Contribution short abstract:

In this paper I will show how anthropologists' kinship has been historically marginalised and how this affects anthropological knowledge production and ethnographic writing practices to this day.

Contribution long abstract:

Kinship studies became a core area of anthropology in the early 20th century. While anthropologists studied kinship and sexuality in different societies, they rarely reflected on their own family relationships. In this paper I will show how anthropologists' kinship has been historically marginalised and how this affects anthropological knowledge production and ethnographic writing practices to this day. Even after it has become commonplace to reflect on the positionality and relationality of the researcher in the field, reflections on anthropologists' marital status, family relationships and sexuality, and the importance of accompanied research, remain understudied and marginalised. I will discuss the reasons for this and argue why these issues need more attention, particularly as academic research becomes increasingly transnational. Reflections on family relations and the influence of researchers' spouses, children, parents and other relatives on academic knowledge production are important and enriching for epistemological and methodological discussions in the discipline and beyond. This perspective is essential and much needed to advance the discussion of the entanglement of the private and the professional in anthropological research.