Annals of Anthropological Practice最新文献

This article reflects on the current status of participatory research in anthropology. I draw on my work at the Instituto Superior Intercultural Ayuuk (Ayuuk Intercultural University) in Oaxaca, Mexico to sketch some of potentials and pitfalls for participatory research during the preliminary, data-collection, and postfield phases. My argument is that while anthropologists as individuals tend to find ways to connect meaningfully with collaborators in the field, the discipline does little to train, foster, or evaluate participatory research as a core element. Assigning participatory research to the status of a personal choice rather than a disciplinary hallmark saps anthropology's potential for meaningful engagement with a host of publics, not the least of which are the communities, groups, and networks of individuals with whom we conduct research. [decolonization, intercultural education, Latin America, participatory research, training and methods]

Collaboration has been a hallmark of applied anthropology for as long as anthropologists have been putting anthropology to use. The very process of applying anthropological methods and theories to real-world problems requires an understanding of the needs of the people experiencing the problem. Collaboration also has a long history in both archaeology and ethnography in Mesoamerica. This article explores the relationship between collaboration and applied anthropology in the context of a volunteer tourism program in rural Yucatan, Mexico. Tourism—and especially archaeological tourism—is a driving force in the region's economy. Increasingly, volunteer tourism initiatives provide visitors with the opportunity to contribute to the local community as part of their travel experience. I argue that the conceptual framework of what constitutes meaningful collaboration offers us a way to examine the interactions and power dynamics surrounding the encounter between volunteer, host, and even ethnographer. Specifically, the article questions whether contributions of various sorts are a requisite for achieving actual collaboration in these encounters.

The context of Mexican anthropology affects their institutional and ethical research protocols, and in turn, this context affects how foreign researchers should comply with these, in addition to the codes of their home professional associations and funders. This article examines research permissions and dissemination of results and products, in terms of Mexican protocols and the American Anthropological Association's Code of Ethics, using examples from U.S. and Mexican field research. The objective is to promote greater collaboration, mutual respect, and dissemination, while recognizing the obstacles that different conceptual, professional, and funding frameworks present.

In this essay, I reflect on six years of collaboration between myself and an organization of indigenous midwives in Mexico. I interrogate the process of finding common grounds between researchers and activists, which includes building a shared political vision of indigenous midwifery and negotiating disagreements on the different ways to impulse change. Building on my experience with Mexican midwives and activists, I share some of the tools we have used, both from within and outside of academia, to contribute to social change. I build on Shannon Speed's call for a “critically engaged activist research” to raise awareness on the urgency of moving from applied anthropology to activist anthropology.

Here I argue that anthropologists, whether we want it or not, affect the localities and the people at our fieldwork sites. These effects can be short, medium or long-term, depending on the place and the circumstances. Short term help may mean helping to pick up fruit or vegetables for dinner or lend a hand during the harvest. Mid-term engagement may mean to set up a school for local teachers wanting to learn anthropological methods or participate over the years in a single project helping with help, funds, or both. Long-term projects may include setting up museums and helping support them through foreign donations or working with locals through the mediation of a foreign or world-wide institution such as the World Health Organization or the United Nations. There are specialty areas, such as medical anthropology, which could seem to have the in-built purpose of achieving long-term effects, but most other anthropological work does not fall within these categories and anthropologists can choose when and how to commit to local welfare depending on their circumstances and those of their hosts. Here I discuss the ways in which different anthropologists have chosen to engage with locals during and after fieldwork.

It is difficult to canonize anthropology and anthropological concepts, in part because of the creative tensions within the discipline's contradictions: a desire and deep respect for local knowledge with a global, comparative perspective, what might be called the “anthropological imagination.” Firmly rooted in—and in defense of—an inclusive vision of humanity, an anthropological imagination inspires “radical empathy.” It offers the scaffolding of a coalitional politics that values the specificity of local struggles but also reaffirms and defends humanity. We must identify the humanity in others, and the common humanity in their struggle, while affirming particular identities and challenging differential privilege: an anthropological imagination inspires radical empathy and solidarity, reminding us, in the words of the World Social Forum, that “another world is possible.” How people learn to cultivate this anthropological imagination and bring it in the service of marginalized groups is not generally discussed, and rarely taught. This article aims to bridge this gap. On October 10, 2018, Julie Maldonado, Associate Director for the Livelihoods Knowledge Exchange Network (LiKEN), discussed her new book, Seeking Justice in an Energy Sacrifice Zone: Standing on Vanishing Land in Coastal Louisiana, via video-conference with Mark Schuller's Anthropology and Contemporary World Problems class at Northern Illinois University. This interview offers one perspective of a career focused around advocacy anthropology that aims to reach public audiences and policy- and decision-makers in ways that translates scholarly research into information that is most useful for problem solving and enacting change in response to our climate crisis.

In recent years, many anthropologists in the United States have become involved with organizations that serve newly resettled refugees, especially as budgets for the agencies have been severely cut since 2017. Here, we reflect on some of our experiences working with Refugees from the Congo Wars (RFCWs) and address some of the challenges we have faced as applied/practicing anthropologists and resettlement support personnel. Juxtaposing a larger southern city—Tampa—with a smaller rustbelt city—Akron—we see many commonalities but also a few differences that likely relate to host city size and existing diversity profiles. Drawing on almost 3 years of research, we offer some shared observations and comparative divergences among populations of RFCWs that shed light on issues of: timing of arrival in the United States, community and class, schooling, gender and family, and food and diet, for people working with this population.

Issues with land ownership and engagement in forestry have been intractable problems that have long impeded wealth development among African Americans in the rural South. Over a 6-year period, an integrated outreach and research program, the Sustainable Forestry and African American Land Retention Program, implemented community-based projects, built networks among relevant organizations, changed policies, and developed new knowledge to address these critical issues of environmental justice. In this paper, we discuss how anthropological practice was integrated into a program of community-based projects to create a platform for long-term change in land ownership, forest management, outreach practice, and policy environments. The results provide an example of how anthropological methods can contribute to social and institutional change by listening and documenting stories and through long-term engagement with a diverse coalition of researchers, practitioners, landowners, and funders.

Ethnographic research on childcare has focused on understanding the influence of cultural contexts on childcare. The research, however, lacks discussions of a child's caregiver as a position of power, and analysis of the knowledge underpinning childcare. Consequently, much remains unknown about the adults responsible for childcare, the significance of their roles, and the values that shape their actions. This paper analyzes how the meanings embedded within the position of “child's caregiver” and the narratives around the position influence childcare practices in Manya Klo, Ghana. The findings suggest that research has overlooked the influence of power in analyses of childcare roles and identifying children's caregivers. The findings challenge the use of female household headship, direct observation of parent–child contact, provision of material goods, and fathers’ absence as bases for determining children's caregivers. The differences in the meanings of childcare concepts create different expectations for local communities and external agencies that support children.