Ethnography: A Theoretically Oriented Practice

✍ Scribed by Vincenzo Matera, Angela Biscaldi

• Publisher: Springer International Publishing;Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2021
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 426
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This volume presents both a historical exploration of ethnography and a thematic discussion of major trends that, over different periods, have oriented and re-oriented research practice. As it overviews ethnography from different geographic and thematic perspectives, it further explores new lines of ethnographic research, including as feminist ethnography and visual research, that uncover non-traditional routes to anthropological knowledge.

As the great ethnographer E. E. Evans-Pritchard wrote, “Anyone who is not a complete idiot can do fieldwork… but will [his contribution] be to theoretical, or just to factual knowledge?” As Evans-Pritchard highlights and as this book argues, successful ethnography must be connected to a sophisticated theoretical reflection rooted in social and cultural anthropology.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter ....Pages i-xi
Ethnography: A Theoretically Oriented Practice Introduction (Vincenzo Matera, Angela Biscaldi)....Pages 1-18
Front Matter ....Pages 19-19
Ethnography Before Ethnography: Genesis and Developments of Fieldwork in North America (Enzo Vinicio Alliegro)....Pages 21-49
Before and After Science: Radcliffe-Brown, British Social Anthropology, and the Relationship Between Field Research, Ethnography, and Theory (Alessandro Mancuso)....Pages 51-80
“Ethnography in France”: Ethnographic Practices and Theories in Marcel Griaule Between the Empirical and Rhetorical (Angela Biscaldi, Vincenzo Matera)....Pages 81-101
The Structural Formula of the Team: Reflections on Ernesto de Martino’s Ethnographic Method (Giovanni Pizza)....Pages 103-125
Front Matter ....Pages 127-127
Illusion of Immediate Knowledge or Spiritual Exercise? The Dialogic Exchange and Pierre Bourdieu’s Ethnography (Ferdinando Fava)....Pages 129-158
The Bridge and the Dance: Situational Analysis in Anthropology (Marco Gardini, Luca Rimoldi)....Pages 159-179
Politics Within Anthropology (Vincenzo Matera)....Pages 181-206
Stumbling Blocks: The Irruption of the Interpretive Approach in Twentieth-Century Anthropology (Patrizia Resta)....Pages 207-228
Front Matter ....Pages 229-229
The Anthropologist’s Eye: Ethnography, Visual Practices, Images (Francesco Faeta)....Pages 231-261
Dennis and Barbara Tedlock: The Dialogic Turn in Anthropology (Angela Biscaldi)....Pages 263-276
Ethnography and Embodiment (Ivo Quaranta)....Pages 277-291
Exploring Mobility Through Mobility: Some of the Methodological Challenges of Multi-sited Ethnography in the Study of Migration (Bruno Riccio)....Pages 293-309
Front Matter ....Pages 311-311
Participant Observation: The Personal Commitment in Native Life—A Problematic Methodological Topos (Gabriella D’Agostino)....Pages 313-340
The Weberian Line of Anthropology: George Marcus from Writing Culture to Design (Alessandro Simonicca)....Pages 341-370
Making the Invisible Ethnography Visible: The Peculiar Relationship Between Italian Anthropology and Feminism (Michela Fusaschi)....Pages 371-393
Beyond the Field: Ethnography, Theory, and Writing in Anthropology (Fabio Dei)....Pages 395-415
Back Matter ....Pages 417-429

✦ Subjects

Social Sciences; Ethnography; Social Anthropology; Cultural Anthropology; Research Methodology