How Does Anthropology Know?

How Does Anthropology Know?
A Workshop on Ethnographic Fieldwork and the Co-Production of Knowledge
Made possible with funding from the S0cial Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC)
Organized by Bob W. White and Kiven Strohm
September 2008 / Montréal

Download conference program here: FinalProgram

For more information, click here: www.atalaku.net/intersubjectivity

In his book Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes its Object, Johannes Fabian calls attention to what may be the central paradox in the production of anthropological knowledge, namely that despite the profoundly intersubjective nature of ethnographic fieldwork, anthropological writing and discourse tend to obscure the processes by which knowledge about culture is co-produced. How, it may be asked, does anthropology know?

Conference attendees during a break

Workshop Objectives

Bringing together scholars working on the co-production of cultural knowledge in various historical and political contexts, this conference aims to use anthropology as a base from which to examine the theoretical, epistemological and ethical implications of an intersubjective approach to knowledge. This workshop has three primary objectives:

• Bring together scholars from different areas of ethnographic research in order to enable collective critical thinking about the theoretical frameworks that are most likely to advance our understanding of how scientific knowledge about culture is co-produced

• Provide detailed accounts of the conditions and categories of knowledge that are made possible through the cross-cultural encounters of ethnographic fieldwork and explain how these encounters are conditioned by the structures and strategies of ethnographic methods

• Explore the ethical and political implications of an intersubjective approach to cultural knowledge, not only in terms of the reciprocity between researcher and subject, but also with regards to a philosophical position that views the co-production of knowledge as part of a larger politics of recognition

Philosopher puppets on paper

The workshop format proposed for this conference is important in part because anthropology has done relatively little to engage with theories of intersubjectivity or intersubjective knowledge. This means that scholars, many of whom will be meeting each other for the first time, will benefit from a more informal, exploratory format within which to present their material and make connections between their respective projects. More importantly, a workshop format seems appropriate given the emergent nature of the subject matter. Through the use of various presentation strategies (team presentations, data sharing, observation activities, group interviews, role plays, intensive use of audio-visual material), this workshop will attempt to reproduce, albeit in the limited context of an academic workshop, the dynamics that occur between anthropologists and their interlocutors in the field. Workshop presenters will be asked to submit written versions of their presentations one month before the workshop and present only a brief summary of its content during the workshop itself in order to allow sufficient time for the presentation of media, data, and discussion.