Epistemología y aforismos. Usos de la antropología contemporánea

This paper identifies epistemological principles that would come to define the task of anthropological research. These principles are theoretical assumptions which would inform the practice of a discipline based on a method of qualitative observation, and on the systematic recording of the things observed with a markedly subjective tone. In this study, I offer a proposal on the ethical stance implicit in the acknowledgement and explicitation of the locus of research, which would in turn underpin the articulation of an explanatory discourse that is demonstrative in nature. A hypothetical researcher would be aware of the multi-dimensional and subjective representation of the phenomenon observed and shun immediatist or prescriptive interpretations. In the conceptual framework offered by Bourdieu, interpretation in this case would entail a modus operandi as a practical expression and “common sense” as a cultural manifestation. What is proposed here is a meditative observation that would result in the co-involvement of the anthropological subject in that which the anthropologist seeks to explain.