Lecture: Thinking photographically about ethnography (original) (raw)
Related papers
Practices of Writing in Ethnographic Work
Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 2020
Although the practice of writing is key to the production of ethnographic knowledge, the topic remains understudied. Using material from our own ethnographic research in the fields of air travel and cultural heritage as data, we develop a reflexive account of ethnographic writing. We examine in detail the practices of jotting down observations, writing field notes, analytic annotating, ordering and rearranging, and drafting and revising papers. The article takes a praxeological stance, conceptualizing writing as a practice that is simultaneously cognitive, embodied, and material. Our analysis finds that writing influences and shapes all stages of ethnographic work, from orienting perception by setting an appropriate mode of attention to organizing the work itself, e.g., by keeping to-do lists. Writing does not simply communicate ethnographic insights, but—as a result of the activity of texts—it also generates them.
Practices of Writing in Ethnographic Work (2021)
Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 2021
Although the practice of writing is key to the production of ethnographic knowledge, the topic remains understudied. Using material from our own ethnographic research in the fields of air travel and cultural heritage as data, we develop a reflexive account of ethnographic writing. We examine in detail the practices of jotting down observations, writing field notes, analytic annotating, ordering and rearranging, and drafting and revising papers. The article takes a praxeological stance, conceptualizing writing as a practice that is simultaneously cognitive, embodied, and material. Our analysis finds that writing influences and shapes all stages of ethnographic work, from orienting perception by setting an appropriate mode of attention to organizing the work itself, e.g., by keeping to-do lists. Writing does not simply communicate ethnographic insights, but – as a result of the activity of texts – it also generates them.
In: A. Ruth, A. Wutich and R. Bernard “The Handbook of Teaching Qualitative and Mixed Research Methods: A Step-by-Step Guide for Instructors”. London: Routledge: 102-105., 2023
An ethnographic text is the central outcome of eldwork. It is also the most important way in which anthropologists publish their research ndings. Despite the centrality of ethnographic texts, how to write ethnographically has not been discussed in any depth until recently. To prepare students to write ethnographically, they rst have to read ethnographies. Analyzing the ethnographic writing styles of others helps them develop their own writing. To apply this knowledge, students observe everyday social interactions, like riding an elevator, and write ethnographic texts about their observations. They receive constructive criticism from their peers and instructor(s) and learn how to revise their texts and improve their writing.
Ethnographic Fieldnote Writing: Methodological Challenges in the 21 st Century
Dhaulagiri Journal of Sociology and Anthropology , 2018
This paper focuses on the methodological challenges in the 21st century of ethnographic field note writing using pen and pencil amidst the increasing use of modern gadgets. Many ethnographers have been using modern electronic devices to collect field texts. Thus, the ethnographers are in a dilemma whether to use the traditional field note writing method or the modern method using gadgets. To address the research problem I conducted in-depth interview with 23 participants focusing on Communist Party of Nepal Maoist female ex-combatants and observed their activities for a prolonged period in the natural setting. Fieldnote is considered the most important field text collection method in ethnographic research. Ethnographic research requires more descriptive and interpretive field text analysis with cultural aspects. This article considers the creation of ethnographic fieldnote in the act of seeing and writing through emerging insight and understanding. The challenges related to the method of writing ethnographic fieldnote have received less attention in methodological discussions. This indicates that while writing ethnographic fieldnote in the field may have some benefits looking at the field practicalities but is equally challenging. There are certain methodological aspects involved in every fieldnote writing mission. My personal experiences of writing ethnographic fieldnote about the experiences of the ex-combatants fail to exclude the researcher in terms of methodological aspects rather it is more multifaceted and inspiring.
Personalising Ethnography: On Memory, Evidence, and Subjectivity: The Writing & Learning Journey
By extending the notion of ‘academic’ writing to include heuristic, figurative, reflexive, and ‘messy’ textualities, I hope to escape the restrictions associated with essay, article, and thesis writing. Few students, it seems, ever attempt to make their ‘academic’ pieces creative or evocative in the same way they do their poems or stories; in fact, they usually ‘play dead’ when it comes to formal writing. Such is the tyranny of the conventional essay on artistic thinking and creative practice. Creative writers, too, seldom venture beyond the formal elements of genre or genre itself. By extending the notion of ‘writing’ to include oxymoronic genres and pictorial, stylistic, and hypertextual elements, I hope to extend the possibilities of text production beyond those usually afforded to students; that is, beyond essays and prose on the one hand, and poems and stories on the other. Various textual theories and practices have helped me in this process: picto-ideo-phonographic writing, autoethnography, messy texts, narrative inquiry, and poststructuralism. Such practices disrupt the ‘formalities’ of the essay and the ‘orthodoxies’ of the book. As Derrida (1976: 87) suggests, ‘What is thought today cannot be written according to the line and the book. . .’ No, but it can inspire us to think differently about how we construct texts and how we write prose (including how we arrange texts on the page).
Writing Ethnography : A Concern of Mind or Heart/Soul
The paper extensively deals with the debate on 'scientific objectivity' and 'subjectivity' in anthropological and ethnographic researches. The modernist's view in anthropology has been to maintain as much of scientific objectivity in anthropological researches as it is done in natural science; on the other hand, the postmodernists claim that anthropology cannot be called a scientific discipline. The question arises that could an anthropologist merely remain a passive spectator and recorder of the social and cultural phenomena, as a natural scientist does in his laboratory? In the opinion of the author, howsoever an anthropologist attempts to remain passive and maintain scientific objectivity during the collection of data for his research, he and his subject of research (i.e. the group whom he studies); both influence each other in mutual interaction. Where lays the panacea then? The paper suggests that postmodernist approach of Trialectics of Spaces in Human Geography, as enunciated by Edward Soja (1989, 1996) in his study of the city and people of Los Angeles, offers at least, a tolerable solution to this continual problem. Ever since its inception as a distinct discipline during the mid-19 th century, anthropology has traveled a long distance; from 'conjectural history' to 'scientific objectivity', from 'cultural relativism' to 'empathizing' with the natives, as also, 'entering into the head' of the natives, and from 'participant observation' to rigorous empirical and statistical analysis. During the last one hundred and fifty years, the anthropologists, have tried and experimented a number of tools, hypotheses, concepts, and theories to discover the causal explanation of social and cultural phenomena. By the year 1920, the era of conjectural history in anthropology had come to an end; and with the publications of The Andaman Islanders (Radcliffe Brown: 1922) and the Argonauts of the Western Pacific (Malinowski: 1922), the positivist approach had moved into the discipline. Such positivist or scientific approach is said to have lasted till the mid-1970s. This is referred to as 'modernist period' in anthropology (Taylor: 1979). During all these years, the anthropologists attempted to
Ethnography is a practice and an expression with a capacious historical past that necessarily included political, philosophical, spiritual aesthetic elements. The study of ethnography is to define culture, people and society and "who they are and what they might become". In brief, it grew out of a master discourse of colonization. Observing the history of ethnography, it is found, the style and approach of writing ethnography is not a constant process. During the changing of time the process is also evolving. And its subject matter and praxis are also changing. Due to the evolving of ethnography how it is different from its earlier period"s ethnography, this is the important question of Ethnography. Earlier ethnography was only bounded with social ethnography but in modern and postmodern time "social ethnography is replaced by "cultural ethnography. Postmodern ethnography is an ethnography that goes beyond its traditional counterpart by expanding its reflexivity and its commitment to the groups it studies; it questions its truth claims and experiments with new mode of repenting. Postmodern ethnography derives its new goals from post modernism. That"s why it rejects grand narrative and "Meta theories" of modernism, with their pre -conceived and sweeping statements. "Reflexivity" is a paramount concern of postmodern ethnography, based on the belief that for too long, the rule and power of the researcher have been ignored by ethnographers.
Journal of Education and Educational Development, 2024
Ethnography is one of the richest research approaches within the qualitative research paradigm for studying the cultural life worlds of others and/or oneself at a deeper level of consciousness. Additionally, it is a genre of writing that uses multi-epistemic lenses to go deeper into the phenomenon in order to inform, reform, and transform lives. The term ‘ethno’(graphy) is a compound word made up of the words ethno and graphy, which stand for culture and writing, respectively. In order to conduct ethnographic research, a researcher must possess a thorough understanding of a specific cultural context, be able to communicate in the language used by the informants, and be able to bracket one’s biases, while understanding how to "recover meaning" from their complex lifeworld. In doing so, it gives the researcher—the ethnographer in the role of an outsider the chance to chronicle the ‘noodle moments’ of the insiders as informants, within their cultural context, by witnessing their way of life and recording what truly takes place there. To this purpose, through their involvement over an extended length of time, ethnographers must generate detailed accounts of the discussions, observations of the events, symbols, artifacts, festivals, and everyday activities of the researched, among other things. Through critically analyzing behaviors, it offers a window into the meaning that people attribute to their cultural sensibility and a source of insights to inform, reform, and transform communities. Thus, it is a more comprehensive way of examining through the perspective of an insider, which sets it apart from other inquiry techniques.
How to write? Experiences, challenges and possibilities of ethnographic writing
Ethnoscripts, 2021
Being a good ethnographer means, amongst other things, not forgetting the future reader during the writing process. This article discusses one possible approach for crafting reader-friendly ethnographies. I review basic strategies for creating stringent and straightforward texts, drawing on the journalistic canon of Reportage writing, and sketch how I personally apply or modify these techniques when composing an ethnography. I address elements such as clear formulation, coherent argumentation, adequate pars pro toto scenes, vivid language, and the difficult terrain of symbols and metaphors. I also suggest steps for reworking the first draft of the text. I conclude by arguing that cultivating and cherishing a recipient-friendly communication style is vital for the public visibility of cultural and social anthropology.
2010
In 1986 George E. Marcus and James Clifford published Writing Culture: The Poetics & Politics of Ethnography, a text that would become a landmark in contemporary anthropology. Twenty-five years later, nine scholars reflect on how the perspectives opened up by its publication have determined the anthropological practice of recent decades providing inspiration for new ideas in the fields of ethnography, cultural anthropology, design and art criticism. The collection of essays begins with a contribution from Massimo Canevacci reflecting on the unexplored potentialities of digital, connective, hybrid media for ethnographic research and writing, and concludes with a conversation between George E. Marcus and Tarek Elhaik, envisioning an anthropology capable of approaching contemporary art and performance. The other eight essays freely move along the boundaries between political anthropology, philosophy of science, phenomenological ethics and anthropology of design, attempting to cross new ethnographic territories and unexplored paths.