Calls for "deparochialization of educational research" (Lingard 2006) may be offering educational ethnography the opportunity to move from the conventional research designs and from the study of single sites and local situations "to examine the circulation of cultural meanings, objects and identities in diffuse time-spaces" (Marcus 1995: 96). One way of following such demands can be the synthesis of ethnographic studies, which might open up the prospect of allowing researchers to unpick the interconnectedness of different sites which have been and are being studied ethnographically. However, another reason for undertaking secondary analyses of ethnographical studies might be a lack of resources in times of economical crisis.

In the light of those discussions, our aim in the symposium is to explore the forms of translocal and transtemporal ethnographic synthesis currently in use by educational ethnographers as well as the challenges and the possibilities that the method offers. Also we are interested in the question, if qualitative synthesis might be a means to sharpen ethnographer's sensitivity for each other's work and achievements in the past.

Next to a contribution discussing methodological challenges (Savin-Baden), different approaches of synthesising ethnographic studies will be introduced: A collaborative cross-cultural ethnography, synthesising on-going studies and involving cooperative data-interpretations (Huf/Raggl), a collaborative cross-cultural analysis in several ethnographic studies that are conducted in different locations (Lahelma/Lappalainen/Mietola), a meta-ethnographical comparison of several ethnographic projects sharing the same thematic and methodological interest (Beach) and a cross-cultural meta-ethnography of two studies with the same research question (Kakos/Fritzsche).

By exploring the possibilities of different approaches in synthesising ethnographical studies, the symposium will attempt to engage researchers in the following questions:

• In how far can a synthesis of ethnographic studies produce deeper or more 'general' insights than primary studies (see Hammersley 2013)?

• Which methodical and methodological challenges and opportunities are connected with the different ways of synthesising ethnographic studies?

• What are the lessons that we can learn from meta-ethnographic synthesis about the possibilities offered by qualitative meta-analysis in general?