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- Convenors:
-
Hege Leivestad
(University of Oslo)
Camila del Mármol (Universitat de Barcelona)
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- Mode:
- Face-to-face
- Location:
- Museu Marítim de Barcelona
- Start time:
- 26 July, 2024 at
Time zone: Europe/Madrid
- Session slots:
- 1
Short Abstract:
In this plenary, we seek to engage early-career scholars in a broader reflection on the complex connections of anthropology and its interlocutors. We want to evoke critical thinking from young scholars recently or currently immersed in ethnographic fieldwork, and confronted with the contradiction of long-term reflections and the urgency of public debate.
Long Abstract:
In the context of overlapping crises that have accelerated the perceived experience of rupture, transition, and emergency, ethnography arises as a long-term methodology inviting slow thinking and reflection; the ongoing conversation on new formats of inquiry, experimental paths of representation, and the boundaries of traditional methods evinces the need to reflect on the immediacy of field experience and the relationship we establish with the public. With the legitimacy of scientific methodologies being increasingly questioned, anthropology is also critically debating its limits and opportunities. Anthropologists are increasingly faced with the haste of public conversation steering our research agendas and claiming attention: how are we to commit to the long time-frames needed to develop in-depth ethnographical insights, while at the same time engaging in the public conversation? Is the anthropologist well equipped to deal with the larger societal issues of our troubled time, and how can we balance extended fieldwork with the urgency of social crisis?
Building on ethnographic experience, we invite short presentations reflecting on the overlapping of urgent debate, the need for critical reflection, and the conflicting roles of ethnographers. We will bring together a round-table of four dialogical presentations to think about the boundaries, methods and opportunities of anthropology in troubled times.
Accepted papers:
Session 1Kristof Nagy (Central European University)
Paper short abstract:
By revisiting my fieldwork in a flagship institution of Orbán’s fascist rule in Hungary, this paper argues that ethnography in troubled times should engage with the institutions of the re/rising fascist states. It also stresses the urgency to connect such works with larger social crises.
Paper long abstract:
"Hello, Soros agent!" was a standard greeting during my year-long ethnographic research at the Hungarian Academy of Arts, a flagship institution of Orbán's Hungary. As a PhD candidate of the Central European University – founded by the ultrarich liberal philanthropist George Soros – I was considered someone from the other side of the culture wars' battle line. By revisiting this fieldwork, I aim to contribute to the ethnography of troubled times with three points.
First, in the shadow of the re/rise of fascist states, I argue for the importance of understanding such regimes from within. Ethnographies from the bellies of the beasts are rare, but they could be vital in grasping the everyday life of fascist states and the reality in which we are living more and more.
Second, I argue that current culture wars profoundly shape ethnographers' positionality. As I have experienced, my affiliation and over-identification with Soros have heavily structured my fieldwork. By systematizing how right-wing interlocutors' suspicion shaped my research, I argue that the culture wars of troubled times are both objects and formative factors of ethnographic research.
Third, I argue that ethnography from troubled times makes only sense if it feeds into the understanding of larger societal crises. As a result, I claim it's only worth getting swallowed into the belly of a fascist state apparatus if we take them deadly seriously, even if we hate them, because these are integral parts of our world that is falling apart and should be changed.
Laura Burke (University of Sussex)
Paper short abstract:
This presentation reflects on engagement with media organisations whilst working as a Ethnographic Research Associate (RA) on a project about rural homelessness in England. Reflecting on competing ethics, it asks how can we balance timing, risk and public engagement during times of crisis.
Paper long abstract:
Mary slept in a tent, in a farmer's field, with her dog for warmth and company. I first interviewed her whilst working as a Part-time Ethnographic Research Associate (RA) on a project about rural homelessness in England. The project, funded and guided by a network of NGOs, involved both survey methods and ethnography. I used a feminist 'patchwork' methodology to investigate the lived experience of homelessness in four rural areas across England. The research attracted a lot of local and national media attention. Mary's story was one of those featured in the final report we wrote with our stakeholders. After having read our report, a journalist got in touch and requested to meet and write about Mary. Sadly that very week, we found Mary had passed away. Might earlier media engagement have changed Mary's situation? Could it have made things worse? How do we balance timing, risk and public engagement during times of crisis?
As an ethnographer, I became a gatekeeper for stories that made it to the mainstream news in the UK. This involved accompanying TV crews for filming at field sites and meeting participants. These encounters were fraught with mixed feelings and ethical dilemmas about deadlines, research time, participants' well-being and outcomes. Here I reflect on the time and care taken whilst doing ethnography, however rapidly, and the mixed approaches of media professionals and deadlines. Crucially I reflect on the double-edged sword of doing public engagement with participants about the very urgent but also enduring issues they face.
Elena Butti (Graduate Institute Geneva (IHEID))
Paper short abstract:
As an urban anthropologist committed to understanding the lives of young people at the urban margins, in this plenary contribution I propose an honest reflection on the double hat as both an academic and a practitioner that I have held in the past few years.
Paper long abstract:
As an urban anthropologist committed to understanding the lives of young people at the urban margins, in this plenary I propose an honest reflection on the double hat as both an academic and a practitioner that I have held in the past few years. My PhD (2014-2019) consisted in an in-depth, multi-year ethnographic study of the lives of adolescents who enter large criminal organziations in the peripheries of Medellín, Colombia. As is to be expected with this kind of topic, I found myself engaging on a daily basis with informants who endure significant hardship. Struck by the societal urgency of the issues I came across, throughout my PhD I sought collaborations with international and local INGOs working on addressing inequality, violence and exclusion. I also turned to visual anthropology, co-producing several short films with young people which, I hoped, would make visible the issues and challenges they were going through. No matter how ‘good’ these attempts were looking on my CV, however, they still felt marginal. I felt a constant pressure to “do something”, and was unsatisfied with the standard academic path to impact. At the end of my fieldwork, I took up a full-time practitioner job in a humanitarian NGO working on delivering programmes that support this population. Now, upon return to full-time academia, I reflect on these interconnected experiences, what worked and what didn't, and I propose concrete ways in which the academic job market can better account for work that seeks to make ethnographic research immediately impactful.