Short Abstract

This panel examines polarisations in the context of archival "fieldwork," highlighting ethical, political, and epistemic tensions and exploring how ethnographic engagement with contested, fragmentary, and digitized historical sources can generate new methodological and theoretical perspectives.

Long Abstract

The commonly held notion of fieldwork in social and cultural anthropology rests on a polarization: the "field" as a distant site inhabited by living interlocutors, and the "archive" as a repository of traces of the "dead." Yet both are spaces of encounter—interpretive tensions marked by gaps and silences.

In accounts of anthropology's history, further polarisations recur: celebrating key figures as pioneers versus critiquing their complicity in colonial or authoritarian regimes; reassessing collections from colonial or wartime expeditions; and debating continuities across colonial, wartime, post-Nazi, and postcolonial academic practices. These contested narratives reveal how tensions continue to shape disciplinary histories and anthropology today.

Another polarisation arises at the intersection of anthropological and historical research. Anthropologists may engage in work similar to historians when dealing with archival sources, yet it could be argued that anthropology approaches the archive with different questions, thereby generating distinct forms of knowledge. This topic has been debated, but it seems timely to revisit the discussion, as archival work is undergoing significant transformations. Digital access alters the sensory experience of handling original documents, while ethical and representational concerns render archival practice increasingly sensitive.

The panel re-examines the practical implications of "fieldwork in the archive." Ethnographic attention to archival absences, contested remnants, and ideologically charged interpretations of the past can illuminate tensions and reveal what has been forgotten or suppressed. The panel thus explores how working with fragmentary or digitized archival sources can generate new methodological and theoretical perspectives on the history of anthropology and its contemporary challenges.

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