Paper short abstract:

Walking as a method is omnipresent in the history of ethnographic disciplines, and is thus deeply inscribed in the professional habitus. Still, it remains unclear how walking has contributed to the negotiation of epistemological interests during different periods of the disciplinary past.

Paper long abstract:

A look at the history of knowledge of anthropological-ethnological disciplines reveals walking as a central epistemic practice of the first half of the 20th century. Since the beginnings of the discipline, it always has been a genuinely preferred research method, especially in so-called "outreach" subject areas such as house research, collecting folklore and folk dance research etc. Walking was then associated with precise observation, with "closeness to the people" and with a new understanding of the public and political functionalisation of folkloristic research. Although many of the proponents of walking as an ethnological method were willing to put their work at the service of political functions and were later criticised for this, this interestingly did not change later on the preference for walking as a method, for example in the newly establishing field of urban anthropology.

In a first step, the paper proposes to trace the hoped-for insights that were combined in the use of walking as a method, drawing from examples of Austrian and Swiss folklorists. To what extent did this type of walking research enable imaginings of a connection with the mountain population being researched? In a second step, the shifts that made walking a habitual method of urban anthropology will be illuminated. Although other references were formulated, walking was nevertheless given a similar perspective. Walking methods thus become tangible as research practices that connect different and contradictory epistemic interests in the history of our discipline.