Paper short abstract:

Drawing on Fredrik Barth’s Darwinian approach ‘watch and wonder’ the paper explores the particular in order to discern generalisations and processes. Using material from Palestine and women’s ‘engagements with the world’ this essay attempts to probe Barth's modes of 'basic data'.

Paper long abstract:

"The frequent assertion that anthropology is an art as well as a science might depend precisely on the unsystematic or unreflecting way in which we accumulate part of our basic data" (Barth 1966:x-xi).

"This quotation is taken from the preface to Robert Pehrson's monograph The social organization of the Marri Baluch. The book was complied and analysed by Barth from field notes provided by Pehrson's wife Jean Pehrson. It provides a point of entry into the paper which associates itself with Barth's naturalist approach to anthropology in the Middle East. Drawing on his Darwinian approach of 'watch and wonder' in the Middle East the paper explores the particular in order to discern generalisations and processes. Using material from the West Bank in Palestine and peasant women's 'engagements with the world' the essay will attempt to probe Barth's modes of 'basic data'.