ANTH 233 Ethnographic Studies
Winter 2019
I acknowledge that St FX is in Mi’kma’ki, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq People.
Jan 14, 17, 21, 24: Writing, from classical to contemporary ethnography, to other forms of writing
Fiction as ethnography. Compare the fictional account with an
ethnographic account of Afghan refugees in Iran.
READ: Yarbakhsh, Elisabeth. 2018. “Call.” Anthropology and Humanism, 43(1): 159–164
Compare with: Olszewska, Zuzanna. 2013. “Classy Kids and
Down-at-Heel Intellectuals: Status Aspiration and Blind Spots in the
Contemporary Ethnography of Iran.” Iranian Studies, 46:6, 841-862,
- remember to keep in mind the different perspectives of Howell, Ingold and Kolshus
- how was the information gathered?
- is it descriptive? Theoretically informed? Comparative? Culturally relative?
- is it with or of the people?
- is the writing accessible?
- voice/authority/politics of representation
- engagement with literature
- how is the population described in terms of homogeneity/heterogeneity?
- is the society described as dynamic or static?
- what is the role of over-arching political, legal, economic,
cultural (etc.) structures within which this society is placed? How
isolated/separate is it from other societies?
- what is the relationship of this work with respect to policy?
- what is the positionality of the author?
Comparing Yarbakhsh and Olszewska:
- what ideas, information, debates, etc, can be presented in fiction?
- what ideas, information, debates, etc, can be presented in fiction?
- are both accessibly written?
- who is the intended audience of each?
- can both present context, theoretical framing, debates, and so on?
- what are the themes pursued in each article?
- how is agency presented in each?
- what are the questions of voice/authority for each work?