Plan for the next three sessions
*) 22nd of February at 10:15: Methods
Alex Stewart: The ethnographer’s method
-85 dry but inspiring pages on how to tell if a particular ethnography is good, scientific work or not…
Cicilie F. will present the book briefly and everybody is encouraged to make a short presentation discussing to what extent Stewart’s criteria of scientificness are useful in their own material. (I’m thinking about posting my presentation either here or on my own blog…).
AK also suggested that we read Paul Stoller’s The taste of ethnographic things, as it is highly relevant in a methods discussion (It’s also interesting for us that Tim Ingold criticized exactly Stoller’s phenomenology for not being able to provide explanations, and explanations in anthropology was also one of the points that came up in today’s discussion). We haven’t decided yet whether we’ve got time read it or not… What do the rest of you think?
*) 14th of March: a monograph on power by Paul Farmer… which one?
*) 4th of April: something by Daniel Miller
as he will have a seminar with us (the phd-candidates the 10th of April). Hopefully he will provide us with a reading list in time for the seminar, or some of us – Christian for instance – can suggest a text of general theoretical and/or methodological interest.
We haven’t yet decided for the rest of the semester, but it’s probably about time we have some presentations of our own work…
Hope to see you all in three weeks!
No one has yet replied whether we should read Stoller’s A taste of ethnographic things for 22/02. Personally, I realise that I’ll not have the time although I’d have love to read it… instead I’1l try finish his newer collection of essays, Sensuous Scolarship, on time as I’ve already started on that one. Perhaps someone else will have had the time to read the monograph…
And what are we going to choose from Farmer for March 14?