CMNS801 Presentation Postmodern ethnography (The postmodern turn in anthropology) Ayaka Yoshimizu October 21, 2008

Ethnography a research process in which the anthropologist closely observes, records, and engages in the daily life of another culture—an experience labeled as the fieldwork method—and then writes accounts of this culture, emphasizing descriptive detail (Marcus and Fischer, 1986, p.18)

Seven Moments of Qualitative Research 1.The traditional period Positivism, ethnographic realism 2.Modernist phase 3.Blurred genres 4.Crisis of representation (Denzin and Lincoln, 2000, p.12-18)

Crisis of representation Uncertainty about adequate means of describing social reality (Marcus and Fischer, 1986) The Predicament of Culture (Clifford, 1988) An experimental moment in the human sciences

Writing Culture: The poetics and politics of ethnography (Clifford and Marcus, 1986) From participant observation to “writing” Ethnography as process Partial truth Experimental Ethical Reflexivity Dialogical mode Co-authorship

Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography (Clifford and Marcus, 1986) From participant observation to “writing” Ethnography as process Partial truth Experimental Ethical Reflexivity Dialogical mode Co-authorship

Postmodern ethnography: Feminists’ critique Mascia-Lees et al. (1993) –Feminists move beyond texts to confront the world Enslin (1994) –“ your work seems like nothing. Your book has no importance. After all, what is writing? You looked, you saw, you wrote a book. But that book won't do anything if not accompanied by work, by practice. Right ”

Seven Moments of Qualitative Research 1.The traditional period Positivism, ethnographic realism 2.Modernist phase 3.Blurred genres 4.Crisis of representation 5.A triple crisis Representation, legitimation, praxis 6.Postexperimental 7.The future (Denzin and Lincoln, 2000, p.12-18)

References Clifford, J. (1988). The predicament of culture: Twentieth-century ethnography, literature, and art. Cambridge; London: Harvard University Press. Clifford, J. and Marcus, G.E. (1986). Writing culture: the poetics and politics of ethnography (pp.1-26). California; London: University of California Press. Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (2000). Introduction: The discipline and practice of qualitative research. In Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (Eds.) Handbook of qualitative research (second edition). Thousand Oaks, Calif. : Sage Publications. Enslin, E. (1994) Beyond writing. Cultural Anthropology9 (4): Marcus, G.E. and Fischer, M.M.J. (1986/1999) Anthropology as cultural critique: an experimental moment in the human sciences. Chicago; London: The University of Chicago Press. Mascia-Lees, F.E. et al. (1989). The postmodern turn in anthropology: cautions from a feminist perspective 15(1): Tyler, S.A. (1986). Post-modern ethnography: from document of the occult to occult document. In Clifford, J. and Marcus, G.E. (Eds.), Writing culture: the poetics and politics of ethnography (pp ). California; London: University of California Press.