UNIT 2: fieldwork

armchair anthropology:

method used in the early mid- to late nineteenth century; undertaking research by examining various documents at their disposal - included the analysis of journals, reports from missionaries, merchants, travellers, colonial administrators - they would make generalizations about the diversity of human societies (“primitive” of “civilized”)

early anthropology defined by the…

who (primitive) and the where (abroad) of research not the how (anthropological perspective)

eurocentric:

a worldview that centres and privileges european perspectives, history, and theories of knowledge

the “work” - methods of collecting information: (2)

• work of fieldwork usually involves spending an extended period of close involvement with a community and is the period in which anthropologists collect most of their data

• process of reciprocal action and influence in this space changes all (researcher; participants) in essential ways

participant observation:

the method anthropologists use to gather information by living and working with the people whose culture they are studying while participating in their lives as much as possible

field notes:

the written, audio or visual documentation of ethnographic data collected during fieldwork

ethics in anthropology in Canada:

any university-based anthropologists must comply with the tri-council policy statement (TCPS) which sets ethical guidelines for researchers and informs research ethics boards (REBs) of all federally funded institutions

2 key pillars of ethical research:

• informed consent

• do no harm

informed consent:

a key ethical principle in anthropological research that requires participants to be fully aware of the scope and potential impacts of a research project and that they consent freely to participate

do no harm:

a key principle Ina anthropological research that requires anthropologists to consider and prevent any harm to individual participants or the community as a whole as a result of their research

connected to ethics is an acknowledgment that fieldwork…

changes people - anthropologists and participants alike

culture shock:

the feeling of physical and mental dislocation/discomfort a person experiences when in a new or strange cultural setting

positivism:

the view that there is a single reality “out there” that can be detected through the senses and that there is a single, appropriate scientific method for investigating that reality; want to explain the material world in terms of material causes/processes detected through the senses and are committed to separation of facts from values

positivism explored: (4)

• heavily influenced the pioneering ethnographers who established the fieldwork tradition, in the nineteenth century when anthropology aspired to be scientific

• now understand “science” very differently, recognizing that there is not just one but a variety of scientific methods each able to produce reliable knowledge about the world

• has roots with French philosopher Auguste Comte’s (1798-1857) “positive philosophy”

• goal = produce objective knowledge (“theory of everything”)

objective knowledge:

knowledge about reality that is absolute and true for all people, in all times and places

controlled comparison:

research method where each research setting would correspond to a separate experimental situation, these settings were carefully selected to display the same range of variation, naturally, that a laboratory scientist could create artificially

salvage anthropology: & repercussions

positivist anthropologists studied predominantly non-european cultures in attempt to produce systematic and accurate accounts

• repercussions: non-european cultures were constructed as objects and that social change, in context with contact with european cultures, was viewed as contamination or “loss” of “authentic” traditional cultures - while social change in european cultures was “modernization”

reflexive:

critically thinking about the way one thinks; reflecting on one’s own experience - anthropologists who actively think about their subjectivity and how it impacts research setting and the production of ethnographic knowledge are being reflexive

reflexive fieldwork: (2)

• retains a respect for detailed, accurate information gathering but it also takes into consideration a broader range of contextual information than does positivist fieldwork - it pays explicit attention to the ethical/political context of research, background of researchers (nationality, gender, etc.)

• creates situated knowledge

critiques of reflexivity:

critiqued by some - for centring on the reliability of anthropologists’ self reports on positionality - people’s descriptions of themselves are not always reliable - however, most would agree reflexive methods are far more useful than positivist alternatives

situated knowledge:

knowledge that is set within or specific to a precise context or situation

positionality:

a person’s uniquely situated social position, which reflects their gender, nationality, political views, previous experiences and so on

decolonizing anthropology:

critical examination of the origins and legacies of colonialism in anthropology, a recognition of colonialism as an ongoing process and structure, and the commitment to confront and undo colonialism in anthropology today

from Harrison’s volume based on meetings/discussions of the association of black anthropologists - calls for 3 shifts in anthropological research:

1. to recognize and acknowledge the ethnographic and theoretical work of black, Indigenous, non-european anthropologists and experts

2. to focus on power and global inequalities created predominantly by colonialism, patriarchy and capitalism

3. to actively participate in the struggle to overcome these inequalities

multi-sited ethnography:

a method of anthropological research focused on a specific topic followed through different field situations, these field situations can be within one culture but socially distinct (social class) or in different geographical locations (different cultures) - data collection relies on detailed methods of survey (objective) and interviews (subjective)

collaborative anthropology:

an approach to ethnography that deliberately and explicitly emphasizes collaboration at every point in the ethnographic process, without veiling it - from project conceptualization to fieldwork and especially through the writing process

facts:

a widely accepted observation that becomes intelligible only when it is interpreted and placed in a context of meaning

David Hess definition of facts:

as a widely accepted observation, a taken-for-granted item of common knowledge

anthropological facts are cross-cultural…

because they are made across cultural boundaries

anthropological facts are made and remade: (4)

• in the field

• when fieldworkers reexamine field notes and reflect on the field experience

• when fieldworkers write about their experiences or discuss them with other anthropologists

• when fieldwork is redone to mark the changes that have occurred

neurodiverse minds & ethnographic practice (Molly Paechter): Temple & Naoki

• Temple describes how she created and used analogies in order to figure out and understand the social world around her - observed and categorized behaviour

• Naoki describes a situation that is at once recognized as bizarre but by slowly piecing together the context he begins to understand the behaviour - going a step further by presenting it in this way - trying to describe not himself but instead those around him

• in both accounts; the deploying of anthropological techniques only takes them so far, they must also integrate what they have learned to create a narrative which performs as a technology of self and gives them a template for living

technology of self:

a mechanism which permits individuals to effect by their own means, or with the help of others, a certain number of operations on their own bodies and souls, thoughts, conduct and way of being, so as to transform themselves in order to attain a certain state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection or immortality (defined by M. Foucault)

why are autistic people so adept at understanding certain aspects of neurotypical sociality, when neurotypical’s are so poor at understanding autistic sociality?

IMBALANCE

• autistic people are forced to live permanently in a neurotypical social world, we can dip in and out of their social world as we choose

• the whole concept of deep participant observation, extended field research supports the fact that one must be completely immersed to fully understand a culture - and thats why autistic people are, immersed in a world full of unfamiliar “primates” (neurotypicals)

Indigenous stories go in…

CIRCLES - they dont go in straight lines; it helps if you listen in circles because there are stories inside and between stories, and finding your way through them is as easy and as hard as finding your way home - part of finding is getting lost and when you are lost you start to open up and listen

Indigenous book: finding common ground is one of the struggles of…

cross-cultural communication, necessary though so both sides communicating can begin to see/understand the same things - if i hadnt believed it i wouldnt have seen it

Indigenous book: when speaking woth people from another culture it often takes…

longer to explain context/background or the meaning of the story than it does to actually tell the story

Indigenous book: describes 1 view of an Indigenous research paradigm in answering these 2 questions

• what are the shared aspects of the ontology, epistemology, axiology, and methodology of research conducted by Indigenous scholars in Australia and Canada?

• how can aspects of an Indigenous research paradigm be put into practice to support other Indigenous people in their own research?

Indigenous book: describes 1 view of an Indigenous research paradigm in answering these 2 questions - what are the answers?

1. the shared aspect of an Indigenous ontology and epistemology in relationality (relationships do not merely shape reality, they are reality) the shared aspect of an Indigenous axiology and methodology is accountability to relationships

2. the shared aspects of relationality and relational accountability can be put into practice through choice of research topic, methods of data collection, form of analysis and presentation of information

Indigenous book: it is not possible to know exactly both the…

context and definition of an index at the same time - the closer you get to defining something the more it loses its context and the more something is put into context the more it loses a specific definition

Indigenous book: research = ____

ceremony

• the purpose of any ceremony is to build stronger relationships or bridge the distance between aspects of our cosmos/ourselves

fieldwork (IC): (4)

defined as an extended period of close involvement with the people in whose way of life anthropologists are interested, during which anthropologists collect most of their data

• not used in earliest forms of anthropology; defining feature of cultural anthropology since the 20th century

• heavily romanticized - both naive and bad science to assume that there will be no misunderstandings between the anthropologist and the participants

• during fieldwork anthropologists work closely with participants

informants (IC):

people in a particular culture who work with anthropologists and provide them with insights about their way of life - uncomfortable with the one way ness of this term; use friends, teachers, respondents

ethnography (IC):

the end result of fieldwork (usually) either written articles or books or filmed or recorded accounts of a particular culture

anthropologist methods in short:

use a variety of methods to try to answer research questions before, during and after fieldwork

what are 5 methods anthropologists use to answer research questions?

• consulting published literature - by other researchers for general knowledge

• archival research - ranging from colonial records to gov. documents

• aesthetic and narrative analysis - for those interested in media/arts

• kinship diagrams - documents who is and isnt kin in a community

• structured and semistructured interviews - almost all anthropologists engage in this

what is said to be the heart of fieldwork?

participant observation

participant observation (IC):

the method anthropologists use to gather information by living and working with the people whose culture they are studying while participating in their lives as much as possible (deep hanging out - paying close attention and taking detailed notes)

ethnographic research can be divided into 3 stages:

1. preparing for the field

2. conducting fieldwork

3. after fieldwork

1. preparing for the field: (5)

• define a problem worth researching

• determine field site (specificity is key)

• obtain research clearance (from academic, government offices, communities themselves)

• obtain funding (must be able to “sell” your project to agency for $)

• consider ethics of the project and obtain ethics clearances

2. conducting fieldwork: (3)

• generally anywhere from 12-24 months living full time on site

• finding somewhere to live and how to get by (basics of the society)

• put methods into action (adopting strategies)

3. after fieldwork: (4)

• organizing/analyzing/producing written/filmed ethnography that you set out to create

• may experience reverse culture shock (coming back home)

• short follow up trips to the field as they discover pieces of info they failed to see earlier in research period

• deciding what style of thesis/film they want to produce

who keyed the term “rich points”?

Michael Agar

rich points:

unexpected moments when problems in cross cultural understanding arise; moments in which gaps or conflicts in the anthropologist’s assumptions about how the world works and those of the people with whom they are working arise (these moments are the greatest opportunities for research)

culture shock (IC):

the feeling of physical and mental dislocation/discomfort a person experiences when in a new or strange cultural setting - manifests in feelings of anxiety and isolation as researchers work in cultural contexts where their common sense fails more often than succeeds

3 major modes of ethnographic fieldwork:

• positivist mode

• reflexive mode

• multi-sited mode

positivist mode of ethnographic fieldwork: (5)

• dominated the discipline until 1960/70s

• committed to looking at how the world works on the basis of material causes and processes that can be detected with the senses

• end goal is to produce objective knowledge

• ideally in an artificial or lab environment (anthropology however observes cultural features in everyday settings)

• led anthropologists into a paradox - in order to fin the truth we must admit that we are personally involved with the people under observation (wherein positivism wants objective facts from an invisible observer)

reflexive mode of ethnographic fieldwork: (4)

• retains positivisms interest in and commitment to the details/accurate gathering of information but also takes into consideration a broader range of factors influencing research processes

• acknowledges that knowledge is situated (avoid sweeping generalizations) - pays attention to identity of filed workers (gender, nationality, class) and how that can influence field interactions

• advocating for strong objectivity - more objective knowledge will ultimately be gained by acknowledging situationality

• polyphonous ethnographies

polyphonous ethnographies:

those that emphasize the interaction between the anthropologist and the people with whom they are working

multi-sited mode of ethnographic fieldwork: (3)

• anthropologists insist (now) that no society was ever entirely isolated - argued that to understand social processes, beliefs, practices, we cannot treat societies as self contained or homogenous but view connections between different groups

• ethnographic research on cultural processes that are not contained by social, ethnic, religious or national boundaries in which the ethnographer follows process site to site, doing fieldwork in sites and with persons that were never traditionally subject to ethnographic analysis (between 2 or more different sites)

• raises some methodological challenges (threatens to dilute knowledge without long term stationing)

Bronislaw Malinowski:

polish anthropologist who is widely credited with having pioneered long term participant observation based fieldwork (1914) - principal contributions was an extensive study of what is known as the “kula ring”, complex system of ceremonial exchange where Trobriand (Papua New Guinea) men residing on different islands travelled great distances by boat to exchange ceremonial bracelets/necklaces (establishing social relations and political authority among the community)

multimodality in anthropology: (3)

the use of an array of methodological tools, and the recombining of those tools to support non-traditional ways of doing ethnography and to support sensory, collaborative, decolonial agendas

• a call to include social media (& its forms) as ethnographic evidence

• trying to transcend dualism (mind & body) of eurowestern thought