As keyword, then, self-care speaks to multiple issues and challenges that define feministanthropology today.
sig. of self care
As keyword, then, self-care speaks to multiple issues and challenges that define feministanthropology today.
sig. of self care
and un-care
want to learn more about this - what does it mean?
polysemy
vocab
Joining refusal to self-care, these writings dovetail with literature from a range of disciplines thatframes refusal as political practice, a perspective Black feminists have long advanced.6
but does this hurt them?
Constituting the ideal subject requires both internal and external transformations, working onboth the body and the psyche
literally policing ourselves
“postfeminism.” While authors vary in their definitions, following AngelaMcRobbie (2009), Rosalind Gill (2017), and Catherine Rottenberg (2014), we use the term to capturea contemporary gendered formation that shifts from structural critique of inequalities toward anow-familiar neoliberal emphasis on individualism, choice, and agency
vocab
More recently, KaiGreen and Marquis Bey elaborate the concept of the “radical we,” which “describes self love as apractice that is not simply good for the self but also generative and good for others. The radical weviews a cared-for collective as made possible by cared-for individuals” (
how do these ideas relate to cultural ideals of collectivist societies like that of many Native American groups in the US?
Cooper critiqued the hegemonic workings of romantic love, pushing past this limitedunderstanding to a broader definition of love “as a political practice connected to the pursuit of asovereign mind, heart, and body” (May 2017, 41). Enabling all individuals to take up such pursuitswould serve society as a whole
relate back to the Brown reading last week
personhood is dividual
dividual vocab: separate/distinct
f care constitutes persons, one way that persons can be deemed as such is through the abilityto care for themselves
autonomy and selfhood- how does this idea interact with disability issues? How is this all tied to capitalism?
Care in Anthropology
relate back to readings on care week 11
it has come to denote a productiveway to attend to one’s self, body, and/or soul that is most often achieved through consumption.
!!!
It is incumbent upon all of us toattend to the reality that feminist scholars often reproduce exclusionary practices.
recognizing shortcomings within the actual fem anthro community
experience, recognizing that “ethnography is a gift of reciprocity, not an imperialentitlement.
leveling power differentials
. It is about a philosophical worldview and politicalcommitments
main goals of fem anthro?
Feminist ethnography is praxis—an actively engaging process that isembodied, taught, learned, and relearned
praxis definition
These consumerist shifts have not necessarily changedwhat feminist ethnographers feel committed to in developing activist scholarship,but they are problematic for reducing activism to a financial engagement that ismore available to some than to others.
!!!!! should feminist activists support consumer-based initiatives if it raises awareness for an otherwise underrecognized cause?
It is important to be sensitive to the fact that research participantsassociated with scholars who identify as activists can experience danger but maynot have the same access to resources. This is particularly significant since it is theresearcher’s responsibility to do no harm, but if one is an activist-scholar, we alsohave a responsibility to attempt to do good.
!!! but how do anthropologists protect participants in this situation
herposition as researcher/interlocutor (rather than being directly identified as an activ-ist) enabled her Maasai participants to use her documentation work in court casestoward their own political project
working as an aid to the legal system
How does this work/ is it ethical for anthropologists to work within the legal system
Rather, they prefer to serve asinterlocutors, whereby they can offer social critique and simultaneously disentanglethe webs of power in which people live.
power differential interpreters
Michelle Téllez is
look up for ENV
multi-tasking activism,
!!!!!!
They risked their lives and limbs during the protest,and Gladwell distinguishes between this form of activism versus cyberactivism,whereby one can push a button to sign a petition or post their outrage over aparticular injustice on Facebook or Twitter. Gladwell holds that these forms ofdigital protest are weak
is social activism less effective is one is not physically placing themselves in proximity to the opposition/putting oneself at physical risk? Is this the litmus test of how committed to the cause someone is?
sticker campaign we hoped to upset and motivate “to go against the grain,to prove everyone wrong” and “to realize what it is we have against us.”
reverse psychology (?) but not really just making obvious the ridiculous stereotypes that may other go unnoticed by privl. communities
With our “stereotype stickers” we wanted to “prick the‘psychic amnesia’ that has infected America” (T
super effective and riveting marketing
Nicolazzo note that “many of theframeworks for collaborative research methodologies have been informed by highlymarginalized communities themselves.
actually taking advice from the communities themselves for how to activism
goals born of long-term engagement
can you successfully conduct feminist ethnographic activist research in a country that is hostile to feminist principles?
ultural capital
vocab
eminist ethnographers contribute to many types of activism, including those thatlean toward conservatism (see discussion of Poewe/“Cesara’s” ethnographic mem-oir in chapter 6).
would be interested to learn more about how conservative anthropological activism can exist- can anthropologists even be conservative? Cultural ones at least?
Obstetric racism sits at the intersection of medical racism and obstetricviolence and is used to explain forms of abuse that medical personnel and institu-tions perpetrate against women during conception, pregnancies, childbirth, andpostpartum. Obstetric racism is enacted on racialized bodies that have experiencedhistorically constituted forms of subjugation.
vocab word
In illumi-nating and challenging the intentions of some conservatives to undermine women’sreproductive rights, research by feminist scholars has informed those debates.
so choosing a particular topic that needs more research is activism itself? Or does more have to be done?
. Meadwrote a column in the 1960s for Redbook, a popular magazine targeted at youngmarried women, and engaged in public dialogue about subjects from adolescence towomen’s sexuality to environmentalism on radio and television
boots on the ground vibe
a public intellec-tual.
what's the difference between a public intellectual and an activist scholar? Is one just an earlier iteration of the other?
it is almost impossible to engage in ethnography and not intervene oradvocate when you do research with people who have preventable illnesses or facechallenges that can be addressed, such as homelessness. In these instances, she positsactivism as an integral part of the research.
but how much of an activist can you be if you're not addressing the issues as they come up if it is within your control
activist-scholar model.
vocab
This chapter examines the role of activism within feminist ethnography and avariety of ways that feminist ethnographers engage in activist work. Many wouldargue that being a feminist activist ethnographer is practicing a form of scholarshipcommitted to human liberation. It requires that you have commitments beyond theacademy—that you are committed to a struggle
main q/topic of chapter
A language of same-sex intimacy in the nineteenth century shouldnot be read in relation to contemporary usage. Bu
Brown seems to be "reading between the lines" with reference to her interpretations of Truth's sexuality, although not written in explicit terms. How can anthropologists do the same and analyze what is unsaid as well as what is said? Is this an effective ethnographic strategy, or can it lead to misinterpretations/misunderstandings in what is considered a social-scientific text?
Truth’s depiction as a wisecrone, with knitting in her lap, perhaps eases public anxiety about her free-dom of movement, her disengagement from conventional family formation
!!
elissa Gregg write: “the ‘lower’ or proximal senses (such as touch, taste,smell, rhythm and motion-sense, or, alternately/ultimately, the autonomicnervous system).
^^
Critical attention to the senses most often gives primacy to the visual. Thisprevents us from understanding the importance of the other senses in theexperience of ecstasy, spiritual or otherwise.
how can anthropologists incorporate senses other than the visual into their ethnographic work to create a more robust ethnography?
In contrast, the radical utopianpractices of the preaching women included challenges to state and capitalistcontrol, alternatives to heterosexual marriage and motherhood, feminisms,experimental health and religious practices, and the wild worlds of dreamsand visions.
how did this challenge heterosexual marriage?
Asmany theorists of affect have shown, feeling is intensely personal but is alsoabout contact: intimate experiences of an intensity that flow like electricitybetween people.
how does this relate to an ethnographer's experience doing fieldwork?
sites where the boundaries between inti-macy, love, eroticism, and sexual and spiritual ecstasy were porous
hmm
Ecstasy, a state of intensely heightened sensual feeling, creates a space of time-lessness, of suspension in the space where the material and immaterial com-ingle, both in the body and out of the body.
How can scholars like Dr. Brown, and ethnographers, describe an emotion, like ecstasy, in their work when it is such an individual and varied experience? How can emotion be captured in intellectual works in a way that is _____
I con-sider the worlds created by these women, in communion and in their dreamsand visions, as utopian practice, profoundly of other temporal dimensionsand ethereal cartographies.
!!!
Jackson andher lifelong partner, Rebecca Perot
?
the “psychic highway” for years
define
ce. Somestates, with an eye to Eastern Europe, even fear the possi-bility of ethnonationalism
how can this be prevented?
d to "opt out of in-digenism" in favor of the only other available "identity ofradical alterity"-membership in Pentecostal ch
interesting
ts, like myself, have watched the people with whomthey have worked for years reframe their long-term collec-tive identities based on criteria such as ethnicity or liveli-hood to embrace a new identity as "indig
how does this minimize the individual indigenous experiences of these ppl?
at exist in manystates by noting "non-dominance" as another commoncharacteristic of indigenous peopl
true but is this problematic
needing to rally together in progressive action to recover what hasbeen lost
kind of like the democrat make america great again
Property literally undercuts Indigenous kinship and attempts to replaceit. It objectifies the land and water and other-than-human beings as potentiallyowned resources
!!
Non-Indigenous peopleclaiming to be Métis misunderstand it as a label that they can appropriate torefer to having any North American Indigenous ancestry, actual or mythologi-cal.
melungeons
Thus, even progressive nationalnarratives imply that Indigenous peoples are inevitably vanishing, which does notsquare with Indigenous peoples’ own will to self-determination, our resistance to
!!! it's very much a "what has been done has been done" narrative
This hierarchy is actualized through the associated verbs/adjectives “ani-mate” and de-animate” that refer to the greater and lesser aliveness attributed tohumans over other-than-humans, to animals over plants, etc.
power of animacy and language
Whether the settler statewants to farm, build a mine or a city, pump oil, or cordon off a national park,the “resources” used to build these nation-states include the lands, waters, andother-than-human beings with whom Indigenous peoples are co-constituted.
art and environment reading
Dreaming,even in inclusive and multicultural tones, of developing an ideal settler stateimplicitly supports the elimination of Indigenous peoples from this place
thesis
To date, theorizations of morality/ethics tend to remain im-plicit in discussions of language and care. This review has outlined some of the possibilities that asynthesis of linguistic, medical, and psychological anthropology research on morality/ethics andcare might yield: a theoretical lens for understanding the moral/ethical affordances of languageand their implications for the embodied constitution of care.
suggestions for direction of future scholarship
may act as a shibboleth—as a mechanism forexclusion.
shibboleth!
For instance, Koen (2013) describes Islamic Pamiri devotionalmusic in Tajikistan by analyzing the patterned repetition of rhythmic, harmonic, and melodicelements.
rhythmic language as care
s Others who are thinking, feeling subjects similarto oneself. Such recognition suggests that one should or could care for the Other.
boils down to empathy
It is paradoxical that the biomedical impulse to care,rooted in recognition of the Other as a thinking, feeling subject, leads to the (at least temporary)treatment of the Other as an object—as a body to be repaired
!!!!!!!
Patients’ and caregivers’ illness experiences, often communicatedin illness narratives, tend to be devalued in medical encounters. Meanwhile, doctors’ biomedicalobjectification of bodies and pathogens yields moral/ethical authority and the ability to diagnoseand prescribe
yet medical language also feels more detached
practices of bowing and uttering of a linguistic particle “a” invarious social relationships. Repeated prompting of such communicative routines socializes ba-bies and young children into culturally distinct moral/ethical standpoints for what Shohet termsbidirectional asymmetrical reciprocity in care relationships
language reinforcing hierarchy in child elder rel.
Care is realized in physical acts that communicate affect, attention, empathy, andcopresence—a touch on the arm, a tenderness in tone of voice, a hug, a kiss, or even a brief momentof shared eye gaze
examples of care
Intertextuality and interdiscursivity providekey resources for moral/ethical reflection by calling participants’ attention to multiple voices andperspectives
also requires a degree of social awareness
This reflexive attention to poetics shifts meaning-making processes into the subjunc-tive mood
?
When a speaker uses an affix orother syntactic construction to indicate that an entity acted, rather than being acted upon, thespeaker is implicitly invoking culturally specific frameworks for evaluating control, intention, andmoral culpability
!!! language shapes the perceived power dynamics and grants certain parties agency
Significant experiential distinctions can be made between everyday habitual (communicative)acts, on the one hand, and conscious (often linguistically articulated) reflection on what oneshould or could do, on the other hand. The former is sometimes labeled “moral,” while the latteris sometimes labeled “ethical
moral vs ethical
After that, I draw from theseunderstandings to examine three key themes: (a) the embodied linguistic constitution of care,(b) the performance of care, and (c) exclusion from care.
3 subpoints
Thicker description 1 of my platform shoes necessitates a broaderfield of examination that can ultimately provide knowledge that crossesvarious disciplines
small personal scale to wide scale
ethno-graphic authority
vocab
Amongother topics, her research addresses infancy and childcare among the Bengin West Africa and cross-culturally. In this excerpt, the coauthors describe thebreadth and impetus for their creative writing project, A World of Babies
SO interesting
highlight our analysis of specific moments in those lives
how is this not confusing?
He opted not toitalicize words in Tagalog and Filipino—which most style guides require—so as notto mark them as “foreign” and distinct from English.
not otherisizing
“germinal” has been used by some feminists as an alternative,
interesting
is fre-quently referred to as “seminal,” linking to the production of semen
vocab
because this grammatical construction canlead a reader to ignore, or a writer to obscure, the fact that someone performedthe action
important to pay attention to how language denotes action/cause/effect
heir data and begin the process ofwriting an ethnographic account
feminist ethnographic framework helps sift through wide range of data and make sense of it
polyvocality,
vocab word- many voices
For Wolf, this makes a useful point: that part of ethnographic responsibility is topresent events in a way that allows for multiple interpretations—even by differentethnographers conducting research at the same time.
how can you present multiple interpretations/POVs while maintaining a cohesive narrative with a main point? Isn't it the anthropologist's job to distill their notes down to a digestible narrative?
s a “Muse Map,” something like a road-map or outline but with the intention of being a guiding force versus merely chartingthe trajectory of a document.
writing strategy
As habit is more dependable than inspiration, continued learning is more depend-able than talent.
consistency
contributing in other ways, such as buying a meal, assisting with livingexpenses, offering rides, or babysitting a participant’s children might be meaning-ful gestures for those who offer time and expertise to one’s research. Other times,an ethnographer may feel compelled to “give back” in the form of support for theorganization they work with by grant writing, developing a website, or other volun-teer work that fits their skill sets
"giving back" in an immediately helpful and meaningful way that further integrates you into the community
help them with their website, and I remember askingFaye [Ginsburg, my dissertation advisor], should I volunteer in their offices,so I can actually be in the office every day that I’m there? And she said, “ohabsolutely, you have to do this.” I said, “but then I’m helping them to createtheir website” [for a cause I didn’t support]. And she said, “but I think if you’reexplicit about that in your research, then that’s okay
interesting mention of ginsburg
Srimati Basu became interested in studying the Indian MRM (Men’s RightsMovement) following her feminist work on violence against women, in part becauseof the contradictions she saw in their opposition to the Indian feminists she had cometo know.
studying the opposition to gain a better understanding of and strategy to combat misogyny
(See “Up from Hatred,” Los AngelesTimes, http://articles .latimes .com /1997 /aug /10 /magazine /tm -21338.)
second source?
“If you ask people to give up hate, then youmust be there for them when they do,”
wow
But who should have to undergo the emotional labor of this and how should they, if they should be, compensated?
Although cultural relativism, the idea that a culture must only be judged within itsown cultural context, is the stated goal of most ethnographers, this is not the sameas moral relativism, often taken to mean that we should tolerate all cultural behav-iors even when we disagree with them.
!!!!
By examining her own biases, Davids analyzes the processes whereby sheopens herself up to locate agency in Marina’s conservatism
could also be applied to Ginsburg in my analysis
Ginsburg was accused of having “gone native” and becoming a right-to-life advocate.Ultimately, her largely pro-choice academic colleagues struggled more with her decisionthan her participants, who were more comfortable with her role of neutrality.
isn't staying neutral on pro-life stuff essentially siding with them? Do you have a moral obligation to set these ideas aside as a researcher? How does this differ from concealing other parts of your identity, like your sexuality, from the participants?
she found herself helping to hold thechild steady for xylocaine injections
wtf
they advocate a fugitive approach
?? need clarification on what this means
In so doing, they make a complex system legible toreaders. Although making complex systems comprehensible has been the intent ofmany ethnographers, what is notable here is that these authors include the demysti-fication of political, legal, and economic systems as fundamentally essential for theirvision of feminist ethnographic inquir
studying-up can be helpful because it exposes complex/difficult to understand processes that affect all of us from the top-down
If one goal of feminist ethnography is toreduce power differentials through the possibilities of cocreating the ethnography,how is that transformed when the power dimensions of your work are reversed?
!!!!!!!!!
shenoted that “when you’re looking at elites, there’s an issue about . . . your relation-ship with powerful people.” Arguably, ethnography, and feminist ethnography inparticular, presumes a degree of authority over those whom researchers study
worries about getting sued/socially disadvantaged as a result of exposing the lives of upper-echelon people
Yet, in 1972, Laura Nader issued aclarion call for anthropology to reinvent itself and for researchers to “study up,”given their unique position and focus on analyzing processes of power. In her stillimportant article, “Up the Anthropologist: Perspectives Gained from StudyingUp,” 14 Nader argues that we need to examine the operationalization of powerwhere it is wielded. Nader asked, “What if . . . anthropologists were to study thecolonizer rather than the colonized, the culture of power rather than the cultureof the powerless, the culture of affluence rather than the culture of poverty?” 1
idea of studying up- how does this require a certain degree of privilege and why would anthropologists hesitate to do it? Why in some ways is it easier to "study down"?
The global politics of mobility also revises the notion that all ethnographicresearch takes place in single “bounded communities
politics of mobility and fem anthro
For example, to tracetransnational GRS markets is irreducible to a discussion of identity catego-ries or sexual practices, although GRS markets exist in the forms they doprecisely because of contradictions and inconsistencies among sex, gender,and sexuality system. . . .
almost like a circular question
Is there anethical imperative to disclose (particular) aspects of our identities to participants?Does whether that identity relates to one’s research topic matter? Will participantsfeel betrayed if they learn later that an ethnographer is “exposed” as being not whothey may have imagined them to be?
to what extent does the researcher have to be honest/vulnerable with the participants?
Ethnographic] fieldwork is an occupation of workaholic
!!! important for researchers to maintain work life balance to protect themselves and the integrity of their work
What herhome institution had failed to account for was that the host country might not havean understanding of ethics commensurate with that in the United States. My col-league was forced to conduct a huge amount of “red herring” research
ignorant to assume that IRB standards in the US are applicable to those in other countries -- or even safe to use
In other words, peopleshould be given all of the information they need so that they have the power torefuse to engage in research or treatment with as much integrity as they should haveto give their consent
definition/importance of informed refusal
we can skirt things like informedconsent, but the problem for many of us is that the very form of informed con-sent—particularly a piece of paper covered with legalistic writing—inserts itselfas a kind of violence into the delicate and intimate relationships we form in thefield
legal/formal nature of IRB not aligned with the community-based nature of a lot of research
not its core.
the IRB not just being to cover the institution's butts if something goes wrong
Indemnification
definition: security against legal action for ones actions
the IRB would focus on supporting researchers indoing the most creative and ethically rigorous work possible
positive change would be altering the IRB to allow for more creative approaches and work within ethical bounds
Bailey highlights the irony that “trans women of colorare not understood as one of the vulnerable communities identified by the IRB thatassesses the potential harms of academic research on those researched.”2
perceived flaws with the IRB
ldWartherewasagreatmigration Northby
look up: laura aguilar diana gamboa
firstencounteredtheteenagedLawrenceatUtopiaChildren’sHouse,acenterforthechildrenofworkingwomen,insteadencouragedhimtoexplorethevisualpossibilitiesofabstractshapesandpatterns.
why? style of the time?
LawrencedescribedlonghoursspentatNewYork’sMetropolitanMuseumofArtstudyingpaintingsbythefourteenth-andfifteenth-centuryItalianartistscreditedwithinventingrationalsystemsformimickingtheappearanceofthe realworldonpaper,canvas,andotherflatplanes
"classic" artistic foundation
Likemanysociallyminded African-Americanartistsofthe1930sandearly’40s,LawrenceadmiredtheMexicanmuralists’commitmenttoproducingartthatilluminatedthehistoryofsubjugatedracesandclasses.
interesting racial parallel
heyalso“understandthesoil.theclimate,andthelifeintheSouth;and,beingbynaturearaceofpeacefulpeople,weprefertoremainintheSouthandsolveourproblemsbyindustry,thrift,andeducation.”
scientific racism?
In this context Lawrence’s panels were linked not onlyto political goals but also to a larger willingness to mobilizecollectively—an elaboration of rationale, but also offuture threat.
!!!
images of trains, railway cars, trainstations and their waiting rooms, and people arriving ator departing from them with their bags appear again andagain, serving as a repetitive motif. There are fourteen suchimages in total across the sixty panels of the series. Thisrhythmic intersplicing of congruent bodies of images, thejuxtaposition producing both aesthetic and ideologicalmeaning, resembles nothing so much as Eisenstein’smontage: the Soviet filmmaker’s cutting back again andagain to the baby carriage in the thrilling Odessa Stepssequence of Battleship Potemkin is the most famous example
soviet collab
In books, photographerscould assert more authorial control over their images thanthey could within the collective corporate structure of thephoto magazine, and could work in a longer format, oftenwith the aim of creating a more coherent and sustainedpolitical argument.
curated
graphic illustrations andpolitical cartoons such as thoseproduced by Alston, Bearden,E. Simms Campbell, and others
format as a political cartoon speaks to his aim
had already developed an extensive researchprotocol unusual for a painter, spending time at the librarytaking notes onbooks, journals, anddocuments
historically informed art
Although there was a wide range in the degreeof formal instruction these workshops offered, all of themreceived federal support toward the costs of salaries, rent,and supplies.
cool
Incommentslikethis,Lawrencesuggeststhatdespiteitsbenefitstohiscareer,andsomepleasureinhisinclusioninthese collections,theconversationamonginstitutionalarbitersofmodernart—amonggallerists,collectors,andcurators—hadnotbeenhisprimaryfocus.
socially minded art
his innovative multipanel narratives on the lives of Toussaint L'Ouverture, Frederickflass, and Harriet Tubman, significant figures inan-American history, had already won praise.
icons across a few centuries
Stone argues that if slaves, women, children, and even corporations can be granted legalpersonhood or standing despite cultural and historical arguments to the contrary, thenecosystems and nonhuman species should also be granted personhood in courts,constitutions, and governing agendas.
rights of nature definition
This results in an "image complex," which, as described byMeg McLagan and Yates McKee, identifies "the channels of circulation along whichcultural forms travel, the nature of the' campaigns that frame them, and the discur-sive platforms that display and encode them in specific truth modes.'?
image complex concept definition
Banerjee's work forms a paral- 64lel aesthetics of survival, focusingon signs of ecological breakdownrather than depicting an ideal-ized purity of the nature preserve,to contribute to a politics.of resis-ranee."
"aesthetics of survival"
One-fifth of the planet's undiscovered oil and natural gas is thought to be buriedin the Arctic fioor, according to the US Geological Survey in 2013, making the region,in the agency's words, "the largest unexplored prospective area for petroleum remain-ing on earth."
1/5 of oil in arctic
According to this understanding, indigeneity refers to systems among humans and non-humans operative in particular places over many generations.
indigeneity def
This idea of connectedness, one shared by a growing num-ber of ecologists and environmental activists, respects the distinctive qualitiesof the refuge while also reincorporating it into a broader vision of global ecol-ogy
concept of connectedness
Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History.
where the work was displayed
Overall, these circumstances caused me to question the statusof my insider knowledge and what it does
talks about how she started a relationship with a trans man during her research and how this impacted her self-identification as a lesbian, and therefore someone "in" her researched community
hey challenged my preconceptions of contemporary lesbian identity. Bythinking and writing reflexively and through a queer lens, I became increasingly vigilant to theways in which the ontological category of lesbian that I inhabited was not universal.
learning more about oneself as the researcher through the process by realizing that as an insider, even your experiences and shared qualities with the participants may not be universal
Queering ethnography requires amethodology that pays attention to the performativity of a self which is gendered, sex,sexualised, classed and generational in the research process.
queering requires researcher's self-awareness
So for instance, I realised, over time that one of my ‘informants’was friends with one of my former lovers.
tea
In the spirit of a feminist and reflexive ethnographicproject, paying attention to the work of emotions and erotics in ethnography is, in part, a pushto question the way in which the ontological and epistemological boundary between the‘knower’ and the ‘known’ is produced and maintained in the discursive production of‘us’/’them’.
understanding that the erotic is viewed as taboo by ethnography as a discipline, "queering" it means to explore it
However, whilst emphasising similarities andshared experiences was productive, it is also necessary to acknowledge that simultaneouslyplaying down my educational background, my professional training and the class mobility thisbrought, also formed part of my interaction with informants, brought about by an awareness thatthese ‘differences’ might jeopardise the ‘rapport’ I sought to develop.
how do we balance privileged identity and "relatability" in research?
It is not so much that the ethnographer is armed with atheoretical and methodological toolbox, possessing a superior ‘objective’ knowledge.
how is the researcher more qualified then, and how do we navigate this power imbalance?
Acknowledging this temporalityis to queer an otherwise normative rational version of ethnographic time
"queer"-ing = to subvert, not nesc. dealing with sexual orientation/identity
The ‘field’ becomes a spatial, temporal and sensory capsule, which is constantly revisitedthrough notes, transcripts and memory in order to make sense of it and to find its broadersociological significance and meaning
!!!!
My own research, situatedclose to home, highlighted how the process of crossing the fictional borders between the fieldof the university and the fieldwork site of the LGB centre blurs the edges of what I thought ofas the field
a physical distance makes it easier to separate oneself and their research from "the field"
Queering ethnography therefore necessarily involves exploring the normativelogics of ethnographic research and writing.
need to examine the normative assumptions of ethnography/ethnographic writing to then "queer" it
I aimed to combine queer,postmodern and poststructural theories of knowledge production and the self, with acommitment to ethnographic understandings of identity categories
theoretical basis
I wanted to analyse the ways in which thechanging meanings of the identity category ‘lesbian’ are discursively produced in socio-historical context, and in particular the ways that women live in relationship to the meanings ofthe category ‘lesbian’.
her own research question entering the lesbian ethnography
theory should be employed when it offers some insight intoethnographic evidence rather than prioritising theory and then seeking to find evidence to‘prove its validity’.
!!!!!
Both of these critiques eschew the ‘god-like’ position ofdetached, rational, objective observer and a neutral positivism, and see the production ofknowledge as a discursive and political activity. Both have demanded attention to reflexivityand intersubjectivity, addressing the researcher’s own ambiguous position.
leveling the power dynamic between the researcher and the researched
However, there is, I believe, astrong case for a queer ethnography that hones queer theory and qualifies it within the contextof everyday life
making queer theory more practical and accessible by putting it in the context of everyday lives
hermeneutic
the branch of knowledge that deals with interpretation, especially of the Bible or literary texts.
circulated around queer’s tendency towardsphilosophical abstraction and textual criticism, its employment of an under-developed conceptof the social, and its lack of engagement with the material relations of inequality
queer theory as too vague, not applicable
appealing for an open discussion of the affective anderotic dimensions of knowledge production which continue to be written out in the writing upprocess
other part of MP/argument
inand around a London LGB community centre.
site
To queer ethnography then, is to curve theestablished orientation of ethnography in its method, ethics and reflexive philosophicalprinciples
"queer" as a verb
apter argues that queer ethnography doesmore than use ethnography to research queer lives; it also takes queer theory seriously toquestion the conventions of ethnographic research.
Main argument
Community elders led fieldtrips, sharing neighborhood histories with youth, whoused digital cameras to document local sites. Youth then curated and installed anexhibit of photos and videos at the conclusion of the camp and created “recordingstations” to document residents’ memories of living in the neighborhood.
cool
asset mapping process in the neighborhood to identify key cultural resources thatcould be incorporated into community planning.
vocab
Participatory Action Research (PAR). PAR aims to better understand acommunity not only through participation in it (as all ethnographers do) but alsothrough working collaboratively with participants to make social change. PAR ispredicated upon collaborative reflection and collectively inquiry
PAR vocab def
African Americans aswell as historical literary fiction offers new methodological possibilities for feministethnographic approaches within archaeology
is historical literary fiction useful to feminist anthro in the same way as oral histories? Need to be taken into consideration with other streams of evidence?
She argues that those who oppose FGC must move beyond aframework of judgment toward one of mutual respect, attentive to the social andhistorical contexts of African lives. Further, they must consider the work of Suda-nese feminists who address FGC not in isolation but alongside issues of reproductivehealth more generally, as well as the negative effects of structural adjustment onfood security and health services.
how do we address FGC through a cultural relativist and feminist lens simultaneously?
Ethnohistory often includes an analysis of folklore, archaeologicalmaterials, music, language, museum collections, and may incorporate life historyinterview
ethnohistory vocab definition
informed consent, whichis typically a written (or sometimes oral) agreement when a person who participatesin research gives permission to the researcher to use quotes, stories, photos, or otherinformation in their research and publications
vocab
. Netnography has become ubiquitous in consumerresearch across a broad range of industries, such as gaming franchises, tourism, andhealthcare. It has also drawn disciplines where ethnography is common—anthro-pology, education, geography, sociology, etc.—into conversation (and sometimescollaboration) with researchers in library and information sciences and computerscience.
what is the relation to algorithmic/marketing techniques used to sell products based on people's data/patterns? What are the ethical implications of this?
They enlisted a groupof graduate students to code all photos that included people by skin tone: black,bronze, and white
vocab
Her goal in gath-ering this data was to provide context and nuance to stories from participants andto present descriptive statistics on the overall demographic picture of the fifty-fourLGBTQ people interviewed, which ultimately challenged popular assumptions thatLGBTQ family-making occurs only among white, wealthy, urban gay and lesbiancouples. 1
descriptive stats vocab word
Sometimesgathering information about sexual orientation, income, age, and so on is just plainnosy
nosy
What is key to ethnographic research is finding out howa participant identifies themselve
identifies themselves (!!)
The key is to couple these histories—becausethey have value and meaning—with other methods so one can obtain themost accurate interpretations of an event or history.
a way to ensure the "accuracy" of oral accounts
The poignancy of this second book, especiallyNisa’s efforts to heal Shostak’s cancer through a traditional !Kung ceremony,offers a moving example of the power of life history to teach readers about unfa-miliar cultural and political contexts
wow
archaeologists call “oral history”
how does oral history appear in the archaeological record?
“the often-casual nature ofthe locations of both participants and [the researcher] during interviews [werereminiscent] of ongoing pandemic-era conversations about working fromhome, and particularly from bed.”
so interesting how the experiences associated with a specific interview location can influence the vibe of the data collection
Here we home in on several undergraduatestudents who navigated completing their degrees—which required an undergradu-ate thesis—while maintaining their commitments to feminist, queer, anti-racist, anddecolonial approaches to ethnography
interesting that they included the stories of undergrads (who typically are not considered relevant to the world of academia)
In many cases, ethnographic interviews become more likeconversations than one-sided questioning, and the ethnographer frequently learnsmore about their projects by fielding questions from participants in this context.Going “off-topic” also allows ethnographic interviews to delve further into thingsthat are important to participants.
when conducting an ethnographic study, how does the researcher keep their participant "on topic," or even should they?
Christa began each interview by tellingparticipants that they were also welcome to ask her questions about her experi-ence as a queer woman who had a second-trimester loss.
for the "ask-the researcher questions" interview approach, does it necessitate that the researcher be a member of the community they are researching?
esearch methods themselvesare neither feminist nor nonfeminist.
MP
In fact, mixed-methods approaches, usingseveral research methods together for a particular project, are common in feministethnographic work
mixed-methods vocab word
andseek out individuals who might not be the customary spokespeople in their com-munities.
how do you "seek out individuals who might not be the customary spokespeople for their communities" without turning into the "giving them a voice" trope?
To ask those with whom I was working to sharein my research was easier and democratic in theory than it was in practice. Suchparticipation demands more work from people than the most thoughtful interview
this approach also definitely takes the power away from the lead anthropologist- more egalitarian but at what cost to the research participants etc
transcripts (typed copiesof recorded interviews
transcript vocab
being done on “queer women”;
the word "on" denotes an innate power relationship
(a) feminist ethnographers must think about language to describe their researchas they design their study and (b) as feminist ethnographers approach their writing,it is important to explain how and why particular choices were made (or why andhow changes occurred during or after the research encounter).
MP about language
What connotations might the term have outside of your discipline, andoutside of academia? For instance, “respondent” and “subject” have a long historyof use in psychology to describe those who fill out surveys or are involved in experi-ments—will your research aim to replicate, or differ from, such studies?
even the language you use in designing a study has implications on the "vibe" of your research
Ethnographers have referred to thosewho participate in their research in many different ways: as subjects, informants,participants, contributors, respondents, interpreters, interlocutors, and those withwhom they had especially close relationships as key informants, gatekeepers, coau-thors, and collaborators.
the multiplicity of research subject "labels"
In other words, [we must think] about the implications of our presenceas researchers.
a more self-aware mode of research where the researcher does not pretend that their presence, and the connotations that bears with it, does not have an impact on the study
Methods are specific procedures, operations, or techniques for identifyingand collecting the evidence necessary to answer research questions. I
methods definition
Thus, it is how afeminist ethnographer utilizes and contextualizes various methods that enable themto contribute to feminist ethnographic research.
!!!! the application of methodologies and the framework is what differentiates a feminist stud from a non-feminist one
that methods themselves are neither inherentlyfeminist nor nonfeminis
it's the applications of these methodologies that makes them feminist? The subject material etc?
Ultimately, citation is quite an effective “reproductive technology,” as independentfeminist scholar Sara Ahmed points out on her research blog, feministkilljoys: kill-ing joy as a world making project
feminist killjoy reference
It was an epiphany of sorts when Bolles shifted the focus from critiquing whom wedo not cite (though certainly acknowledging the importance of this) to becomingactively engaged with locating diverse scholarship in order to influence our workand knowledge development
action opposed to just talk
related to a researcher’s position that is too simplistic, emphasizingthat one is either only an insider or an outsider.
nuance
Is the insider/outsider dichotomy a definitive way to understandthe researcher/researched relationship? Does the insider role establish legitimacy forthe researcher? Does being familiar with the group make it easier to interview orconduct extended fieldwork with them?
but the goal of field work is not objectivity
He simply wishes to make it possible for a man tobe both a Negro and an American, without being cursed andspit upon by his fellows, without having the doors of opportu-nity closed in his face
insider/outsider duality
Using biblicalallusions to Easter and the resurrection, Marshall depicts fullygrown men who refuse to give in to society’s degradations andmisled attempts at salvation.
determined and hopeful to make the gardens live up to their names
Marshallsuggests idealized pastoral compositions seen in paintingsbeginning with the Italian Renaissance
historiography - irony
the difference between the misguided utopian idealand its harsh reality
juxtaposition
We put an end to it because it is wrong
justice
We have materials on how to havedifficult discussions about sexual misconduct, power in mentoring relationships, and exclusion thatinstitutions have not been willing to have thus far. (All materials are open access and can bedownloaded from www.meto
proposed solution
ven now, in the #MeToo era,we’re still here. As Paige West’s (2018) critique of the recent fallout over abuse and discriminationinvolving theHAU Journal of Ethnographic Theorydescribes, it was primarily younger and moreprecarious scholars (i.e., graduate students, junior and contingent faculty, Indigenous scholars, andscholars of color) who attempted to take on the question of who wields power in anthropology andagainst whom while senior and tenured scholars seemed happy to fall back on that now-familiarfiction that the problem must lie with some specific bad actor on the editorial team or with thelikely spurious claims of the accusers.
bc these are the people disproportionately affected by the power imbalances
Thisanthropology, despite all the work it has done so far, still treats women without men, queer women,women without children, women without homes, nonwhite women, disabled women, and poor womenas matters of topical research and not as critical voices absent from the very structures and historyof anthropology itself
anthropology excluding women who do not fall into the traditional definition of womanhood
As a reflection of disciplinary anthropology today, #MeToo highlights the continued divisionsbetween feminism as a political movement and feminist anthropology as an academic subdisciplinecaught between institutional recognition or legitimacy and broader goals for social and culturalchange (Wiegman 2002)
MP
the question is not whether anthropology has sufficiently incorporated feminism into itsresearch methodologies but ultimately whether anthropology is ready to take on itself.
mq
where internet algorithms tend to perpetuate racial bias
youtube
hrough creating web content about the civil rights movement or the Holocaust,some white supremacists learned to disguise racist propaganda as historical fact, to great success.Many cloaked sites consistently appear as top options in Google search engine results (for years, aGoogle search for “Martin Luther King” turned up a white supremacist site as one of the top sites)
fake news!
is blended with these sexual fears by framing Jews as secretly controlling institutionsthroughout the West, from governments to banks to media. Jews are blamed for misogyny, feminism,and encouraging miscegenation
how did these become blended together?