1 Fieldwork Tradition in Anthropology

Dr. Mitoo Das

Contents:

1. Introduction
2. What is Fieldwork?
3. History of Fieldwork in Anthropology
4. Doing Fieldwork in Anthropology
5. Ethics in Fieldwork
6. Fieldwork Today
7. Summary

Learning Outcomes:

After going through this module, the learner will be able to know:

•  about fieldwork in anthropology along with its history;
•  the significance and uniqueness of fieldwork in anthropology;
•  the different ways in which fieldwork is conducted in anthropology;
•  the issues and concerns that go along with it;
•  ethics in conducting fieldwork; and
•  changing scenario in fieldwork studies.

1. Introduction

Anthropology is popularly known as a “field science”. This is because in its study of humans, both socially and biologically, it depends on authenticating its data from real experiences and knowledge. This reality is captured not by suppositions and theories but by gathering first hand knowledge on it. This is where fieldwork as an approach of study comes in.

This module will discuss the relevance of fieldwork and its tradition in anthropology and put forward how, it as a methodology since its inception and evolution has played an important role in anthropological study.

2. What is Fieldwork?

Fieldwork is central to the inquiry of anthropology. It can be said to have formed the foundation of the discipline. The famous anthropologist, Margaret Mead notes: “We still have no way to make an anthropologist except by sending him into the field: this contact with living material is our distinguishing mark” (1964: 5).

Traditionally the word “field” indicates the area where the members of the group to be researched by the investigator, live in. However today, the “field” may also be the internet, a museum, a school, a library, a hospital, a lab, a market, an urban eating joint, a virtual space etc. The “field” becomes the readymade laboratory for the researcher. Fieldwork is investigation in anthropology where the researcher stays in or visits the place of investigation for long periods of time, not less than a year, receives firsthand experience and collects data. Powdermaker defines fieldwork as “the study of people and of their culture in their natural habitat. Anthropological fieldwork has been characterised by the prolonged residence of the investigator, his participation in and observation of the society, and his attempt to understand the inside view of the native people and to achieve the holistic view of a social scientist” (cited in Robben and Sluka 2007: 7). Others like Luhrmann points out that, “Anthropology is the naturalist’s trade: you sit and watch and learn from the species in its natural environment” (1989”: 15).

Fieldwork is equally important to the socio-cultural anthropologists, the physical anthropologists and the archaeological anthropologists. It is one methodology they follow in their distinct branches throughout their academic lifetime due to the remarkable awareness it provides. Anthropologists depend on fieldwork as their ultimate source of gathering valid data. It is because as Srivastava puts it, “compared to the other methods, fieldwork yields a lot of data about the lifestyles of people and the meaning they attribute to their actions. Fieldwork also teaches the distinction between ‘what people think’, ‘what people say’, ‘what people do, and ‘what people say they ought to have done’” (2004: 11).

Fieldwork is a kind of characteristic custom, a procedure that assists anthropologists in the inquiry of human life. It offers a huge level of flexibility to the fieldworker as s/he can modify approaches and techniques of investigation and collection of data, create and add newer processes and formulate “on-the-spot strategies to come to grips with unforeseen challenges of fieldwork”(Madan, 1995:112).

With this brief description on what fieldwork is, the module now proceeds with a concise history of fieldwork in anthropology.

3. History of Fieldwork in Anthropology

Anthropology today may hold a strong position in fieldwork expertise. But this was not always the case. When anthropology began as a valid discipline, its precursors though very much interested in knowing about how people lived all over the world, were however not too keen to go out and investigate on their own. These European scholars of the nineteenth century rather preferred to be dependent on the inquiries made by missionaries, voyagers, traders, administrators, etc. who were based locally in their places of interest, mostly colonies. Such scholars were generally known as armchair anthropologists.

E.B. Tylor (1832-1917), one of our first generation anthropologists who probably gave the most famous definition of culture and an advocate of theory of human development (called evolutionism), did assist an amateur archaeologist in his field expedition to Mexico in the mid 1850s. His first book, Anahuac, or Mexico and the Mexicans, Ancient and Modern (1861), was based on this fieldwork.

However his later and more famous works were authored through knowledge gathered from secondary sources thus placing him in the category of armchair anthropologists.

Another contemporary of Tylor’s and also a promoter of evolutionism, American scholar, L.H. Morgan (1818-1881) known for his studies on family, marriage and kinship, conducted his first fieldwork among the Iroquois, a native American tribe in the 1840s. He published his findings in the form of book called League of the Iroquois (1851). Unlike armchair anthropologists of his time, he continued his field expeditions among many other North American tribes collecting data on their kinship systems. Though fieldwork as a full fledged process of investigation in anthropology was not yet introduced in the discipline, Morgan is influential in promoting the development and use of genealogical method during fieldwork while studying family, marriage and kinship.

There was more fieldwork conducted by both the British and the Americans during the late nineteenth century. British stalwarts, W.H.R. Rivers (1864-1922) and A.C. Haddon (1855-1940) organised the famous expedition to the Torres Straits in the Pacific, in Australia in 1898 and Franz Boas (1858-1942), revered American anthropologist, did his first fieldwork among the Eskimos in Baffin Island, Canada in 1883. Rivers focused on the understanding of kinship relations and by the time he studied the Todas of Southern India, anthropologists realised the importance of visiting and directly gathering knowledge of societies they were interested in rather than theorising from their homes.

Boas, popularly called the father of American anthropology, strongly denounced the half-baked generalisations propagated by early 19th century anthropologists based on their scanty data made available through others. For Boas, to theorise one had to be dependent on proper ethnographic data collected on a first hand basis. Boas vehemently believed that all fields of anthropology had to be investigated in order to procure accurate data and to provide a viewpoint. This thought of his permitted him to reconstruct “the history of the growth of ideas with much greater accuracy than the generalizations of a comparative method” (Hyatt 1990:43). Boas thus introduced new ways of doing fieldwork in anthropology where he emphasised on ethnographic fieldwork, cultural relativism and participant observation method. His cultural relativism brought in new insights to the study of anthropology as the emphasis shifted from the reasoning of the investigating anthropologist to the perception and interpretation of the respondents of the culture investigated. This was to do away with objective notions of one society being claimed more superior than another, or more correct than the other.

This historical narrative would not be complete without mentioning the significant contributions of Bronislaw Malinowski, a Polish anthropologist, to fieldwork and the development of British social anthropology. Malinowski changed the way fieldwork was conducted in anthropological investigation. His published works based on his experiences with the Trobriand Islanders of Papua New Guinea enlightened the anthropological fraternity and others on how culture, society and its people were to be researched coherently. He mainly stressed on the following while doing fieldwork: Intensive ethnographic fieldwork; Participant observation; and Communicating in the local language. The first two are similar to what Boas had proposed, with slight variance in them. Malinowski pointed out the importance of building rapport, staying for a long period of time (for about a year or two) and getting to know the society being studied as convincingly as possible. To guide in this, participant observation denoting the involvement of the investigator in day to day events and dealings is a must. Both staying with the respondents and taking part in everyday happenings would require the investigator to build a certain level of comfort and trust among the respondents, the hosts. This can be created by communicating in the local language which Malinowski believed to be of immense assistance. Malinowski’s elaborate description of the practice of Kula ring in his celebrated, Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922) with the use of his prescribed fieldwork methods still remains the hallmark of ethnographic investigation.

Women’s entry into anthropology’s fieldwork, once a male dominated space, happened before World War I, with Elsie Clews Parsons one of the few women of her time who did fieldwork in the American Southwest in 1910. It was gradually held that women have more access to women respondents’ lives, a point which was advocated by E. B. Tylor in the 19th century itself who suggested that wives should assist their husbands for fieldwork to assist in such areas (Visweswaran, 1997). Boas too advocated this sentiment as he believed that “women had access to areas of social life men did not have; he considered women more intuitive and skilled in interpersonal relationships and urged them to collect data on the emotional expressive sides of life” (Modell, 1984: 181). It was no surprise then that Boas’ students, Ruth Benedict, Margaret Mead, Cora Du Bois etc. were women who did their fieldwork in the 1920s and 30s and became leading anthropologists of their time. In the late 1940s women like Mary Douglas came to the forefront, doing her fieldwork in the Congo and became famous for her works on ritual purity and impurity and symbolism. These women through their research also brought in the notions of feminism and sexuality in their works and gave a much needed twist to the anthropology that was practiced at that time.

These advances in the history of anthropology set the ground for serious fieldwork methodology and established anthropology into a legitimate field science. This concise historical account now leads us to how fieldwork as a tradition in anthropology exists.

4. Doing Fieldwork in Anthropology

By now we have gathered quite a bit of knowledge on the importance of fieldwork in anthropology. Its history is so strong that it has become imperative to go to the field, live with the people under study and take part in their everyday life while collecting data. This has become part and parcel in the training of an anthropologist.

The practice of fieldwork is an undeniable aspect of anthropology to understand and benefit human beings. But how do we go about conducting fieldwork in reality. In the discussion on fieldwork history we mentioned certain methods introduced or used by our esteemed anthropologists. In fieldwork a set of methodology, methods, techniques and tools are used to assist the investigator in his/her inquiry. These field methods are anthropology’s fundamental source of data.

Field methods are followed in all the four branches of anthropology, i.e. physical or biological anthropology, socio-cultural anthropology, archaeological anthropology and linguistic anthropology. In biological anthropology the field methods are used and linked with laboratory work to know in detail about human beings biologically. The field allows researchers to know about human beings’ evolution, place in the animal kingdom, physiology, anatomy, relationship with other species, adaptation to nature etc. Biological anthropology takes help of surveys, blood, hair, urine and other samples, anthropometric measurements and also observation of primates to study humans better. To understand human beings’ past, archaeological anthropology study material culture and stratigraphy. Archaeologists in the field collect information on past human ways of life through landscape surveys, sampling, studying artifacts and remains of bodies through excavations. In linguistic anthropology, anthropologists resort to participant observation, interviewing, recording of sounds and speeches etc. in the field to understand the significance of language, physical or symbolic in influencing the biological, social and cultural lives of any community. To conduct fieldwork convincingly, a linguistic anthropologist must be trained and adept in the language s/he studies. Social anthropology uses methods like participant observation, interviews, questionnaires, focused group discussions, case studies, life histories etc. to comprehend living human societies along with their social relationships, institutions and beliefs and practices. What they create is called ethnography.

Depending on the kind of investigation fieldwork may be influenced by varied scenarios. Methods to be used in the field will depend on the topic of research, type of research, place of research, available facilities, etc. The two major ways anthropologists adopt to collect data are quantitative data and qualitative data. These methods may be used together or separately depending on the needs of the research. Quantitative data includes data collected through census, surveys, reports, archives, population studies, mapping and also using statistical methods to analyse the collected information. It is mostly utilized by biological anthropologists though it is adequately used by experts from other branches of anthropology too.

Though social anthropologists do make use of the quantitative data collection method, their main concentration is on qualitative data collection method. The most prominent method here though frequently debated is the participant observation method. The Malinowskian tradition of observation allows an anthropologist in the field to observe social life in all its complexities in variant and comprehensive ways. This participation in the everyday performances be it mundane or formal ritualistic ones, the anthropologist gets an opportunity to enter the lives of the community studied and build rapport with the informants or respondents, which works as the opening to the process of field study. Once rapport is established, participant observation continues for further understanding of the lives of the researched, and is supplemented with necessary methods and techniques to assist the research investigation.

Fieldwork investigation consists of what we may call general and specific processes. Once the fieldworker identifies the unit (people) and the universe (the geographical and cultural area) these two processes are concentrated on. The general processes assist in introducing the specific processes of investigation. Establishing familiarity with community members, keeping notes in the form of a field diary of everyday occurrences, making efforts to learn the local language, conversing about general topics, photographing etc. are general means by which the researcher may with time get an entry into the field and the lives of the people. Though these sound easy, sometimes the investigator’s initial entry into the field may be obstructed by the various identities the investigator may possess. For example age, gender, ethnicity, class, caste, religion etc. may sometimes negatively affect the community to be investigated. Thus the process of entry in such situations may become lengthier and gruellling than imagined. However the investigator must not lose heart and must continue to make endeavours to finally bring the community to trust him/her.

Another initial task that the fieldworker may introduce is the collection of census. This will allow entry into every household, and give the respondents an opportunity to assess and evaluate the researcher. Sooner or later few friendships will develop with certain people who may assist further in getting the researcher access into more people’s lives facilitating the investigation.

Once the general processes are concluded, the researcher may now make an attempt to introduce the specific processes. This would of course mean that s/he should now gather knowledge of the various institutions available in the community and see how his/her topic of research may be taken forward. The literature review which the researcher should do before landing in the field will now help in designing and managing the interview guide along with the initial data collected based on the census and the social institutions. The interviews may be basic questions to begin with and once the respondent becomes comfortable with the researcher, they may be converted to precise ones dealing with the topic of research in hand. This can then lead to other ways of data collection like case studies, life histories and the like. Throughout all these, the researcher must always be respectful about the way of life of the community and should never do anything to malign the trust that is built.

A researcher should always be ready for the unexpected in the field and though a field guide is necessary to assist him/her in the field, one has to be alert enough to make beneficial decisions for oneself, which would not affect the fieldwork or the people adversely.

Fieldwork is guided by various theories, from the old ones to the new ones, depending on the kind of study formulated. These theories helps in supervising the researcher to reach his/her goal of the topic or theme attempted to be studied. These theories may be tested with the use of a hypotheses if need be. It is often a mix of pragmatic and philosophical ideas.

In qualitative research, social reality is studied from various perspectives. However anthropology in its earlier days was highly influenced by the following of the positivist approach known as positivism. This approach is based on natural science and solely promoted quantitative research where objectivity and distance from the respondents were the main components. This attempt was to create a scientific response to the investigation. But with time, following Franz Boas, prominent anthropologists in the 1970’s and 1980’s, , like Clifford Geertz, George Marcus and Paul Rabinow denounced the objective analysis advocated by the likes of Malinowski and introduced subjective analysis with an emphasis on self reflexivity. Such studies came to be called as interpretive or descriptive studies where the approach of research was from an “emic” viewpoint, meaning that the respondents’ or the cultures’ opinion was given importance rather than the researcher’s standpoint, which is known as the “etic” perspective.

Anthropological research and fieldwork has come a long way from what it was in the beginning. However the intent remains the same. Fieldwork assists in the creating or learning of knowledge which may bring about new understanding of the lives we live. Once data is collected, the findings are then analysed and a report or thesis is built in order to put forward the conclusions inferred.

Though the above descriptions of fieldwork sound intriguing and without any complications yet it is not always the case. The most apparent concern that may be faced while doing fieldwork is the concern of ethics. In the brief account below, how ethics conceives a major effect in fieldwork is discussed.

5. Ethics in Fieldwork

Researchers frequently face ethical dilemmas while conducting fieldwork. Barnes postulates that “… research has an ethical dimension whenever it impinges on creatures with whom we have moral relations.” (1996: 180-181). Ethical issues can crop up the moment a researcher decides on a topic. The topic might be controversial for the people who are to be studied and they may not give consent for any exploration in their space. Ethical predicaments may arise when there are disputes and tensions related to an apposite reaction to any situation which has to do with the researcher, respondents or the findings and its production.

It is the researcher who attempts to enter the place to investigate, the people to study and while doing so, lives, relationships, equations are all placed under the risk of being known by him/her and by the world too. For the fieldworker, the intentions are only academic, intellectual and professional thoughts to be offered to the world but not for the population studied. The impact of such activities may be high. Ethics and ethical solutions hence need to be brought in while conducting fieldwork. Ethics need to be viewed subjectively as not only is it difficult to identify ethical norms but it is equally difficult to employ them as different situations may bring out different ethical problems.

A framework, to help resolve some basic ethical issues is noted below:

• a)Confidentiality: The researcher as the “taker” of information from the field must be cautious of his/her position. S/he should take the utmost care of his/her behaviour in the field and also in the final representation i.e., the thesis or report. Rapport building and creating trust among the respondents allow them to open up in front of the researcher, revealing many instances from their lives which if broadcasted may cause harm to the community. In such instances it is the responsibility of the researcher to protect their identities and manage their confidentiality if sought for. Research findings should never be utilized at the cost of the respondents’ lives. If names have to be used at all, they should be done so with the use of pseudonyms.
• b)Consent: Along with confidentiality comes consent. In fact if there is consent from the respondent, then confidentiality may arise. The researcher has to first seek the permission from the respondents to probe into their lives and their society. While doing so, s/he should also inform the nature of the research, the objectives, the use of the findings and their effects. Only after the consent of the respondents, the work becomes ethically complete. They should be informed that their participation is voluntary. This is called informed consent.
• c)Utility: Most of the times the respondents pour out information expansively without expecting anything in return from the researcher. It becomes the moral responsibility of the researcher to utilise this information in a way which is productive to his/her work and at the same time if possible be accessible and beneficial to the respondents’ community. The aid and help of a community’s betterment should always be thought about by the researcher.
• d)Knowledge and its Transmission: Once the findings are analysed and produced in the form of a thesis, book, research paper or report, it signifies the dissemination of knowledge. How this is done is an important ethical concern. The distribution of proper knowledge is something that researchers are  challenged  with.  Knowledge  reaching  the  public  domain  should  not  only contain  an  addition  to  the  already  available  data  but  should  also  bring  out  avenues  for enlightenment and interest to contribute to it more. It should reach both the academic and the non-academic worlds. In this the researcher should be careful about what to reveal and what not to. How much should be published and how much should not be, keeping in mind the issues of the community studied, must be taken care of.

These are some fundamental challenges to be kept in mind by the researcher in terms of moral responsibility while in the field. Though one can never predict what situations may unfold in the field and what decisions one may have to take for the benefit of the research as well as the community studied, the above concerns may certainly act as guidelines for tackling ethical issues on the field.

6. Fieldwork Today:

Today anthropological fieldwork has come a long way in terms of the kinds of investigation conducted. The areas of research have become manifold too. With varied transformations taking place in the globalized world, we find that along with the conventional areas of fieldwork, the spaces where research and fieldwork are done have evolved. Fieldwork is no longer only conducted in remote populations but also in urban settings, and at times, one’s own native place, either urban or rural. Topics of research are such today that fieldwork may be conducted in government and legal spaces to know about policies and laws and also assist government bodies in the formulation of new ones. Fieldwork is also done in communities only so that reformations in their structure may be brought about with the help of the government and civil bodies. Anthropological fieldwork now not only concentrates on environmental changes and how they affect human lives but also at the same time researches media and how it influences the way humans act in their social lives. The internet or new media has also become a much sought after area of investigation as it too is seen as a space exhibiting culture, a space which allows social interaction of the virtual kind. Internet research or virtual ethnography as it is commonly called is a challenging space as it offers mixed practices, meanings and identities where what is real or surreal is hard to decipher.

Contexts may have evolved to give way to varied novel ways of doing fieldwork, but its essence remains the same. The purpose of fieldwork that anthropology advocates remains unchanged and it is this unique way of knowing and learning is the hallmark of anthropology as a field science.

Summary

The module on Fieldwork Tradition in Anthropology provides the learner with a descriptive account of what fieldwork is and how it is an intrinsic part of anthropological study. Fieldwork in anthropology is crucial to the discipline’s way of gathering knowledge about human life, be it social or physical. To recapitulate, the module provides an introduction to what fieldwork is and proceeds with a narrative of its development historically. This historicity also tells us what significant methods and techniques of doing fieldwork research developed along the way. The entry of women scholars into the field providing a more emotive and intuitive account of communities studied (including women respondents and their views), also brought the much desired comprehensive understanding of society and culture. The module then gives an account of the methodologies, methods and techniques available and used in anthropological fieldwork and how these are influenced by the kind of research the researcher proposes. This leads to the issue of ethics to be handled in fieldwork which is carefully discussed here. The module is concluded with the changing scenario in fieldwork with new interests in research areas. The module hopefully acts as a guide to any learner of anthropology who would participate in fieldwork research during his/her academic training.