Baird Campbell on Why Ethnography Matters

Our Interlocutors, Ourselves

The word ethnography has any many definitions as it does practitioners. It comes from the Greek roots ‘ethnos’ (nation, people) and ‘graphy’ (to write about): writing about people. However, there is much writing “about people” that isn’t ethnography. So, what exactly sets ethnography apart, and why does it matter?

Ethnography first came into widespread use during the initial boom in anthropological study in the early and mid-1900s, when ethnographers like Bronislaw Malinowski, Franz Boas, Ruth Benedict, and Margaret Mead began to study the cultures of social groups other than own. This research distinguished itself from earlier studies of culture through its focus on modern ethnography’s primary methodology, participant observation: that is, living and working with and among one’s interlocutors (the people one is studying) to gain a nuanced understanding of their everyday lives.

Though this early work was sometimes motivated by goals of cultural and linguistic preservation and increased human connection, it also largely took place in colonial spaces and/or in service of the US military, reflecting and reproducing an uneven power dynamic between ethnographer and subject that—to some extent—persists in the discipline today. For example, a popular type of ethnography during this period was so-called “salvage ethnography,” based on the idea that indigenous cultures, languages, and lifeways were inevitably doomed, and thus evidence of their existence should be gathered for posterity. This early “salvage ethnography” both played into colonial tropes of indigenous-as-past and also dude create valuable records of languages and cultural practices that are unfortunately no longer part of daily life. The colonial baggage of anthropology is clear. (link to video?) Nonetheless, ethnographic study has increasingly expanded to all areas of the globe and—slowly but surely—is being taken up as a tool for understanding the Global North as well as the Global South. Ethnographers no longer (only) study groups they consider to be radically different from themselves, but have also begun to apply ethnographic methods to studying their own environments and cultural assumptions.

As renowned cultural anthropologist Ruth Behar reminds us, “Anthropologists have faith you can get to know people through relationships.” While to some this may seem like a foregone conclusion, data collected at the micro, personal level are often framed as less rigorous than those collected through large, quantitative studies. Nonetheless, ethnographers are keenly aware of the power of one interaction, gesture, or seemingly off-hand comment to change our whole way of thinking. That is, despite its colonial legacy, ethnography allows us to see and take stock of the many gaps, misunderstandings, and blind spots that make up our individual understandings of the world and of ourselves. Vanessa Agard-Jones adds: “The gesture, the small movement, the fine indicators of embodiment are things I’ve tried to pay attention to.”

This sensitivity to the importance of individual experiences is perhaps more important than ever, as we navigate a world that seems newly full of generalizations, harmful stereotypes, and overt racism and xenophobia. As our ongoing documentary series “Shifting Stereotypes” shows, ethnography allows us to understand people as people—and as members of a group—and, just as importantly, it demands that we understand ourselves the same way. Behar again reminds us, “Even the most insider person is somewhat of an outsider when you take the role of the ethnographer,” a role that must thus be taken on with great care. Ethnography is important because it allows for collaboration with others, taking stock of our differences and similarities to better understand the world. But perhaps just as importantly, it demands that we take stock of our own positions in the world even as we attempt to understand others. It invites us to gain a deeper understanding of ourselves and our own worlds, pushing past our preconceived notions to reveal more complex and multiple truths.

Baird Campbell is Cool Anthropology’s Graduate Assistant and Public Scholar. He’s been formally trained in Sociocultural Anthropology at Rice University (PhD forthcoming), and Latin American Studies at Tulane University (MA). His areas of interest include queer studies, embodiment, post-colonial theory, social movements, activism, digital media and public discourse. You can find out more about how these interests translate into projects and pursuits by contacting him directly at baird@coolanthropology.com