So, I am also taking Criminal Investigations this semester, and Dr. McGuire had us read Donnie Brasco. The entire time reading it, I couldn't help but think about this class. Granted, Agent Pistone was not an anthropologist or sociologist, he was an FBI agent. In the beginning of the book, he discusses how he got "in" with the mob. Luckily, he knew somewhat how things worked in the mob, at least enough to know that he should not look too eager to hang around the wiseguys. He did what was acceptable, and that was to start showing his face around the places that the wiseguys hung out. He made sure that at some point someone knew he was a thief, so that word would get back to the mobsters. After a few months of a lot of patience, Donnie Brasco was hanging out with "connected guys," and even further down the line, he got in with some "made guys."
Even after he has made it in, he has to continue to adapt. He has to talk like the mob guys, walk like them, and even dress like them. Lefty, his good friend in the mob, tells him how to dress - he's no longer allowed to wear jeans. After Lefty goes on the record and claims Donnie, he has to shave his mustache because connected guys don't wear mustaches.
Although Agent Pistone (a.k.a. Donnie Brasco) was not an anthropologist, his undercover efforts in the mob were very similar to an ethnography.
