Anthropologists invented and
championed the techniques and perspectives now considered ‘cutting
edge’ in qualitative and combined research methodologies. From small
villages to DNA labs, ethnography offers the tools for understanding
how human worlds operate.
This course introduces students to key ethnographic methods including participant observation and long-term ethnographic field work. We will cover issues of ethics in field work, personal praxis, research preparation and process and particularly, in ongoing researcher-researched relationships. Interviewing skills, data coding, preliminary analysis, and report writing will be included. Students will work collaboratively and on solo projects. Some class time will be spent off campus at sites around O’ahu.
Students who complete this course will have a good understanding of
what cultural anthropologists actually do, and what it means to work as
an anthropologist.
Required Texts
(you may order these directly
from the press, or find them on Amazon. They will also be in the UH
bookstore):
Doing Cultural Anthropology. Michael V. Angrosino, Ed. Waveland Press
Field Projects in Anthropology; A Student Handbook, 3rd Edition. Julia G. Crane and Michael V. Angrosino Waveland PressAtlas Ti (Download the Free Educational version at: http://www.atlasti.com/demo.shtml )
Highly Recommended
Texts:
Decolonizing
Methodologies, Linda Tuhiwai Smith. U of Otago Press & Zed
Books (available in the USA from Palgrave)
Fieldwork and Families:
Constructing New Models for Ethnographic Research. University of
Hawaii Press. <>
The
Invention of Culture. Roy Wagner. U of Chicago
Press 
Pop Quizes (3, 10% each, based on book chapters) 30%
Human Subjects Proposal to The IRB 15%
Participant Observation Fieldnotes / Diary 10%
Independent Project 30%
Class Presentations (re: Independent Project) APR--MAY 15%
| Post-Colonial
and Indigenous Contributions to Research and
Coming to Knowledge |
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| Royal Commission on
Aboriginal Peoples, (Canada) pdf file AHURI Ethical Principles and Guidelines for Indigenous Research (Australia). Nishnaabe Ways of Coming to Knowledge: Gifts of the Seven Grandfathers (From The Mishomis Book: The Voice of the Ojibway, Edward Benton-Banai 1988) Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Societies. New York: Zed Books. (Linda Tuhiwai Smith 1999) |
Gifts of the 7 Grandfathers (1) To cherish knowledge is to know WISDOM (2) To know LOVE is to know peace (3) To honor all of the Creation is to have RESPECT (4) BRAVERY is to face the foe with integrity (5) HONESTY in facing a situation is to be brave (6) HUMILITY is to know yourself as a sacred part of the Creation (7) TRUTH is to know all of these things (1988, 64) |
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| Ethnography
as Moral Practice |
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“Anthropology is, actually, a sly and deceptive science....when it
seems most insistently to be talking about the distant, the strange,
the long ago, or the
idiosyncratic, it is in fact also talking about the close, the
familiar,
the contemporary..."
(Clifford Geertz) |
|
Eagleton, Terry, Towards a Common Culture. In
The Idea of Culture. Pgs. 112-131. Rosaldo, Renato, After Objectivism, In Culture and Truth. Pg.46-67. Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson, Beyond “Culture”: Space, and the Politics of Difference. In Inda and Rosaldo (eds.) The Anthropology of Globalization. Pgs. 64-80. Rabinow, Paul, Representations are Social Facts: Modernity and Post-Modernity in Anthropology. In Clifford and Marcus (eds.) Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography. Pgs. 235-261. D’Andrade, Roy and Scheper-Hughes, Nancy. Objectivity and Militancy: A Debate. Current Anthropology 36(3):399-440. Young Leslie, Heather & Mike Evans, Understanding Differences & Similarities. Ethnographic Essays in Cultural Anthropology. (2002) Itasca: Peacock Publishers |
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| Ethics and Consent
for Research: Institutional Review Board Committee on Human Studies Guidelines (U Hawai’i). Including the Belmont Report Informed Consent in Anthropological Research: We Are Not Exempt. Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban, Human Organization 53(1):1-10 (1994) The Nuremberg Code (1947) American Anthropological Association resources re: Ethical Principles of Research. ACUNS Ethical Principles for Conduct of Research in the North AHURI Ethical Principles and Guidelines for Indigenous Research (Australia). Selected Human Ethics Research (International Links) Declaration of Geneva (replaces Hippocratic Oath) |
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| Horror
Stories: Remembering the Tuskegee Syphilis Study CIA Project MK-Ultra & Brainwashing Experiments at the Allen Memorial Institute in Montreal |
Anthropology and Public Health: Caring
for Those in Crisis: Integrating Anthropology and Public Health in
Complex Humanitarian Emergencies (Holly Ann Williams)
Ethnography & Advertising: How Black Label beer
company used anthropologists to find their market niche &
create a new style of campaign.
From "The Symbolism of Popular Taoist Magic (1973)" to Hakuhodo Inc.,
Japan's 2nd largest advertising agency (1993): John McCreery, the Anthropologist
who became an "Ad Man".
"Weak States, Uncivil Societies and Thousands of NGOs Western
Democracy Export as Benevolent Colonialism in the Balkans" by
Steven Sampson (2002). A paper offering a description of
ethnographic evaluation & anthropological analysis of NGO Projects
in the Balkans (a must read for development-afficionados).
