ETHNOGRAPHIC RESEARCH

ITS HISTORY, METHODS AND THEORIES

HISTORY OF ETHNOGRAPHIC RESEARCH AND ITS USES

Cultural anthropology emerged as a formal discipline during the heyday of colonialism (1870 – 19500 WHEN MANY European anthropologists focused on the study of traditional peoples and their cultures in the colonies overseas.

In the disturbing and often violent historical context of expansion and domination by European and other powerful political states and commercial enterprises, the survival of thousands of traditional communities worldwide has been at stake.

Many of these have become extinct but others survived.

Thus, early anthropological practice of documenting endangered cultures was called SALVAGE ETHNOGRAPHY AND IS NOW KNOWN AS URGENT ANTHROPOLOGY.

The first generation of anthropologists often began their careers working for museums, increasingly those coming later were academically trained in the emerging discipline and became active in newly founded anthropology departments.

Beyond documenting social practices, beliefs, artifacts, and other disappearing cultural features, anthropologists also sought to reconstruct traditional ways of life that had already been abandoned and that were often only remembered by surviving elders.

Although anthropological theories have come and gone during the past hundred years, the plight of indigenous peoples struggling for cultural survival endures.

Anthropologists can and still do contribute to that effort, assisting in cultural preservation efforts.

Acculturation Studies

Since the 1930s, anthropologists have been aware that the number of traditional cultures is quickly diminishing. In response, some began studying asymmetrical (sharply uneven) culture contact, or ACCULTURATION – the often disruptive process of culture change occurring in traditional societies coming in contact with

more powerful state societies, in particular industrialized or capitalist socities.

APPLIED ANTHROPOLOGY

In identifying the disintegrating effects of asymmetrical culture contact, ACCULTURATION studies gave birth to APPLIED ANTHROPOLOGY – the use of anthropological knowledge and methods to solve practical problems in communities confronting new challenges.

STUDYING CULTURES AT A DISTANCE

During World War II, anthropologists shifted their attention from small scale traditional communities to modern state societies.

Aiming to discover basic personality traits, or psychological profiles, shared by the majority of the people in the modern state societies.

Since on-location ethnographic fieldwork during wartime was impossible, and in many most foreign countries difficult if not prohibitive, Mead, Ruth Benedict, and other anthropologists developed innovative technique for studying “CULTURE AT A DISTANCE” – through the analysis of newspapers, literatures, photographs, etc.

For instance, by investigating child-rearing practices, cultural beliefs, and attitudes, and by examining any documented material for the appearance of recurrent themes and values, these anthropologists tried to portray the national character of the peoples inhabiting these distant countries.

This cultural information and anthropological understanding of foreign societies was also used for propaganda and psychological warfare.

ADVOCACY ANTHROPOLOGY

By the 1960s, European colonial powers had lost almost all of their overseas territorial possessions.

Many anthropologists turned their attention to the newly independent countries in Africa and Asia, while others focused on South and Central America.

Some anthropologists studied groups to playing a role in helping them adjust to their new circumstances – an example of Applied anthropology.

Others have become advocates for peasant communities, ethnic or religious minorities, or indigenous groups struggling to hold onto their ancestral lands, etc.

Especially over the past few decades, anthropologists committed to social justice and human rights have become actively involved in efforts to assist indigenous groups, and ethnic communities.

Today,, most anthropologists committed to community-based and politically involved research refer to their work as ADVOCACY ANTHROPOLOGY.

Globalization and multi-sited ethnography

The impact of globalization is everywhere. Of relevance to anthropologists is the fact that distant localities are becoming linked in such a way that local events and situations are shaped by forces and activities occurring thousands of miles away, and vice versa.

One of the many consequences of globalization is the formation of DIASPORIC populations (diaspora is a Greek word, originally meaning “scattering”), living and working far from their original homelands. While this has left some people feeling displaced and fragmented, others are transcending and

vast distances and staying in touch with family and friends from home with the aid of modern transportation and communication technologies.

Through e-mail, Internet forums, and World Wide Web access to local news, geographically dispersed individuals spend part of their lives in cyberspace, dubbed

“ethnoscapes” by anthropologists ARJUS APPADURAI from India.

This electronically mediated environment enables people who are far from home to remain informed to maintain their social networks and even to hold onto a shared sense of ethnic identity that distinguished them from the collectivity of individuals

with whom they share their daily routines in actual geographic space.

Globalization has given rise to a new trend in anthropological research and analysis known as MULTI-SITED ETHNOGRAPHY – the investigation and documentation of peoples and cultures embedded in the larger structures of a

globalizing world, utilizing a range of methods in various locations of time and space.

Also emerging in multi-sited ethnography are greater interdisciplinary approaches to fieldwork, bringing in theoretical ideas and research methods from cultural studies, media studies, and mass communication.

One example is the emergence of ethnographic studies of online “IMAGINED COMMUNITIES” or ‘CYBERETHNOGRAPHY.

Doing Ethnography: Cultural Anthropology Research methods

1. Preparatory Research

Before heading into the field, anthropologists do preparatory research. This includes delving into any existing written, visual, or sound information available about the people and place one has chosen to study.

Because anthropologists must be able to communicate with the people they have chosen to study, they will also have to learn the language used in the community selected for fieldwork.

Finally, anthropologists prepare for fieldwork by studying theoretical, historical, ethnographic, and other literature relevant to the research problem to be investigated.

2. Participant Observation

Once in the field, anthropologists are anything but passive onlookers. They rely on PARTICIPANT OBSERVATION – a research method in which one learns about a group’s beliefs and behaviors through social participation and personal

observation within the community, as well as interviews and discussion with individual members of the group over an extended stay in the community.

3. Ethnographic tools and Aids

An anthropologist’s most essential ethnographic tools in the field are notebooks, pens/pencil, camera, sound recorder, and increasingly, laptop computers sometimes equipped with a variety of specific data processing programs.

Anthropologists may also formally enlist the assistance of KEY CONSULTANTS – members of the society being studied, who provide information that helps researchers understand the meaning of what they observe.

4. Data Gathering: the Ethnographer’s Approach

Information collected by ethnographers fall into two main categories: QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE DATA.

QUANTITATIVE DATA – consists of statistical or measurable information such as population density.

QUALITATIVE DATA – concerns nonstatistical information about such features as settlement patterns.

Often, these nonquantifiable data are the most important part of the ethnographic research because they capture the essence of culture and provide us with deeper insights into the unique lives of different people, making us truly understand what, why, and how they feel, think, and act in their own distinctive ways.

5. Surveys.

Surveys are just one part of a much larger research strategy of the anthropologists.

6. Interviewing

Asking questions is fundamental to ethnographic fieldwork and takes place in INFORMAL INTERVIEWS (unstructured, open-ended conversations in everyday life) and FORMAL INTERVIEWS (structured question/

answer sessions carefully notated as they occur and based on prepared questions.

7. Mapping

Identifying distant places where the anthropologists study cultures.

8. Photographing and Filming

Most anthropologists use cameras for fieldwork.

Photography has been instrumental in anthropological research for more than a century.

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