Ethnographic Research Research Articles

From Survivalism to Rooted Cosmopolitanism: Transformations of a Chinese Voluntary Association in New Zealand

ABSTRACT Drawing on ethnographic and archival research, this paper investigates the response of a Chinese voluntary association in New Zealand to demographic changes in the national Chinese community since the 1990s. The Chinese Community Association developed from the closed-off and inward-facing Chinese community of New Zealand – the “old Chinese” whose ancestors arrived from rural Cantonese-speaking counties in Guangdong in the 1860s. Immigration law changes in 1989 brought new communities speaking different languages, with different political, social and economic backgrounds into New Zealand, creating new diversification to what it means to be a Chinese New Zealander. This paper investigates how this “old Chinese” association has adapted to “new” Chinese groups. We argue that a unique “rooted cosmopolitanism” has developed in this association, where local practices and resources have enabled it to manage potential tensions and growing pains of serving diverse groups in the current multi-ethnic context of New Zealand.

Provincializing Acoustics, Feeling Europe

In recent decades, churches and other spaces left over from Istanbul’s multi-confessional and multi-ethnic past have grown increasingly popular as concert venues for performances of Western classical music favored among Istanbul secularists. The popularity of this alternative acoustic infrastructure is often attributed to the ostensibly appropriate atmosphere and “good” acoustics of such spaces. Taking up Istanbul discourses of acoustics and atmosphere as novel sites of ethnographic inquiry, in this article I ask: What is the relationship between atmosphere and acoustics? Which modes of perception are afforded by good acoustics in Istanbul? What makes them good? What is the relationship between these discourses and acoustic spaces linked to non-Turkish and non-Muslim communities? I examine how acoustics in this context is less an objective, technical discourse of material and spatial qualities enabling clear aural perception, than a local discursive concept anchored by the multi-sensory affordances of certain spaces – in particular, Levantine churches in Istanbul’s staunchly secularist Kadıköy district. I demonstrate that good acoustics in this case are emergent from sonic atmospheres in which tuned bodies and spaces from Istanbul’s non-Muslim past are brought into dynamic relation. In this way, sonic atmosphere becomes a particularly clear instance of heritage as cultural process through which Europe comes to be felt, and attributions of good acoustics become a demotic discursive concept for referring to and evaluating that “feel.” I thus provincialize acoustics by elucidating the way in which it is not a universal concept of (social) scientific analysis but rather a local and colloquial, demotic concept for discussing how Europe comes to be felt in particular Istanbul spaces.

Ethical ambivalence in postcolonial touristic encounters

This article aims to understand the ways in which tourists approach, negotiate and interpret a colonial past, memory and imaginary in the Bà Nà hills of Vietnam. Ethnographic research was undertaken from March to November 2019. By using ambivalence as an interpretive and analytic tool to elucidate the place of ethics from the postcolonial perspective, this article focused to reveal contradictory emotions, incompatible values and emotional internal clashes of tourists toward a colonial past. Findings show that tourists’ ethical ambivalence is located in-between ‘care of the self’ and ‘concern for the others’ and that such ethical ambivalence demonstrates tourists’ negotiation and articulation of their own needs and desires with those of other people by recognising the alterity of others.

Незгасима пам'ять про «згаслий рід» (до 205-ліття Григорія Галагана)

The article assesses the social significance of Hryhoriy Galagan's contribution to the formation of national self-identification and the cultural revival of the Ukrainian nation. The author presents various features of Hryhoriy Galagan's economic and reforming activities in a landlord economy against the background of market transformations. It is noted that the driving force behind Galagan's reform efforts is not only the desire to increase family wealth, but also the desire to modernize the economy in accordance with market conditions. Economic activities in the family estates of the Galagans are analyzed, such as crop cultivation, animal husbandry, and sugar cultivation. It is shown that, under the influence of the growth of market demand for certain goods (sugar, oats), Galagan significantly expanded the areas of the corresponding crops in his estates. A change in the structure of crops with an orientation to market demand led to an increase in the farm's profitability. In particular, the increase in sugar beet crops made it possible to provide sugar factories with own raw materials and reduced the cost of manufactured products. The article also highlights the creation of cloth factories, which contributed to increasing the profitability of production before the agrarian reform. It was concluded that the innovative approach to farm management, the ability to adapt to the needs of the market and the socially responsible position of the owner became the basis for the growth of commodification and profitability of estates. The article displays the main stages, forms and results of Grigory Galahan's social activities. The role of Grigory Galahan's philanthropic activity, which was manifested in the organization of the Paul Galagan College, support of ethnographic research, publication of folk songs and historical works, are separately analyzed. Galagan's patronage is considered in the article as a factor in the formation of self-awareness of the Ukrainian nation and national culture, as well as the development of independent Ukrainian education, and the history of Ukrainian culture.

Landscapes of Housing

The concepts of residential space and housing, created by Yugoslav modernist Juraj Neidhardt through the collaboration with architect Dušan Grabrijan, have yet to be investigated systematically, especially from the urban design point of view. As rooted in joint ethnographic research of local Bosnian dwelling culture and vernacular architecture, Neidhardt developed a specific approach to modern neighborhood design compared to the prevalent scientific-planning approach in post-war modernism. From the perspective of urban design, Neidhardt examined the possibilities of conceptualizing more humane dwellings in the context of rapid housing construction in post-war Yugoslavia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, looking through the lens of traditional dwelling culture in which architecture is a mediator between man and landscape. The article will distill, describe, and interpret Neidhardt’s ideas of a modern neighborhood that arise from elaborated descriptions of the Bosnian vernacular architecture articulated in close collaboration with Dušan Grabrijan. Neighborhood concepts have significantly different densities and forms, as designed and redesigned through four decades. Nevertheless, the fundamental design principles common to all neighborhood concepts are recognized, focusing on the dichotomy of architecture and landscape in terms of form and meaning. The research was based on analyzing the author’s books and published texts and designs in several Yugoslavian architectural journals.

Producing Russian-Speaking Community Activities in Australia: The Role of Migrant Organisations and Russian Political Influence

ABSTRACT The prevailing perspective on migrant organisations emphasises their positive contributions and role in the lives of migrants from various countries worldwide. Drawing on Bourdieu’s field theory and the ‘community of unbelonging’ framework, the article presents a contrasting view that reveals the limitations of the celebratory understanding of migration organisations, their activities and representative function for ‘migrant community’ members. Based on ethnographic research in Australia, I show how Russian-speaking migrant institutions, due to their involvement in competitive struggles and the pro-Kremlin ideological network, can restrict public forms of community participation, the expression of collective memory, and civic practices employed within the migrant community. I demonstrate how Russia, aiming to implement its political and ideological goals and instrumentalise the diaspora, has established or supported a specific migrant institution: ‘migrant quasi-non-governmental organisations.’ Different migrant groups become involved in the Russian ideological compatriots project through these migrant quasi-NGOs, mediating Russia’s strategies to extend political and cultural influence. The dynamic processes in the field are influenced by the Russian-Ukrainian war and the emergence of new players wishing to act as cultural producers, and this shift of dominant forces impacts the production of community activities.

Mothers Experiencing Legal and Financial Precarity Post-Migration: Solidarity Practices, Everyday Resistance and the Role of Social Infrastructure

Restrictive immigration policies across Europe intersect with socio-economic structures, increasing the risks of precarity, exploitation and abuse faced by many women and mothers. This can be understood as ‘structural’ or ‘slow’ violence, and in the UK particularly affects racially minoritised mothers with insecure immigration statuses experiencing financial hardship. Drawing on my ethnographic research in London, UK, this article explores how precariously positioned mothers engage in solidarity practices which are infused with everyday resistance, and how social infrastructure shapes these practices. I identify six solidarity practices: reaching out and providing recognition; sharing material and financial resources; sharing information and practical help; informal hosting; providing advice and advocacy; and sharing emotional support. The article shows how solidarity practices are entwined with everyday resistance, and highlights how social infrastructure can facilitate mobilisation of intersecting identities, supporting such solidarity practices. It also calls attention to the tensions that can emerge within everyday solidarity practices.

Activist burnout in No Borders: The case of a highly diverse movement.

Activist burnout is a common threat to activists' personal sustainability and to a movement's effectiveness. Compared to related fields such as humanitarian aid or social work we know relatively little about mental health risks in activists or how a specific activist environment may contribute to mental health outcomes. This study examines the case of the No Borders movement in Europe, a grassroots movement fighting for migrant rights. The movement's groups are highly diverse in terms of nationality, ethnicity, culture, and religion because they are composed of refugees, migrants, and local populations. Following the vulnerability-stress-model, the article asks: which specific stressors occur in the No Borders movement? The analysis is exploratory and based on ethnographic research and qualitative interviews (N = 26). Situational Analysis (SitA) shows that: a) activists have to navigate a complex environment in which radical grassroots activism meets humanitarian emergencies, and b) in dealing with diversity and intergroup conflicts they are under pressure to live up to their political ideals. These insights led to the identification of three stressors: prefigurative betrayal, inadequate expectations, and split of life-worlds. Understanding these stressors can contribute to informing preventive measures in No Borders and in other migrant or antiracist movements.

Engaging with spaces of linguistic partial understanding in multilingual linguistic ethnography

Abstract This paper gives an account of the impact of spaces of linguistic non-understanding and spaces of linguistic partial understanding in the first author’s linguistic ethnographic doctoral study of lawyer-client communication within UK immigration legal advice meetings. The paper uses the researching multilingually framework as a lens for exploring how the researcher’s positionality as a native speaker of English, an elementary-level learner of Arabic, and a non-speaker of other languages she encountered were material to the research process. Data in the form of researcher reflections, notes and records made about the impact of language(s) at different stages of the project is drawn on to examine the role of linguistic support – in the form of input from translators – at each stage, and the exercise of linguistic reflexivity in relation to this dimension of the research. The paper argues for the need, when doing ethnographic research in contexts of linguistic unpredictability, to be reflexive about the literacy practices and language ideologies of people involved in linguistic support, since these are also part of the language ecology that shapes the process of knowledge production. Thus, linguistic reflexivity is part of a practice of epistemological accountability in multilingual linguistic ethnography.

Liminal Solidarity: How Ukrainian Refugee Mothers Negotiate Situational Kinship in a Collective Reception Centre in Belgium

While solidarity practices among refugees have increasingly drawn scholars' interest, hardly any research has addressed the complex relationships between refugee women in the specific context of collective reception centres. At the same time, there has not been accounted for the way in which specific intersectional identities of refugee mothers shape mutual solidarity. Literature on refugee solidarity often analyses solidarity with an overdetermined political reading, which precludes the context in which solidarity emerges from being adequately researched. Based on my ethnographic research with Ukrainian refugee mothers in an emergency reception centre in Belgium, I propose a conceptualisation of solidarity that acknowledges that overlapping, intersectional identities do not automatically generate belonging. I argue for employing a situated intersectional lens (Yuval-Davis, 2015), and combining 'situational kinship' (Nelson, 2013) with 'resilient moves' (Groeninck et al., 2020) in order to grasp how the mothers’ navigating of the specific liminal and intersectional context of the reception centre, produced everyday practices of solidarity.

The caring adult role: ethical reflections from an ethnographic study of school bullying

ABSTRACT In this article, we contribute to a discussion of ethics within school bullying research by reflecting on our own recent ethnographic study into the relations between school bullying and the institutional context of schooling conducted at three elementary schools and one lower-secondary school in Sweden. We argue for a reflexive, responsive, and flexible adult researcher role when conducting ethnographic research into school bullying; what we term the caring adult role. The caring adult role provides a means of ethically conducting research by helping to facilitate access, navigate power relations, provide a consistent starting point for deciding when to intervene in ethically questionable situations, and a way for adult researchers to differentiate themselves from those adults in schools who may be perceived by students as non-caring. We argue that this is an ethically sounder approach than one that suspends all adult-like characteristics and avoids directing or correcting the behaviour of children.

Intersecting social relations of care: a protocol for an ethnographic and interview study with South Asian people ageing in place with dementia

IntroductionPeople living at home with dementia are often cared for by family members, especially those from minority ethnic groups. Many people living with dementia from minority ethnic communities face barriers...

Dance knowledge through the body: Gender roles within contact improvisation

This article challenges the assumption of contact improvisation (CI) as a gender-neutral dance form, as it has been claimed since the emergence of the dance form in the 1970s and pertained until recent times. Drawing on ethnographic research in Montreal (2019), the investigation combines autoethnography and participant observation to examine the influence of gender roles and power dynamics on the dance floor. To understand the claim of egalitarianism in CI, the study first exposes a discourse analysis of CI’s initial gender egalitarian ideology (1970s) and its reaction against dominant dance forms like ballet. The article discusses the role of the body in ethnographic work, suggesting that the researcher’s sensorial and affective experiences can challenge scholarly assumptions and fieldwork’s discourses. By highlighting how knowledge is embodied, the article emphasizes anthropology’s contribution to dance theory through the disclosure of knowledge via somatic experience.

Historical-ethnographic exploration of blacksmithing practiced by the Gypsies (Roma) in the Eastern Carpathian area. Ethnographic field research in the traditional ”chocanary” Roma community in the city of Soroca (May 14-16, 2024)

Blacksmithing, once “the most important craft in the life of village communities,” has now been marginalized by the widespread use of intelligent iron processing technologies in industry. Consequently, now that the traditional craft of iron processing with only hammer, fire and anvil is “fading away with the disappearance of blacksmiths,” it is imperative to preserve the last “left traces” of this “good and precious craft” in the Eastern Carpathian area. Based on the use of new historical and ethnographic sources, this study presents 25 new elements and identifies the cultural significance of the trinitarian expression “blacksmithing (craft) – blacksmiths (craftsmen) – gypsies (Roma).” The materials collected as a result of collecting field ethnographic material in the city of Soroca (14-16 May 2024) were processed, in particular on the craft of iron processing (blacksmithing), which is the native craft of the traditional gypsies “chokenari”, located on the Soroca “Ringing Mountain”, which is currently practiced on a small scale by the last attested gypsy blacksmith and is under threat of extinction.

Synthetic ethnography: Field devices for the qualitative study of generative models

Advancements in generative artificial intelligence have led to a rapid proliferation of machine learning models capable of synthesizing text, images, sounds, and other kinds of content. While the increasing realism of synthetic content stokes fears about misinformation and triggers debates around intellectual property, generative models are adopted across creative industries and synthetic media seep into cultural production. Qualitative research in the social and human sciences has dedicated comparatively little attention to this category of machine learning, particularly in terms of what types of novel research methodology they both demand and facilitate. In this article, we propose a methodological approach for the qualitative study of generative models grounded on the experimentation with field devices which we call synthetic ethnography. Synthetic ethnography is not simply a qualitative research methodology applied to the study of the social and cultural contexts developing around generative artificial intelligence, but also strives to envision practical and experimental ways to repurpose these models as research tools in their own right. After briefly introducing generative models and revisiting the trajectory of digital ethnographic research, we discuss three case studies for which the authors have developed experimental field devices to study different aspects of generative artificial intelligence ethnographically. In the conclusion, we derive a broader methodological proposal from these case studies, arguing that synthetic ethnography facilitates insights into how the algorithmic processes, training datasets and latent spaces behind these systems modulate bias, reconfigure agency, and challenge epistemological categories.

Peran Komunikasi Komunitas Budaya dalam Melestarikan Alat Musik Tradisional di Era Modern: Studi Etnografi pada Eksistensi Citra Musik Karinding di Balaraja

The rapid development of the times in the current era makes us forget about traditional culture, such as the traditional musical instrument Karinding, which is not widely known by people today. People are more familiar with modern musical instruments than traditional musical instruments such as guitar, bass, drums, and piano. This research aims to find out how the role and function of the Sanggar Bakar (Barak Karinding) community in maintaining its existence in today's modern era. The method used is Qualitative research method with ethnographic research type. The theory used is Functionalism Theory. The paradigm used is constructivism. Data collection techniques were conducted by in-depth interviews, observation and documentation. The results showed that Sanggar Bakar (Barak Karinding) in maintaining its existence they apply various roles and functions well and uniquely in society, so that the culture still exists in the modern era. In accordance with the theory of functionalism, all biological, instrumental, and integrative needs are met so that the spread of Karinding culture is comprehensive and sustainable.

Facilitators and Barriers to Developing a Research Program: A Focused Ethnography of New Tenure-Track PhD-Prepared Nursing Faculty.

Creating a research program is a critical requirement for new PhD-prepared tenure-track nursing faculty in Canada. The purpose of this article is to present key findings of new faculty members focusing on facilitators and barriers to development of their research program. We conducted focused ethnography research examining the experience of 17 new faculty members from across Canada. The following themes were identified: teaching release, preparation from PhD program, intense feelings, supports and processes, mentoring, obtaining grants, and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Implications for practice include identifying ways to facilitate faculty retention as they develop their research program. This research will be of interest to deans of nursing and new faculty members.

From theory to practice: A case study and ethnographic exploration of translanguaging strategies in second language academic writing

This paper examines the intersection of case study and ethnographic research methodologies within the field of Applied Linguistics, focusing specifically on the investigation of translanguaging practices in academic writing. The paper explores the theoretical underpinnings and practical applications of these qualitative research methods, highlighting their key characteristics, benefits, and challenges. By reviewing exemplary studies, the paper aims to demonstrate the strengths and complexities of these methodologies in understanding the diverse language practices of multilingual learners in educational settings. It concludes by reflecting on the potential of these research approaches to inform the development of inclusive and effective teaching practices for diverse student populations in a globalized world.

Memory dissonance and competitive discourses about the past on the example of the legacy of the “Gryf Pomorski” Secret Military Organisation

In the article, we present the circumstances surrounding the establishment and activities of the “Gryf Pomorski” secret military organisation and contemporary forms of its commemoration in the context of historical policy. We discuss the causes and effects of the conflict over the memory of the partisans of “Gryf Pomorski” and the manifestations of competing discourses about them. The basis of the analysis are materials collected during ethnographic field research in Pomerania.

Off and on stage interactions: Muslim-Jewish encounter in urban Europe

Drawing on ethnographic and interview-based research in six cities (Berlin and Frankfurt in Germany, London and Manchester in the UK and Paris and Strasbourg in France), this article explores intercultural, interethnic and interreligious encounter as exemplified by Jewish-Muslim interaction. We look at three sites across the cities: “staged” encounters which take place in formal interfaith and municipal settings, and “unstaged” encounters in public and commercial spaces, both often relying on the role of key “entrepreneurs of encounter”, who tend to occupy liminal or marginal spaces in relation to their ascribed identities. We show that the texture and the possibilities (and sometimes impossibility) of encounters are structured intersectionally (crucially by class and by generation), and shaped by patterns of insecurity and securitisation and by different available discursive repertoires and cognitive frames (produced at supra-national, national, local and micro-local levels – e.g. Israel/Palestine politics, laïcité or communitarianism, city narratives and neighbourhood identities respectively). Although insecurity, securitisation, policy panic and geopolitical pressures can block meaningful encounter, emerging transdiasporic cultural formations point towards some fragile resources for hope.