their ability as a novice, as well as be conscious of, I think that it is good training and might become somewhat of a second nature for future projects, thereby eliminating as much ethnocentrism as possible.
Here is Michael Agar's anthroplogical equation: "That's how abduction works. Instead of, from P we derive Q, or from Q we derive P, the logic changes to, what kind of P do I need to invent such that this new and interesting Q makes some kind of sense".(p.40). Now that makes sense!
I have previously covered a few of my own opinions regarding statistics. Agar seems to be an avid user and believer in them. As a novice, I really can't say much about them except that I fear them immensly. He does say, however, that popular thought amongst professionals in anthropology and sociology seem to love the existence of numbers in ethnographic writing, despite their relevance. It is about the relevant numbers, he says. I keep quoting this guy, but I truly could not say these important things in a better way: "If you're a top-down hypothesis-testing type, you can seal the system shut against new information and leave subjects with a choice of stepping into your framework or getting out of your study."(43). He goes on to talk again about positivism wchich unfortunately I do not get. It seems to me as if every anthroplogist has their own VERY DIFFERENT theories as to what this means and I remain utterly confused.
At this point in the book, he begins discussing techniques and ways of writing the final ethnography. I cannot leave out one very interesting point and that is that Agar is not entirely supportive of fieldnotes in general and if one uses them, he does not believe in the sacred aspect of fieldnotes as many anthropologists do. I get the sense that he thinks that they are given too much attention. In all the rest of the books that I have read for this course, fieldnotes are the seemingly main subject around which methods are described. Again, as a novice, I imagine myself becoming obssessed with them when I begin my ethnographic journey as a way to justify my work, memories of my fieldwork and references for the actual writing of the ethnography.
Agar talks about the many different ways in which one begins anthropological fieldwork and grant proposals. I feel as if it must all differ greatly, depending on one's credentials but also what institution, if any, the anthropologist is using as a starting point. I will nevertheless use this book as a reference for different research starting points.
He discusses the absolute importance of the use of locals in an ethnographic project. He believes that it makes the work go much faster if the ethnographer establishes or finds a solid connection with at least one local before embarking on the full project. I feel though as if a large portion of his technical advice is mainly for ethnographic work in the US, although still very important. It just depends on what kind of work an anthropologist will be doing.
An interesting thing that Agar talks about is the obsession of the "community" boundaries and that there is an increasing loss of such "bounded communities", thereby losing the interest of some anthropologists. This ties in very much with my discussion earlier on increasing globalization. There are very few remaining "bounded communities" and this means that a new set of anthropological questions need to be asked. It also means that new ways of interpretation must be created as well as new angles to be looked at to enable us to report as accurately as possible.
Agar writes very humorously in this book. On page 91, with the chapter heading: "Who are you to do this?" he says:

"Ethnography is really quite an arrogant enterprise. In a short period of time, an ethnographer moves in among a group of strangers to study and describe their beliefs, document their social life, write about their subsistence strategies, and generally expore the territory right down to their recipies for the evening meal. The task is an impossible one. At best, and ethnography can only be partial".

What I love here is how he blatantly admits what other ethnographers vehementy deny and that is that the "ethnography is only partial".
Agar thinks that a role is automatically assigned to the ethnographer and this subsequenty affects the knowledge that is gained in the method process. Perhaps if the ethnographer is at least conscious of this and it is recorded in notes and ethnogaphy, then maybe the interpretations can be thus understood with this in mind. So, he goes on to say that "'objectivity' is perhaps best seen as a label to hide probems in the social sciences. The problem is not whether the ethnographer is biased; the problem is what kinds of biases exist-how do they enter into ethnographic work and how can their operation be documented".(p.92). I have often thought about this in my readings and I agree with Agar when I say that what if the ethnographer duly admits these things? This means that the reader has more trust in the ethnographer and the ethnography because these biases are identified and explained, thereby allowing the reader to understand more clearly how the ethnographer arrived at these conclusions and their methods of interpretation. This leads Agar to one very important thought and that is that the ethnogrpaher must understand his/herself before being able to interpret the other. In addition to this, an ethnographic project surely results in the ethnographer learning a lot about themselves.
Agar thinks that the methodological questions that the ethnographer asks are vital to the information that is provided. This is something that all the books have seemed to agree on and I imagine that this is something that comes with experience, or at least to some degree. It seems to me that there is a technique as well as experience that is required for effective question asking.