Teaching projects

Empirical research conducted by anthropologists is generally referred to as “fieldwork”. As the term suggests, the research is conducted in a “field”. But what is this field? Is it best thought of as a physical location? A social group, an organisation, or a network? Or is it an artefact of the questions that the researcher is investigating? Does it have boundaries or is it open ended? How does the researcher “enter” (and “leave”) the field? What hurdles and difficulties can be expected? In this module, we will address the questions of how an anthropological researcher decides on a topic of research and where this research will take place. As will become clear, these two questions are closely related to each other and it is usually impossible to answer one without addressing the other. The unit makes use of a video lecture by guest anthropologist, Claudio Sopranzetti, who describes the process of developing his award-winning research on motorcycle taxi drivers in Bangkok. Each unit also includes an “outlook” section which moves beyond the topic at hand to consider broader aspects of doing ethnography. Here, this unit features a “podcast” conversation between Claudio Sopranzetti and Jovan Maud on the subject of “embarrassment” in the field.

Part 1 Defining and Entering the Field Part 2 Guest Lecture Part 3 Fieldwork Task Part 4 Outlook - Podcast - Embarrassment Bildergalerie

This learning unit deals with the nature of ethnographic field research, in particular the methodology known as "participant observation". This unit focuses on the inherent (productive) tension between the two main pillars of ethnographic research: participation and observation. Although paired and interdependent, the imperatives of participating and observing bring with them different priorities and demands. It’s these two somewhat contradictory demands that mean that the researcher is always necessarily oscillating between the closeness of participation and the distance of reflection. It’s this oscillation, or moving back and forth between modes, that this unit discusses. The unit also uses excerpts from Gary Kildea’s classic film, Celso and Cora, set in the slums of Manila in the 1980s and using a highly “participatory” camera style, to help the students to visualise the process of entering a new field and slowly developing rapport with one’s interlocutors, and to appreciate the dynamic movement between participation and observation that this requires. This unit’s “outlook” includes details of a field trip conducted by Jovan Maud and Prof. Andrea Lauser to a Vietnamese lên đồng spirit medium session, together with studies of Hanoi’s University of Social Sciences and Humanities. Here, the students completing this unit can read the reflections of Vietnamese students who attended the ritual to contemplate first-hand their experiences of balancing observation and participation.

Part 1 Between participation and observation Part 2 Film Celso and Cora Part 3 Fieldwork exercise Part 4 Outlook - Attending a mediumship ritual in Vietnam Bildergalerie

This learning unit deals with an important aspect of ethnographic field research, the relationships that are an inevitable part of conducting participant observation. In addition to a video introduction by Prof. Lauser, the unit uses exerpts from the ethnographic film Ngat is Dead (preview), which follows the Dutch anthropologist Ton Otto, who has been adopted by a family on Baluan Island in Papua New Guinea. In the film, Otto must negotiate the hotly contested issue of the appropriate ritual response to the death of his adoptive father. The film demonstrates the important of relationships between anthropologists and their interlocutors and how negotiating such relationships is an integral aspect of conducting good ethnographic research. The “outlook” in this unit is a short account of Prof. Lauser’s fieldwork with the Mangyan in the Philippines in the 1980s. Here she discusses the various ways her presence was interpreted by the people with whom she was researching.

Part 1 Screencast: Research relationships Part 2 Film: Ngat is Dead Part 3 Fieldwork Exercise Part 4 Are anthropologists greedy eaters? Bildergalerie

This unit delves into the methodological relationship that researchers take to their subject matter, recognizing that a range of positions or postures are possible. This is not only a matter of how actively the researcher participates but The unit draws on the Anthropology of Religion, specifically Bielo’s model of four methodological postures:

1. Methodological atheism

2. Methodological agnosticism

3. Methodological ludism

4. Methodological theism

These postures refer to different ways of treating the truth claims of our interlocutors, our relationship to their reality. Do we treat it as symptomatic of deeper “social” forces, as the “methodological atheist” would, or do we take a more “playful” approach that tries to experience and appreciate the reality that we are studying? Although this model was developed for the Anthropology of Religion, we argue that it can be applied more broadly to draw attention to the fact that researchers have a choice about how they position themselves vis-a-vis their interlocutors and topic. In addition to the usual video presentation and screencast, this unit presents a series of hypothetical research topics and asks students how taking different postures would affect the approach to research.

Part 1 Screencast: Four methodological postures Part 2 Text - Paul Stoller Part 3 Hypotheticals Part 4 Fieldwork Task Bildergalerie