Title: Fieldwork and Ethnography
1Fieldwork and Ethnography
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4Fieldwork
- living with people for an extended time
- variety of field techniques for collecting that
data - fieldwork field techniques developed in the
study of smaller scale societies with greater
cultural uniformity compared to large-scale
industrial societies - the concept of holism
5Before Fieldwork
- schooling training
- language acquisition (at school in the field)
- research proposal
- visa, government bureaucracies permissions to
do fieldwork - changing nature of the rules ethicsof
fieldwork
6Field Equipment
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9Medicine, money, and as field equipment
10Entering the Field
- expats (missionaries, other anthros,
international development people) - tourists
- going native types
- exceptional locals
- culture shock
- refuge from the natives
11Field Techniques The Ethnographic Method
- participant-observation - defining characteristic
of cultural anthropology its methods of
research - first-hand observation of daily behavior
immersed in daily life - no other human science does this
- what people say what they do
12(Kottak), "The common humanity of the student and
the studied, the ethnographer and the researched
community, makes participant observation
inevitable."
13- (Malinowski), , in this type of work, it is
good for the ethnographer sometimes to put aside
camera, note book and pencil, and to join in
himself in what is going on."
14Surveys Interviews
- 2 techniques of asking questions eliciting
responses - quantitative vs. qualitative methods
- Collection logic analytical approach
- Enumerated -- statistical
- Descriptive -- interpretive
15Surveys
- structured closed-ended questionnaires
- genealogical method/genealogies
- statistical analysis
- objectivity
- who administers
16Interviews
- structured open-ended
- unstructured
- spontaneous planned
17Ethnographic vs. Survey Research
- study whole functioning community vs. a sample
- develop rapport
- totality of an informant's life-context
- context thick description
- adds depth to survey data (i.e. kinship
genealogies)
18Life History
- recollections of lifetime experiences
- identify important life turns for a culture
- indicates the diversity of experience within what
appears to be a society of cultural uniformity - problem with remembering in the present
- Notions of narrative and history
19Informants
20Informants
- what is a "well informed informant"?
- compared to who?
- the relationships between ethnographer
informant - relations of power
- trust, friendship, economic contract, learning,
adopted as family member, prestige for both
21Anthropology in pairs and such
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23TYPES OF KNOWLEDGE
- Emic local knowledge how people think,
perceive, categorize the world what has meaning
in their world-the natives point of view - Etic -- shift focus from the native's point of
view to that of the anthropologist
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26Reflexivity
- Type of knowledge intersubjective
- A self consciousness about the impact on the data
produced in the context of doing fieldwork and
writing culture - how the anthropologist effects the thoughts,
actions of informants - how the ethnocentrism of the anthro colors the
interpretation and final representation of others
thinking actions
27Paul Rabinow on Reflexive Knowledge
- Field data are constructs of the process by which
we acquire them -- intersubjective - The problem is a hermeneutical one
- hermeneutic interpretation ... as the
comprehension of self by the detour of the
comprehension of the other - Fieldwork is dialectic
- DIALECTIC BECAUSE NEITHER THE SUBJECT NOR THE
OBJECT REMAIN STATIC
28Ali Rabinow
- highlighting, identification, and analysis also
disturbed Alis usual patterns of experience. - forced to reflect on his own activities and
objectify them as an informant. - began to develop an art of presenting his world
to me - But the more we engaged in such activity, the
more he experienced aspects of his own life in
new ways.
29Reflexive Knowledge and Doing Anthropology as
Negotiated Reality
- a mutually constructed ground of experience and
understanding - an acknowledgement of the dialogue between the
anthropologist and the informant in the
experience of fieldwork
30Negotiated Reality
- anthropologists are historically situated through
the questions we ask and the manner we seek to
understand and experience the world - anthropologists receive from our informants their
interpretations that are also mediated by culture
and history - the data is doubly mediated
- first by presence of the anthropologist
- Then by a second order self-reflection of our
informants
31- fieldwork is an experience in humanity
- a kind of social relationship
- risky business
32Anthropology and the Ethics of Fieldwork
- Anthropological researchers, teachers and
practitioners are members of many different
communities, each with its own moral rules or
codes of ethics - In both proposing and carrying out research,
anthropological
researchers must be open about the purpose(s),
potential impacts, and source(s) of support for
research projects with funders, colleagues,
persons studied or providing information, and
with relevant parties affected by the research.
33Ethics and Informant Relationships
- Anthropological researchers have primary ethical
obligations to the people, species, and materials
they study and to the people with whom they work - avoid harm or wrong
- respect the well-being
- consult actively with the affected individuals or
group(s)
34Fieldwork and Informed Consent
- Anthropological researchers should obtain in
advance the informed consent of persons being
studied, providing information, owning or
controlling access to material being studied, or
otherwise identified as having interests which
might be impacted by the research
35Ethics Beyond the Field
- Responsibility to scholarship and science
- Responsibility to the public
- Responsibility to students and trainees
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