Paper short abstract:

This presentation takes convergences between market research and anthropology as a starting point for exploring problems of anthropological knowledge in the contemporary. I reflect on the limits of fieldwork and discuss analytical possibilities for producing untimely anthropological knowledge.

Paper long abstract:

In 2010 I was engaged in a research project on market research consultancies that produce and sell knowledge of emergent market trends, directions, and tendencies. I was particularly interested in the temporal orientation of their work: how they seek to produce "a future market" as an object about which knowledge is possible. I found that market research consultancies were paying less attention to existing or past markets, while showing more interest in emergent markets or anticipated future markets. One thing that intrigued me about this approach was the extent to which it is reminiscent of contemporary anthropology and its increasing orientation toward the emergent. This presentation takes this convergence between market research and anthropology as a starting point for exploring problems of anthropological knowledge in the contemporary. First, I discuss methodological limits of fieldwork. As spaces of knowledge production have become as critical to business as they are to academia, such companies as market consultancies might increasingly refuse to engage with anthropological interlocutors. For instance, after an initial interview with one company's sales manager, I received an email explaining, very courteously, that because of time restraints no one at the company would be able to speak with me—ever again. Second, I reflect on analytical problems and strategies for contemporary anthropology. Since it was far from obvious how to differentiate the production of contemporary anthropological knowledge from that of market research consultancies, I raise questions about strategies and possibilities for producing "untimely" anthropological knowledge about the contemporary.