Paper short abstract:

The relationship between subjectivity and objectivity in research is given in the social field we try to attain. It is our decision though how to engage in social action in that social field; but our own desires are not really what matters, but our conditions of possibility

Paper long abstract:

Ethnography had its grounds in positivist thought to attain objectivity while doing fieldwork. Beyond that, ethnographers were trained to do ethnography practically alone in supposedly isolated places. Nowadays none of these are the case. Objectivity is always into question and places had become nodes of global relations: tourists, journalists, physicians, environmental three huggers, environmental policy actors, political parties, and other not neatly situated local actors conflux. So negotiation of our presence in the field has become a real conundrum. This negotiation, is also a reciprocal act of exchange. This negotiated situational character of ethnographers in the field renders each of them to carefully take decisions about proximity, engagement, participation, even speaking about the matters -and the people- to attain. In this paper, I analyze the battlefield of tourism production in the northern region of Quintana Roo, México to show how doing nothing and taking no part in the field was the way to express action and engagement. I content that subjectivity is the main way anthropologist and ethnographers have to understand peoples reality. Moreover, I do think that objectifying our own subjectivity in the social field we study, allows anthropologists to show commitment, engagement and to provide critical information to the "other". The conditions of the possibility of taking action while doing nothing made the difference while objectifying my presence, but mostly, the interest groups, factions and battles were taking place there.