4 Relevance of rapport establishment

Dr. Rukshana Zaman

Contents

1. Introduction
2. History of Rapport Building
3. Relevance of Rapport Building
4. Reflections on Empirical Experiences
5. Anthropological Journeys Beyond the ‘Exotic’
6. Women and the Field
7. Summary

Learning Objectives:

To comprehend:

•  what is rapport building;
•  the historical background of rapport building in anthropological works;
•  relevance of rapport building in fieldwork; and
•  some of the empirical experiences of rapport building.

1. Introduction

Rapporteur is an old French word that literally means to bring back1. Anthropological study be it biological/physical, social/cultural or prehistoric archaeology, fieldwork is the hallmark. Rapport building is one of the important process in fieldwork, through which anthropologists gain access to a community or tribe and is able to bring back data. The aim of rapport is to create a harmonious and friendly relation with people. Creating rapport helps in building trust, belief and confidence among two or more persons.

This module will take you through the history of rapport establishment when and how it started in anthropological fieldwork. It would also emphasize on the relevance of rapport establishment in fieldwork. Empirical experiences from the fields have been shared in this module to elucidate the different processes anthropologists used to build rapport with the people during fieldwork. This module also takes into account the challenges of rapport establishment outside the trodden path of fieldwork among a particular community or tribe. A few narrations of women anthropologists and their experiences in terms of rapport building is also a part of this module.

2. History

The study of the ‘other’ has been the focus of anthropology since its inception. Early anthropologists popularly known as ‘arm chair’ anthropologists had collected and complied data based on the facts recorded in logbooks of travellers and the stories the missionaries brought back home from far off lands. Sir James George Frazer’s volume The Golden Bough, 1922 is one such collection on religion based on the notes from travellers. The later anthropologists started criticizing this methodology as they emphasized on first hand data collected through direct contact with the people under study. This was the phase of expeditions that were carried out by anthropologists like C. G. Seligman, W.H.R. Rivers and others. The tradition of intensive fieldwork involving the active participation of the fieldworker in the day to day lives of the people is reckoned with Bronislaw Malinowski’s work on the Trobriand islanders. Malinowski had spent thirty eight months in the island observing and participating in the village activities. This later came to be known as participant observation, a technique of conducting fieldwork.

1. The weblink of the dictionary has been provided in Quadrant 3.

With the introduction of fieldwork in anthropology, rapport building became an integral part of the process. A fieldworker going to an unknown place had to establish a way of communication and trust while living among strangers and studying their lives and cultures. Rapport building paves the way for the fieldworker to communicate with the people under study.

3. Relevance of Rapport Building

Before embarking on fieldwork, the under graduate and post graduate students of anthropology discipline are initiated on the ways of conducting fieldwork through induction sessions. The students are advised about their conduct in the field. The question herein is why there is emphasis on rapport building. Rapport building is important to connect with the people we are going to study. If there is no mutual understanding and trust the process of data collection would be difficult. As such the emphasis is primarily on dress, food and behaviour of the researcher so that one can connect with the people. For example if in a village people strictly follow norms of behaviour, dress code etc and we go and visit them in dresses that might be considered inappropriate by their standards or we go to a village and ask the villagers to just extend their fingers and we prick them to collect blood samples, then what would be the consequences? Under such circumstances we might have to face hostile behaviour from the village dwellers towards our visit. Such an atmosphere is not congenital for data collection and might not serve the purpose of our visit. Thus, the dictum followed is extending a warm and friendly gesture to our respondents and always respect their culture. So how do we go about it? Greetings are considered as the ice breaker, every student is encouraged to greet the people in the local language when in the field. As stated earlier, in a field situation the fieldworker has to connect with the people and thus, students are always advised to read about the people and their culture before initiating fieldwork. The students are encouraged to wear simple clothes so that the people reckon them as one amongst them and not as an outsider and to accept food and drinks courteously whenever offered. In many cultures it is considered rude behaviour to refuse offerings of food. It might also reflect that their hospitality is not being accepted. The basic rule of fieldwork is to go with an open mind and do away with ethnocentric thoughts and behaviours as one is primarily trying to understand the culture and the people or a situation. A researcher has to be prepared for unfavourable circumstances but try the very best in building rapport.

4. Reflections on Empirical Experiences

The fact still remains that no class can prepare a fieldworker to the kind of field situation one might face. Every field is unique in itself. As there are no clear cut methods available on how to build rapport, here in this section we would discus experiences of some of the anthropologists in the field to understand the different situations faced by them during the rapport building process. It is also important to note that a process that had worked for one researcher might not work for another.

Presentation of the self in the field: How a researcher presents oneself in the field goes a long way in rapport building. At the outset a researcher has to make the intentions of the research work explicit to the community/organization/institutions under study. Many a times when working in rural areas or villages, the researcher might be mistaken for an official representing the government leading to build up of expectations on the part of the community. Such misunderstanding needs to be clarified immediately as it might lead to negative repercussion in the later course of the field study.

Dress Food Drinking and Behaviour: While preparing for fieldwork a researcher has to comprehend that while the researcher studies the community, the community also studies the researcher. How the researcher dresses, interacts with the people of different age groups and gender, reacts to offering of food and drinks etc is being constantly scrutinized by the people under study. The researcher’s behaviour in the field also decides the rapport building process. At times the community has a specific pre-conceived image of the researcher. Anthropologists in the field many a times have to act and behave in the manner the field perceives. In this connection Middleton (1970: 71-72) writes that during his study of the Lugbara, who addressed him as ‘our European’ expected him to be dressed, behave and act like a European at all times. They expected him to treat them to European norms of hospitality whenever they visited his place. Srinivas (2002) writes that during his fieldwork in a village in Karnataka there was no privacy to his life. Being an unmarried young man he was constantly being questioned by the villagers as to the reason for his bachelorhood, as most men in the village his age had a couple of children. The headman of the village constantly monitored his behaviour and even pointed out personal details like when a man should shave and admonished Srinivas for shaving after having a bath. Srinivas had to conform to the purity and pollution aspects observed by the village folks. Golde (1970:80) speaking about her fieldwork in a Mexican village states that being an unmarried girl the villagers felt that she should adhere to certain norms like not smoking, drinking, going out alone at night, speak openly about such topics like sex, pregnancy, entertain any male in the house except in the presence of some village elders etc. Moreover, when she started wearing clothes like the womenfolk of the village as part of rapport building she started receiving many proposals for marriage including a marriage proposal to be the second wife. Thus, it is seen that different field situations have different standards for the researcher. In one situation we see that the people expected Middleton the researcher to be his natural self, while in the case of Srinivas and Golde the villagers expected them to follow the norms of the village. In case of Golde, a female fieldworker the villagers expected her to follow norms and behave in a fashion which they deemed fit for an unmarried woman.

Social drinking: When in Rome behave like a Roman is a popular saying. Most times an anthropologist’s to establish a bond with the locals tries to inculcate habits and become a part of their routine. Men, it is believed bond easily while drinking and many anthropologists have tried this route. On the experience of drinking to be accepted as one among them, Gutmann (1996:181) stated that he took part in an afternoon drinking binge and faced varied reactions from the locals, some admonished him and stated he should have “known better” than to join in such a drinking session, while others made fun of him and would tease him with “Hey Mateo, want some anis?” for days to come. Thus, it became a running gag for him. While Vishnoi (2015: 203) expresses that her ice breaking moments in the field happened when she started joining in for the lemon tea refreshment breaks in the organization though not an adherent tea drinker. She was accepted as one among them and was included in the interactive sessions. Vishnoi was able to get past the barrier of ‘outsider’ and became one amongst them ‘insider’ when she joined in the tea drinking sessions in the organization.

Language and Interpreters: Understanding and being able to communicate in the language spoken by the people under study goes a long way in building a good rapport. A fieldworker well versed in the language of the people would be able to communicate better. It also does away with misinterpretation and miscommunication. However, there are instances also where the help of interpreters were taken by anthropologists in the field. Selecting the right interpreter also has a strong role to play in rapport building. For instance, Weidman (1970) working in a Burmese village among Buddhist population writes that she had hired an interpreter who was interested more in promoting her own religion and inflicting on the people the superiority of her own belief system rather than taking notes on the beliefs of the Buddhist way of life. The villagers were irked by the attitude of the interpreter and to maintain harmonious relationship in the village Weidman had to do away with the service of the interpreter. Likewise, Nanda (1999) states that while working among the Hijras of India where the community was spread in different cities like Delhi, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad, Bastipore etc, she had to employ interpreters who knew Gujarati, Hindi and Punjabi. She then worked with different translators to transcribe the taped conversations and interviews into verbatim English (Nanda, xviii). This aspect provided opportunity for Nanda to double check the contents and its meaning.

Ethics: A good anthropologist’s leaves a valuable impact on the field in terms of rapport building and goes a long way in creating an amicable field ambience for other anthropologists to visit the field in the future. Srivastava (2015) describes that Raghu the interpreter who had worked with Elwin during his fieldwork among the Biagas in 1939 and also with Srivastva in 1987 used to speak about Elwin’s devotion and dedication to the field. Yet there are instances where exoticization had over shadowed Eldwin’s work putting anthropological honesty at stake. Srivastava further states that Raghu’s name was not mentioned anywhere in Elwin’s work. It is of immense importance that a researcher does not lose the real essence of fieldwork and also acknowledge the help that comes in from various quarters.

In a field situation the question of paying respondents keeps coming up. The request for liquor, tobacco, small gifts like bangles, earrings, etc; and even cash in exchange for information is always there. One can always give in to these demands as part of rapport building process yet the question still remains as how far it is justifiable to offer gifts to gain friendship and access to information. In terms of paying cash to respondents, Das and Parry (1983) has written critically on the issue and argued that by such behaviour the field is spoilt for other researchers who might be working on a shoe string budget, to conduct what Srivastava (2004) had termed as ‘peaceful fieldwork’. The authenticity of data based on gifts and payments too might be at stake. The respondents might manipulate data for greed.

5. Anthropological Journeys Beyond the ‘Exotic’

The tradition of fieldwork in anthropology has come a long way since Malinowski’s work among the Trobriand Islanders. Malinowski had stated that one of the proper conditions for ethnographic work is that “one has to cut oneself off from the company of other white men, and remaining in as close contact with the natives as possible, which really can only be achieved by camping right in their villages” (Malinowski, 1922: 6). Today the very concept of field has undergone a tremendous change. Field no longer means going to an ‘exotic’ far off place. The field today in anthropological parlance can be an organization, an institution, a rural or urban site, or work among one’s own people, not to forget the recent trends of multisite fieldwork. In this section experiences of anthropologists would be shared on their rapport building process who had taken up fieldwork outside the trodden path of studying the ‘exotic’.

Work in an Institute/ Organisation: Rapport building is challenging in an institution or an organization. Here,there are always two fractions the management and the workers. Normally, entry into such places by a researcher is through the management and thus, many a times the workers feel it difficult to accept the researcher in his/her own right. Researcher is more or less considered an informer of the management and in such a situation rapport building becomes very crucial. Baviskar (2002) had the feeling of walking on a razor’s edge in managing his relationship with two rival factions in the sugar co-operative. Chitra (2002) had worked among the students of Ambil College in Mysore. Despite having done her under graduation in the same college she had difficulty reaching out to the common students of the college as she was friendly with the princesses and other elites of the college. Pal (2015) states that working in an orphanage in Delhi she had to face the problem of speaking with the older boys. Initially the caretakers of the orphanage did not encourage her to meet and question the elder boys.

Research in one’s own community: Many might believe that it is easier to study one’s own community. The first presumption is that being an insider rapport building is an easy task. But the question arises as to how much an insider is being considered to be one amongst them by the community. Das (2015) writes that during her fieldwork among her own community in a small village where some of her relatives resided, but not her own hometown, she faced the issue of being a non resident and thus, was not considered an insider. The horde of elephants that were on rampage the night she arrived at the village had a role to play in her rapport building process. When she was in the same situation as the rest of the villagers taking shelter in the naamghar (village prayer hall) living through the same circumstances, that she was accepted as one of them.

Multisite Fieldwork: The process of rapport building in itself is a tedious process as many a times it is really difficult to understand, respect and come to terms with each other’s culture. In the case of multisite fieldwork where the researcher is working and gathering data from more than one site the task of rapport building becomes even more challenging. In such situations word of mouth helps as in the case of Nanda (1999). She worked among the Hijras in India and her principle sites were Bombay (now Mumbai), Delhi, Ahmedabad, Bastipore and Chandigarh. The rapport building process was helped by the fact that the Hijras being a small community knew each other and would give Nanda references whom to meet in the other cities. The Hijras would in turn also spread the news about her work when they visited their friends in the neighbouring cities.

6. Women and the Field

Entry into a new territory is never easy. During the initial days of fieldwork despite introductions and necessary letters from competent authority, the researcher has to face suspicions and is treated as an intruder. In the case of female fieldworkers the task of working among strangers, living among them, to work in a community with conceived set of rules, organized relationships and defined roles, the challenges are many fold. Weidman (1970) states that her fieldwork in Burma in year 1957 had many challenges. During that time Burma was going through a political turmoil leading to unrest in the society with kidnapping and murders becoming an everyday affair. She was unable to locate a village where she could start her fieldwork as her acquaintances were reluctant to take responsibility, as first and foremost she was a woman that to single. “Single woman did not live alone within the city, let alone outside of Rangoon, in a poor little farming village” (Weidman, 1970: 245). Her single status did not conform to the norms of the society and was considered not appropriate. The outmost consideration was her safety as many feared that as she was a foreigner she might be kidnapped, murdered or taken as a wife by one of the rebel leaders, least was the concern for her work. Weidman after many futile attempts was able to find a village best suited for her work. Times were tough and at one point she was asked by the authorities to leave the village when the headman was kidnapped. But the headman escaped and returned to the village. Almost a month later Weidman was allowed to return to the village. This was a turning point as the villagers accepted her as she was ready to continue with her work despite difficult times. Golde (1970) writes that while working in a Mexican village after her initial introduction when she returned to stay in the village even her host, Jose` from whom she had rented a house was surprised to see her. He was not confident that she would not return. This lack of trust Golde writes that she encountered at many levels and at different point of time. Cora Du Bois (1970) writing about her fieldwork in Orissa, Bhubaneswar for a period of six years stated that she was under constant scrutiny as rumours among the government officials were making rounds that she was a spy in disguise. She used to keep all her field records and documents unlocked in the guest house so that any visiting officer from the government could go through her work.

7. Summary

There is no concrete methodology of rapport building. The same field can be predictably unpredictable (Channa, 2015). Every day in the field is a new day. The approach that has yielded data today might not yield anything tomorrow. Field situations are challenging in itself as the respondents may not belong to the same strata, community or group. It is a process that one develops in the field. The process of rapport building is continuous. Rapport building is a two way process. In the field the researcher is not the only one collecting data, the people under study also observes the researcher. The researcher might be questioned on the marital status, caste and family history. A fieldworker has to be prepared for all kind of situations and queries. At times the researcher might face emotional situations beyond the control of any text book. At such times the researcher has to react with caution and the understanding of the situation, above all the researcher needs to be always focused and keep in mind the object of the fieldwork. A fieldworker has to be observant and sensitive to the moods of the subjects. One cannot force the subjects to respond. It is an everyday lived experience. Rapport building is the process that paves the way for the researcher to become a part of the people that are being studied.