Jala Role: Normative Practice of Collaborative Ethnography in a Hostile Research Frontier, South Omo, Ethiopia

Abstract

This article outlines the significance of a normative social and cultural practice, Jala role, for collaborative ethnography in a hostile research frontier. Based on self-reflective notes and fieldwork details, this article critically discusses the notion of Jala as a methodological enterprise of collaborative ethnography in Omo Valley, Ethiopia. The Jala role enables a pathway to emic perspectives of the right-holders and reflect on the methodological limitation of the predominant focus on the conduct of duty bearer. Its normative value enables modes of self-presentation and access to ethnographic knowledge holders by going back and forth in multi-sited fields iteratively. These features establish the concept of collaborative ethnography as deliberate and explicit collaborations with participants of ethnographic fieldwork. The parties to the relationship have mutual obligations to support each other that neither define collaboration as reciprocation nor let the parties enter into stressful relationships except for a few challenges explored reflexively.