The struggle in the composition community regarding the place of personal narrative in academic writing became particularly acute for a class of undergraduate Critical Writing students undertaking ethnographic work. By mid-semester, students had read and produced a series of texts about culture and found themselves reading and writing about culture as if it were a text. First, students wrote position papers about whether what they had done up to that point was ethnography. In a later "thick description" assignment, students employed the work of Clifford Geertz, whose theories they had examined, as a resource. One student's essay is discussed as showing that the student had developed a certain kind of descriptive expertise; moreover, the essay showed a recognition that the work of the piece had only begun once the story of a personal experience had been recorded. The writing went beyond description of the experience to critical analysis of its significance. The use of ethnographic writing in instruction may allow a new view of the importance of teaching and learning about writing. (SG)