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Conversations regarding moral values are increasingly becoming a pivotal dimension of public discourse. This paper presents a new approach to unacceptable discourse. Drawing on René Girard's cultural anthropology and Luciano Elizalde's dissent management theory, this work develops a scale of situations of dissent, such as controversy, polemic and public discourse scandal. It offers a detailed study of the polemic raised by the book Marry Him and Be Submissive, a process of dissent which was generated in Spain in November 2013 on the occasion of the publication of this Italian bestseller and lasted until January 2014. The book was written by the Italian journalist Costanza Miriano and translated and edited by the Archdiocese of Granada. The case study uses a triangular approach to discourse analysis, which aims to comprehend the enunciator's legitimacy and social positioning, the communication context in which the debate takes place, and the characteristics of the public discourse. A central element regards how reactions are organized around the signifier 'submissive' and the different frames of interpretation assigned to this word, in what will be called 'feminist' and 'post-feminist' paradigms. Mechanisms of dissent and consensus are explained, and takeaways and actors' strategies are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the emergent field of biocuration, taking it as a case of academic data work. Biocurators organise, manage, and enrich the now vast quantities of data that are produced by the contemporary biosciences, but their work remains largely invisible to the scholarly communities that make use of it. Based on ethnographic engagement with the field and interviews with biocurators, and mobilising conceptual frames of care and epistemic justice, we examine how biocurators frame their data practices, arguing that biocuration can, in emphasising collaboration and care, be seen as an 'academia otherwise' that resists dominant narratives of scholarly excellence. At the same time this explicit framing of data work as care work involves a 'dark side' that elides the epistemic labour involved in it. In closing we suggest that engagement with biocuration leads us to attend to the ways in which care work constitutes technoscientific knowledge, and to the epistemic contributions it may make. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses how 8th graders build epistemic practices of evaluation of knowledge. Guided by Ethnography in Education, we followed a group in their science lessons through one year, using participant observation. Following Kelly's propositions concerning epistemic practices, we selected key events towards an analysis of discursive interactions. The results indicate a trajectory of changes in constructing practices of evaluation of knowledge over time. The repertoire built by the group throughout 8th grade allowed students to evaluate knowledge claims in order to value alleged scientific evidence to the detriment of other rationalities. Evidence, in this case, was being used as a tool for students to support and communicate their propositions, but they were not evaluated. Events that broke with rationality based on the use of evidence generated opportunities for the group to start engaging in practices such as: evaluating the quality of alleged scientific evidence, pondering possible errors, or proposing alternative interpretations. Future events in the history of the group throughout 9th grade indicate that this type of practice became part of their discussions. We discuss implications for pedagogical practice and research in science education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contributes to the literature on geographies of masculinities by examining how young men's (aged 12–18) performances of masculinity through humour was mutually constitutive of and constituted by the spaces of the Fusion and Retro youth cafés in the city and suburbs of Cork in the south of Ireland. Research on open access youth provision such as youth clubs, centres and youth cafés have found that they can afford young people the opportunity to 'be themselves', reflecting the ideals of safety and inclusivity that are meant to be sustained in these spaces. Using ethnographic observations, this paper shows that such ideals are never a given as the inequality embedded in gendered performances mean the spaces must be continually (re)produced as inclusive. It contributes to an understanding of youth cafés as micropolitical spaces of becoming that shape and are shaped by negotiations over meanings of gender and masculinity in particular. Furthermore, it advances two new concepts - 'humorous improprieties' and 'humour bombing' - to the performative geographies literature, highlighting two nuanced ways in which young men construct themselves as men in relation to space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an alternative lens of viewing digital technologies and networked spaces in outdoor intercultural learning, by introducing the Taoist philosophy of Ziran (nature) and Wuwei (inaction). The application of digital technology to outdoor learning has become prevailing and triggered critical debates and discussions among scholars and practitioners. The majority of the perspectives are, however, oriented in Western ideologies, and very rarely has any research considered this issue in the context of outdoor intercultural learning. A mini-ethnographic study was conducted to reconcile the nature-technology dichotomy during an EU-exchange sail-training voyage. Methodological implications are provided for conducting fieldwork in outdoor learning research, in line with the Ziran-Wuwei principles. The findings suggest that educators and facilitators follow the dialectical, relational, and contextual orientations to manage the (non)use of digital devices to maximise learners' outdoor experiential engagement and reflections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing from an ethnographic study with U.S.-born children who had relocated to their parents' hometowns in Mexico, we engaged transborder and dis/ability critical race studies (DisCrit) frameworks to understand the compounding, deterritorialized ways undocumentedness and dis/ability shape educational experiences across borders. In this article, we focus on the experiences of two familias and argue that a transborder DisCrit framing is necessary to reveal how undocumented parents advocate and dream across disjunctures in search of access to educational supports and humanizing futures for their children with dis/abilities across the countries they call home. Findings reveal how intersecting forms of undocumentedness, or exclusion from papers for access and belonging, constrained families' access to movement across geopolitical borders, schooling and health-care institutions, and documented diagnoses needed to access learning supports. In the implications, we explore what approaches to policy, education, and research might look like if they centered the experiences, subaltern knowledges, and humanizing dreams of transborder parents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

: People with dementia are often excluded from research due to ethical concerns and a reliance upon conventional research methods which focus on recall and verbal expression. Creative, sensory and embodied research methods typically involve techniques that conceptually bring individuals "into" the research, thus affording an expressive capacity that traditional methods do not. This paper details a "method story", presenting three interlinked cycles of study used to explore the significance of clothing to people with dementia living in a care home. The studies drew upon arts-based and design led practices. This paper details the methods used and the opportunities that they presented when exploring the lived experience of dementia. Creative, sensory and embodied approaches enabled people with dementia to engage with research, supporting imaginative, spontaneous and flexible participation. This supports the use of novel methods when undertaking research with people who have dementia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the political legacies of transmigration in local elections in Indonesia. Lampung province has an unusual ethnic make-up because in the past 100 years both the Dutch colonial administration and Indonesian Government have been implementing a transmigration programme. Transmigration has therefore changed the demographic pattern of Lampung. Since 2005, the mode of local election has been changed from indirect to direct. As a consequence of this, there is a revival of ethnic identity politics in local elections. In this paper, we focus on a transmigration affected area where the descendants of Javanese transmigrants are numerically dominant and correspondingly powerful in local politics. This research leads us to argue that ethnicity has become an important factor in local elections and that in transmigration affected areas it has led to the political domination of Javanese transmigrant descendants in local politics. We further to show how, in response to this, native Lampungese elites have adopted a number of strategies to help them retain a role in local politics. Our argument runs contrary to that of some scholars who have claimed that ethnicity is playing a diminishing role in Indonesian local elections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study addresses certain methodological challenges of being a 'practisearcher' at a worksite that is physically distant from but no less influential to freelance interpreters – the interpreting agency. Drawing on the discourse of emotionality and positionality of workplace ethnographic research, this paper focuses on the diverse emotions that are experienced by the author through navigating conflicting expectations in a complex business environment. The purpose of this study is to highlight the analytical values of the emotional efforts of the researcher through reflecting upon the uneasy moments when our identities are questioned, our behaviours cause distrust, or when our rushed decisions lead to unforeseen results. Although such instances are integral to everyday fieldwork practice, they tend to be largely toned down in the rational account of academic reasoning. Through presenting a series of extracts from the research diaries and fieldnotes, the author argues that emotions are untapped resources that can help researchers to delve into the complex network of participants, to critically assess our multiple positions and identities (in the eyes of others and our own), as ethnographers go through rites of passage, and to make sense of the socio-cultural contexts where the organisation under study is situated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper foregrounds the methodological question of how the heuristic research practices of mapping and ethnography operate together to co-produce situated knowledge of/with the urban margin. By critically reflecting on collaborative map-making with young adults in Dharavi (Mumbai), it argues for mapping as an open-ended collaboration in which mappers' various 'finding' and 'founding' acts to support the production of situated knowledge of an ever-shifting urban margin. The continuous efforts to make such knowledge visible is through re-reading, re-writing and re-drawing acts. The method prompted by this experience is proposed as 'popular cartography'. It aims to transcend mappers' backgrounds, technical skills, and disciplinary biases, and offers a collaborative medium for expressing often overlooked, opaque or difficult-to-describe lived experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most previous research on sexual minority migrants focused on those who move from places where there are fewer legal rights for sexual minorities to where there are more. This paper distinctively fills a research gap through a focus on a subset of sexual minority migrants: sexual minority expatriates. It presents a five-year ethnographic case study of a judicial review in Hong Kong QT v Director of Immigration and other lesbian and gay couples who moved to Hong Kong, and business organisations that advocate for immigration equality. First, the analysis highlights that both subjective cultural assumptions and objective legal conditions play an important role in sexual minority expatriates' assessment of gay-friendliness of the work destination. Second, this paper uncovers the agency of gay and lesbian expatriates' impact on the local legal sexual landscape and illustrates how sexual citizenship could be reclaimed by relying on the homonormative logic that the same-sex couples are productive labour and beneficial to the economy. This paper contributes to a deeper understanding of sexual minority migration by theorising how sexual minority migrants may not only be constrained by the legal and social environments in the migration destination, but they may also actively change and shape them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Behavioral public policy (BPP) has become increasingly popular with governments across the globe but what defines it in practice? It is not a concrete concept, encompassing a series of instruments, evaluation methods and theoretical influences. Using the findings from an ethnographic study of a behavioral insights team in the Australian Government this paper interrogates how BPP has been translated from these discrete components into practice by policymakers. This research posits that a significant degree of adaptation has taken place during this translation process. Participants could be referring to multiple different things when speaking about and implementing BPP, sometimes even communicating at cross-purposes. This paper incorporates Bevir and Rhodes 'traditions' to existing policy translation research to further interrogate how actors make meaning from and adapt ideas like BPP. This framework makes it possible to explore which translations carry greater influence and asks what this means for the BPP agenda moving forward. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A spectre haunts how we think about housing—describing it in binaries, in oppositions, in 'essentialised' identities (formal/informal, north/south, social/spatial, product/process). What does a more nuanced understanding of assemblages—drawn from the original work of Deleuze and Guattari—have to offer housing studies to move beyond such dichotomies? This paper outlines a conceptual framework where housing is re-thought as an unfolding of socio-material processual-relations and desires forming a field of intensities. This theoretical framework is used to think through empirical findings from a six-month socio-spatial ethnography conducted in Karail, the largest informal settlement in Dhaka that houses 300,000 people. The findings, seen through assemblages, allow identifying, firstly, the interconnections between different actors across different binaries that make it work and secondly, the different modes of settlement's production itself. Lastly, the paper recasts the settlement as a manifestation of a landscape of intersecting desires in an effort to speak of housing in a new language transcending the stifling dichotomy of top-down/bottom-up. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this editorial introduction to the Special Theme, Sacrifice, Suffering and Hope: Education, Aspiration and Young People's Affective Orientations to the Future, we discuss the key theoretical themes (aspiration, sacrifice and affect) that underpin the papers in this collection. With geographical focus on India, Indonesia, Kenya and Bangladesh, our aim is to contribute a more ethnographically-grounded understanding of the affective orientations that emerge or become visible in the context of young people's educational experiences, and that shape and give meaning to processes of aspiration formation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emergency Contraceptive Pills (ECPs) are increasingly available over the counter as a form of hormonal birth control in India. As use of ECPs is increasing over time, this paper draws on ethnographic research in Dehradun, in Uttarakhand (Northern State) to highlight the everyday material conditions under which women create narrative around choice and agency regarding these ECPs. Women viewed ECPs as better options than abortion, appreciated the sense of empowerment these provided them because they could be consumed in houses where women had limited 'space and privacy;' and finally that ECPs and their advertisements could act as 'agents of social change.' Feminist scholarship on reproduction demonstrates that choice is a form of agency that is enacted within certain constraints. Using this framework, the research here highlights how women create narratives about ideas of contraceptive choice and notions of 'empowerment' when talking about ECPs and their advertisements. In revisiting the dilemma about women's agency and choice, this paper builds on Rosalind Gill's concept of 'critical respect' to propose 'critical ethnographic respect' as an ethnographic tool to help read women's responses and respectfully contextualise the materiality from within which these narratives emerge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This ethnographic study is an exploration of risk as an everyday practice that women undertake to actualize their mobilities and social worlds in the city of Banaras, renowned as a sacred urban city in Northern India. The scholarship about this site has typically not centered on women's experiences, knowledge, and lives, in narrating the overwhelming sacred rhetoric of the city. This paper contributes to the extant scholarship on gender, risk, corporeality, and urbanity by establishing a dialogue between risk theories embedded in institutional management discourse, emerging from Western contexts, and the lived and embodied risk practices of women in the global South. Risk, as conceptualized in this paper, presents a grounded discussion of women's active and conscious modes of being emplaced in myriad sites in urban cities through their mobilities. In essence, the paper draws links between the potentiality of everyday risk-taking and women's mobilities. This is achieved through interrogating the embedded notions of 'respectable' femininity, honor, fear, and violence, through ethnographic accounts of having observed, interacted with, and interviewed women from diverse socio-economic backgrounds in the city. In doing so, the paper argues that women attempt to enable themselves and recreate their worlds in a patriarchal urban setting through various intersectional forms of risk-taking, namely, what I denote 'imposed' and 'chosen' varieties, which intersect in complex ways. Therefore, the paper highlights women's risk-taking as potentializing the everyday but also views this as a practice that sustains them as inhabitants of Banaras. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessors' perspectives on their evaluative practices remain relatively under-researched. Given evidence that higher education assessment and feedback continue to be problematic, this paper proposes a specific methodological innovation with potential to contribute both to research and practice in this area. It explores the potential of a micro-analysis of textual engagement, nested within an ethnographic approach, to defamiliarize the often taken-for-granted practice of marking. The study on which the paper is based used screen capture combined with audio-recorded, concurrent talk-around-text to throw light on the processes, strategies and perspectives of eight teachers within one university as they assessed undergraduates' work. This close-up focus was nested within broader ethnographic data generation incorporating interviews, marked assignments and other assessment-related texts. The paper presents selected 'moments of engagement' to show how this methodology can offer a renewed understanding of evaluative literacies as complex, 'messy' and shot through with influences invisible in the final assessed text but which may nevertheless be highly consequential. The paper concludes by reflecting on the potential for this type of data and analysis to contribute to assessor development and inform debate about the future of higher education assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay is based on ethnographic fieldwork carried out among the Dimasas (of Assam and Nagaland) in Northeastern India. This Indigenous group has a system of double descent which places them separately from the other ethnic groups in the Indian subcontinent. In double descent, lineages are drawn through both the paternal and maternal lines of descent. The existing literature suggests that studies on double descent have mostly focused on ethnic groups in Africa, while not much research has been done on Dimasas or other Indigenous groups with double descent in the region. The paper attempts to fill the gap in South Asian anthropological literature on kinship discourses by focusing on the Dimasas of Northeast India. Further, by taking gender as an analytical tool, the paper attempts to explore the complex cultural contours of the double descent system, which intricately gets subsumed within the patriarchal setup in Dimasa society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the socio-cultural transformation and challenges faced by the Rongmei tribe against the backdrop of continuous demographic growth and rapid urbanisation , inadequate planning, and shoddy policies of deathscapes in Manipur, Northeast India. It also examines the recent changes in cultural and customary practices concerning death, dignity and disposal of the dead among the Tingkao Ragwang Chapriak (TRC) group within the Rongmei tribe of Imphal. This article is the result of ethnographic fieldwork conducted from 2015 to 2020. In the last two decades, Thien (a traditional institution of Rongmei) and TRC have played significant roles in transitioning and negotiating customary practises and acquiring burial land. The analysis of this dynamic process with the concept of 'mortal migration' conceptualised as an extra-territorial customary rite of passage of death, is a significant contribution of this paper. It falls under what may be called extra-territorial village administration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines how Malagasy dina—local-level codes considered 'customary law' in Madagascar—have been enrolled in competing projects of territorial production. In doing so, it engages with conversations regarding the mobilization of indigenous forms—here manifested in the guise of 'authentic' institutions—to stake claims and govern behavior on extractive frontiers. Drawing on ethnographic evidence from Betsiaka, a rural commune in Madagascar's far north, I show how a gold mining-specific dina has figured in local leaders' struggles against state-corporate interventions; in external actors' strategies of domination; and in intracommunity contests between factions seeking wealth and power in the diggings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The aim of this meta-ethnography was to identify and synthesize qualitative studies focusing on older people's and registered nurses' interpretations of competence in home care. Methods: The meta-ethnography followed the six phases developed by Noblit and Hare (1988). Results: In Phase 6, the translation process of the included studies, three themes were identified: i) temporality--the feeling of being of value; ii) dignity--a person, not just a patient; and iii) mutuality of being--togetherness. A synthesis was developed, and the phrase "a becoming in the meeting" emerged. Conclusion: The sense of becoming includes progress, which means becoming something other than before in relation with others and refers to what constitutes the meeting between the older person and the registered nurse working in home care. Competence originates from becoming in the meeting, and registered nurses should therefore value what they do and hold on to this aspect of caring competence that centres on a caring relationship. It is important for registered nurses working in home care to be able to cultivate a caring relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contemporary public as well as academic discourse on personal law in India has over the years engaged with the issues of its inadequacies, judicialisation and uniformity. This discourse has paid scant attention to the functioning of the law and the complexities of a multicultural nation-state committed to the idea of political secularism. This paper engages with the mahallu system of Malabar and sheds light on how decision-making in Muslim personal law is a process embedded in quotidian micro-politics, sectarian dynamics, social censure and affect. By tracing a triple talaq case in its ethnographic details we show that love (or lack of it), kinship expectations and community authority come together in resolving a conjugal dispute that does not lead to a straight path of legal interpretation but into a labyrinth of micro-politics of local religious factions and authority. The paper shows that the non-state quasi-legal institutions that come under the rubric of the mahallu system comprise of a particular kind of legal pluralism which is complex and replete with multilayered relations of power. This also brings to fore the binary and the play between what is considered to be legal and legitimate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relationship-based practice has become an influential theory through which social work practice is understood. However, much more critical attention needs to be given to the kinds of relationships involved. This paper is based on an ethnographic study of long-term social work that spent 15 months observing practice with service users and organisational life to find out how social workers establish and sustain long-term relationships with children and parents in child protection cases, or don't. The paper introduces into the literature the concept of a 'holding relationship', which was present in several of the cases we studied, especially where therapeutic change occurred. The aims of the paper are to document the nature of a holding relationship and to develop it as a concept. A 'holding relationship' involved social workers being reliable, immersing themselves in the service user's day-to-day existence and developing their life-skills, getting physically and emotionally close to them, and practicing critically by taking account of power and inequalities. The concept of a 'holding relationship' draws on psycho-dynamic and sociological theory to provide new ways of thinking that can help make sense of the practical and emotional relating involved in social work and promote the development of such helpful relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we reflect on the challenges of ethnographic fieldwork in tourism research. Specifically, we discuss the intense, messy and complex dynamics of doing (tourism) ethnographic fieldwork, highlighting how key challenges have affected us as researchers, our practises, relationships and experiences in the field. Our reflections are illustrated considering respectively our research experiences of mountaineering in the Himalayas, walking tourism in China, horse-riding tourism in the UK and volunteer tourism in Peru. Although these fields have very different social and geopolitical contexts, we experienced similar issues. Our most commonly experienced challenges include time limitations, having 'enough data', accessibility to the informants and rapport building. Through the discussion of these challenges, we unpack the often conflicting emotional contours of fieldwork which are commonly experienced but rarely spoken of. With this paper, we seek to open critical debates on the emotional aspects of tourism research which may be particularly useful for novice ethnographers and scholars constrained by the institutionalized pressures of academia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Building on Deleuze and Guattari's theorising of transversality, this paper offers an ethnography of life-with-oil in the city of Esmeraldas, home to Ecuador's largest oil refinery complex and a chokepoint of the country's oil export logistics. The paper elaborates how desires, struggles, and wagers that shape everyday life in the city, which appear peripheral to the formal circulation of oil, are in fact constitutive of how hydrocarbon capital is enacted. Transversal desires move in and out of the logistics of oil flow, sometimes hosting and facilitating, other times choking the dynamics of said flow. I rely on the aesthetics and potentialities of the ethnographic ground to get at the disruptions, ruptures, and shifts through which transversal flows become part of the logistics of oil flow in Esmeraldas, and to remain attentive to what is obscured in master narratives about oil in capitalist systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the help of multi-sited ethnography in Israel and Pakistan, this paper looks at the history of antisemitism in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. I show that while antisemitism is widespread in parts of Pakistani society today, it was not the reason why most of Karachi's Jews left the country in the 1960s or the 1970s. In the paper, I explore possible explanations for the rise of antisemitism in parts of Pakistan's society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing from an ethnographic evaluation of the American violence prevention program Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP), the present paper aims to explore 1) The participating girls' views of classroom culture and sense of safety, and; 2) Strategies for and obstacles to creating a transformative space for conversations about sexualized violence in three schools with young people aged 12–18 in Sweden. The material analysed in this paper consists of transcripts from video observations and field notes from all sessions in three classes and from group and individual interviews with participants. The paper contributes to critical research on violence in a broad sense, including its prevention, and on anti-oppressive education. In conclusion, we stress the importance of competence, commitment and preparing for precarity, when involving young people. Addressing boys and men as allies in violence prevention must be balanced with a critical feminist understanding of the realities of violence, including sensitivity both to the needs of the group and of individual possibly victimized participants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the development and evaluation of the video Observation Tool for Interprofessional Skills (VOTIS). We describe the development of an authentic interprofessional assessment tool that incorporates video reflection and allows formative and summative assessment of individual learners' interprofessional skills within an authentic interprofessional context. We then investigate its validity and reliability. The VOTIS was developed using a modified Delphi technique. The tool was piloted with 61 students and 11 clinical educators who completed the VOTIS following team meetings where students interacted about their interprofessional clinical work. The following were calculated: internal consistency; students' proficiency levels; inter-rater reliability between students and clinical educators; and inter-rater reliability between clinical educators and an independent rater. Results indicate that the VOTIS has acceptable internal consistency and moderate reliability and has value in evaluating students' interprofessional skills. Study outcomes highlight the need for more explicit wording of tool content and instructions and further clinical educator training to increase the utility and reliability of the VOTIS as a learning and assessment tool. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports findings from a longitudinal qualitative study that explored the ethnographic learning processes of 10 modern languages students who spent one full academic year abroad, having first completed successfully an Introduction to Ethnography course in the UK. It begins from the argument that although significant attempts have been made to integrate ethnography into modern languages undergraduate degree programmes, relatively little is known about its actual impact on modern languages sojourners. Drawing on active interviews and reflective diaries that were designed to investigate this impact from shortly before participants embarked on their year abroad to the moment they returned, the thematic and critical discourse analysis of the data focuses attention on two key themes: students' perceptions of their host cultures and the impact of ethnography on students' perceptions. Findings from the first theme reveal that participants' perceptions were derogatory and that they used a number of mitigating discourse strategies to avoid creating a negative impression on the researchers. Findings from the second theme suggest that ethnography made little impact on most participants, given that their derogatory perceptions of the "foreign other" remained almost intact throughout the year abroad. The paper discusses possible reasons for these findings, arguing that the contextual nature of ethnographic inquiry does not always enable modern languages sojourners to dismantle the cultural generalisations they may make. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a theoretically influenced discussion of methodological issues in carrying out ethnographic work at Peartree Academy. Food is central to our sense of identity. It draws on notions of the school restaurant and presents an account of the complexities surrounding the disorderliness of fieldwork in researching children's food space. The aim of this paper is to explore how researcher identity needs to be considered within the relationship between discipline and social learning spaces for eating. Foucault's concept of discipline is introduced in conceptualising the study. Key reflections place emphasis on the messiness of researching such spaces and offer recommendations for navigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article announces that the journal "South Asian Diaspora" is inviting for contributors to contribute articles on its special issue to be published in 2010. It states that the upcoming conference called "At Home in the World: South Asians and the BBC World Service 1932-2008" will be place for the submission of articles. It notes that the guest editors for the said conference will be Marie Gillespie, Sharika Thiranagma, and Gerd Baumann.

Media analysis is an established area of sport sociology and has been a theme for systematic investigation since the mid-1980s. In this paper, we reflect on our research experiences of undertaking a longitudinal study in print media analysis since 1996. Following a collaborative inquiry framework, we combined autoethnographic narrative interwoven with a focus group interview. This paper aims to document our personal and professional experiences of a research group during an extended study and shares some recommendations based on our reflections. Themes of longitudinal challenges, disappointment, and sisterhood as researchers and friends are presented. By exploring our research experiences and, through them, the changes to the research area and processes we hope to illuminate our research journeys for others to critique and understand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to explore the insight that can be brought by Deleuze and Guattari's concept of minor literature with regard to questions of field access within the context of organizational ethnography. This paper draws from an ethnographic account of scientists negotiating access during a field expedition to Fiji. While the scientists could secure access prior to their departure by abiding by the legal dimension of plant collecting in the field, they had to renegotiate access in the field by engaging with different epistemologies, codes and forms of relationality. Positioned as an ethnography of field access, this paper highlights the enmeshment of codes, practices and trajectories in the negotiation of field access and seeks to set the lines of a 'minor politics of access' within the context of organizational ethnography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Practices, positioned through a sociomaterial lens make visible everyday work, often challenging our understanding of practices in consequence. Artists, and the world of contemporary art offer interesting contexts to explore practices through a sociomaterial lens and render visible everyday work important in the accomplishment of art. As such, this paper presents a distinctive sociomaterial exploration of practices that reconfigures our understanding of professional practices and their pedagogies in art. Drawing on theoretical resources of practice and materiality, I present findings from an art-based ethnographic study of conceptual artists that combined art and practice-oriented perspectives to look beyond discipline-based processes of artmaking to practices as they happen. I present these findings first, and innovatively, as a series of photo-collages and then, using words, as mundane practices of looking, studio-making and pause, around which other practices coalesce including peer-support, self-promotion, pedagogy and movement-driven. The photo-collages, visually and literally, reposition artistic practices as those necessary in the accomplishment of everyday work, preserving a relationality sometimes lost in written accounts of sociomaterial practices. The paper thus presents novel and necessary insights into the professional development of artists; methodological insights for relational studies of practices; and questions for professional education broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To provide an overview of the experiences and needs of patients adjusting to life after receiving a diagnosis of secondary progressive multiple sclerosis (SPMS). We conducted a meta-ethnographic synthesis of qualitative studies on the experiences of transition to SPMS, based on a systematic literature search of CINAHL, PsycINFO, Embase, MEDLINE, and Web of Science. Identified studies were quality-appraised using a critical appraisal checklist, and individual findings synthesised inductively. The synthesis included 12 articles with 144 people with SPMS. Adjusting to SPMS transition encompassed a variety of reactions and coping strategies. Successful adjustment was associated with accepting and adapting coping strategies, and availability of social support and relationships. Clinical services increased uncertainty around adjustment where patients felt clinicians were not transparent with them about their changing diagnosis. People adjust to SPMS in different ways, with the success of adjustment influenced by a patient's primary coping mechanism. Coping mechanisms are determined by pre-existing individual differences, alongside engagement with, and quality of, social support networks and activities. Services should ensure that people are provided with informational support about their illness progression, and emotional support concerning coping strategies, social networks, and physical activity, as these are key determinants of successful adjustment. Adjusting to secondary progressive multiple sclerosis is a difficult and stressful time for patients. Coping strategies patients use, their support network and their activity levels are key determinants of successful adjustment. Clinicians should be open with patients about their assessment of their changing diagnosis, rather than trying to avoid upsetting the patient by withholding information. Clinical services should be proactive in supporting patients during adjustment with learning positive coping strategies, and maintaining or increasing social relationships and activity levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This methodological commentary focuses on the use of ethnography for health and rehabilitation practitioners. In recent years, ethnography has become a methodology of choice amongst diagnostic radiography researchers at uncovering phenomena pertinent to the clinical setting. This paper adds to the evidence base by providing not only a methodology account from two experienced researchers, but also offers a paradigmatic approach to ethnography that incorporates qualitative and quantitative approaches. It details an alternate ideological discourse in alignment with the role of a diagnostic radiographer, which can be replicated in other disciplines and thus offering an array of empirical opportunity for prospective health and rehabilitation practitioners. This paper provides an introduction into the use of ethnography for health and rehabilitation practitioners. The authors reflect on the value of ethnography in order to satisfy a researcher's aims and objectives. The authors provide an "umbrella strategy" that can be used by other prospective health and rehabilitation researchers. It is argued here that this methodology offers an alternate strategy of uncovering new ideas and research data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we make a theoretical and methodical case for combining Institutional Ethnography and Reflexive Grounded Theory to investigate linguistic transition processes of newly-arrived students in the German school system. Legitimised by a missing knowledge of German, the students are separated into preparatory classes in order to prepare them (linguistically) for the regular classes. This article develops a reflexive institutional-ethnographic approach that problematises and visualises the various voices and practices of social actors engaged in these transition processes. We elaborate the theoretical premises, methodical steps and procedures of a combined approach which allows to reconstruct the transition moment and its attendant tensions, stakeholder perspectives and embeddedness in wider social processes of migration-related multilingualism. The paper enriches the methodological landscape in language, education and migration studies and offers implications for engaging with educational research sites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper calls for another perspective on cockfight and the symbolism of masculinity. Previous research on cockfighting has its own perspective and interesting findings, one such work on the matter was that of Geertz who focused on the symbolism of cockfighting within the context of Balinese culture. I argue that, as anthropological studies develop a number of anthropological approaches that produce a more holistic ethnography also evolve. One of them is multispecies ethnography. This approach places culture and nature on one equal level of analysis. This research involves Kampung Laut People in Segara Anakan, Indonesia. The data is collected through observation and in-depth interviews through the 'art of noticing' method. The findings of this research show a different perspective in understanding the practice of cockfighting through interspecies collaboration. In terms of scientific contributions, this paper introduces a multispecies ethnographic approach as another approach to understanding the socio-cultural phenomenon of cockfighting and human interactions with non-human species. This perspective complements Geertz's symbolic cultural perspective. In terms of its contribution to humanitarian issues, the holistic multispecies perspective employed within this research advocates for a balanced interrelation between humans and other species in creating a sustainable ecological system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper asks what we can learn from discomfort in virtual reality (VR) beyond perception-altering or consciousness-raising technical affordances. I accomplish this by directing focus upon the everyday VR user and using ethnographic participant observation. I first define a working concept called "discomforting VR" within the context of a corporate marketing scheme, a concept that focuses on unsettling feelings generated by VR experiences. Second, I report on research methods that aim to take a grounded approach toward how to better listen to and feel users in VR. I present two distinct "ethnographic logs," which are a narration from fieldwork in operation, and I argue that VR can best be understood as a technology that hosts significant community. These findings take us beyond understanding VR as a space offering an embodied sense of immersion/interaction. The paper is a contribution to those interested in the study of Social VR. It will serve as a resource to any who wish to think productively about VR as a focal point for contemporary digital life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Parents are the key people in the family when it comes to determining the extent and type of education for their children. Within the theoretical frameworks of African feminisms, human capital theory, and the liminality theory, this paper examines the parental perceptions of the girls' secondary education in Tanzania's rural communities. Moreover, it determines the effects of those perceptions on the girls' secondary schooling in rural Tanzania. Using the ethnographic research design, this qualitative study found that, although some parents perceived girls' secondary education negatively, there were some glimmers of hope and changing attitudes among parents. The findings further indicate that there are tensions and conflicting perspectives, as some of the parents struggled to reconcile emerging beliefs about girls' education with the existing largely conservative cultural and familial practices. This changing perception on the girls' secondary education signals a favourable disposition towards the improvement of girls' secondary schooling, particularly in the largely conservative rural communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a study that investigated how students labelled as having learning disabilities experienced attributions from their teachers and the impacts of the attributions for these students' learning and interactions. The article explores the phenomena from an attribution theoretical lens. Ethnographic case study underpinned the research as it allowed us to fully immerse and to gain in-depth understanding of what was happening in one public school in Indonesia. We undertook interviews and participant observations, involving two students labelled as having disabilities (aged 10–11). The two key themes emerged: (1) the negative way being recognised by others and (2) being learning disabled marks a student as being different. The attributions assigned to students labelled with learning disabilities are circulated in the classroom and have significant effects on how these students perceive view themselves and participate in learning. As a result, the attributions create and shape their self-worth in their classroom communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While marriage is crucial in the preservation of clan alliances, as well as the reinforcing of the wider kinship structure in Somali society, there is very little research that critically engages with marriage as a concept for emancipation. This paper argues that as a minority clan group, members from the Gabooye collective in Somaliland experience inequality due to a lack of access to the resources needed for reaching full participatory parity, such as recognition, redistribution, and representation. By conceptualising a political economy of marriage in Somaliland, the paper uses empirical data from Somaliland to illustrate how marriage, across clan affiliation, is a possible pathway to justice and, therefore, emancipation. This paper concludes that the Gabooye are experiencing socio-economic challenges due to social rules and customs that put restrictions on their ability to marry other clan groups in Somaliland. The ethnographic findings on justice claims and marriage, as a pathway for reconciling with such claims, will add to the scant literature on this topic and it will also stimulate future research on minority clan members in Somaliland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One proposed strategy to overcome labour shortages in male-dominated jobs is to attract female workers. This has been the case for lorry driving in the UK. These efforts, however, often work to reproduce binary gendered stereotypes, or seek to include women without questioning how working conditions and everyday embodied work itself constructs gender roles and difference and is differentially experienced. In this paper, we highlight differentiated lorry driving bodies at work, centring lorries as an essential part of global logistical systems. Empirically drawing from interviews and mobile ethnographies with freight drivers in England, we tell a series of composite stories which uncover gendered ideals of worker-bodies, and embodied experiences of mobilities. With the gendered, embodied life's work of lorry driving remaining largely invisible and poorly understood, we illustrate the complex intersections between places, people, materialities and forms of work. Through this paper, we show how (gendered) narratives and bodily difference are both reproduced and disrupted through lorry driving work. We argue that only through recognising – and destabilising - the gendered re/production of mobile work will other logistical futures be made possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses collaborative ethnographic work investigating multilingualism within education in Botswana, Tanzania, and Zambia. The paper takes a reflective perspective on how research is conducted and the role that multilingualism and collaboration can play in the research process itself. As a team of thirteen individuals, working across four countries, we bring a range of multilingual repertoires to the project. In this paper we discuss three principles which have been important in guiding our thinking and practice. These are: researching multilingually; researching collaboratively; and researching responsively. We discuss the rationale behind these principles and the role they play in our work. We then discuss challenges and successes which have emerged from implementing these principles in practice and use these to outline a framework that those interested in conducting similar work can use to guide their own thinking and practices. The data discussed in this article consist of a corpus of vignettes from members of the project team. Ten vignettes have been collaboratively analysed adopting a thematic analysis. Tasked with reflecting on, and evaluating, the principles the vignette data provide insight into the opportunities and challenges of working multilingually, collaboratively, and responsively within a team with diverse linguistic repertoires. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we critically evaluate the insertion of anthropologists in the field in two locations in central and northern Mozambique, focusing on the negotiation and production of ethnographic data in contexts of uncertainty. The anthropologists entered the field sites of Micaúne and Cóbuè via non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and their existing development projects. During the fieldwork, the researchers developed a relationship of proximity with several participants who positioned the anthropologists as agents of change at the same level as NGO officials. We explore the partnership and negotiation between anthropologists and research participants, reflecting on the challenges of collaboration at a critical time when the economic development of Micaúne and Cóbuè was at stake. This enquiry goes beyond the political or ethical dimension of development to focus on the management of expectations for future change. Neste artigo, analisamos criticamente a inserção de antropólogos no campo em dois locais situados no centro e no norte de Moçambique, respectivamente, com foco na negociação e na produção de dados etnográficos em contextos de incerteza. A inserção dos antropólogos nas localidades de Chinde e Cóbuè se deu através de organizações não governamentais (ONGs) e seus projetos de desenvolvimento em implementação. Durante o trabalho de campo, os pesquisadores desenvolveram uma relação de proximidade com vários interlocutores que colocaram os antropólogos na posição de agentes de mudança no mesmo nível que os funcionários das ONGs. Neste trabalho, exploramos a parceria e a negociação entre antropólogos e seus interlocutores na investigação, refletindo sobre os desafios da colaboração num momento crítico, em que estava em risco o desenvolvimento econômico tanto de Chinde como de Cóbuè. Nossa reflexão vai para além da dimensão política ou ética do desenvolvimento, prestando atenção à gestão de expectativas em relação a futuras mudanças. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is based on the results of an ethnography conducted in the context of several junior high schools in the host community of Iran. It draws on the data collected via observations and forty sessions of in-depth semi-structured interviews with school staff, domestic (Iranian) and refugee (Afghan) students, and their parents. The paper aims to explore the probable impacts of some particular elements on the absorption of refugee students in the host community. These elements included interactions between refugee and domestic students, the role of their parents, and the role of multicultural aspects of pedagogy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2018, the Inter-American Court delivered the first – and so far, only – judgment against Brazil on Indigenous land rights. This leading decision upheld the state's failure to comply with human rights obligations due to the non-removal of non-Indigenous individuals from the territory of the Xukuru people. Such an issue, namely, insecure land tenure affects Indigenous peoples worldwide. The decision's outcome consolidated a critical trend in international law concerning the concept of Indigenous lands: a place where Indigenous peoples have their residence and holistically develop their life, which states must actively protect, according to Article 21 of the American Convention read in conjunction with Article 1.1 and 2 thereof. By analyzing secondary sources (inter alia, ethnographies and court documents), this paper addresses the role of social (or cultural) anthropology regarding expert evidence in the Xukuru land claims. It articulates the Brazilian and Inter-American legal framework on expert evidence and Indigenous land rights with the literature on 'anthropological expertise' and 'cultural expertise', which includes the branches of forensic social anthropology and expert social anthropology. This analysis underscores the evolving challenges concerning expert evidence in legal-administrative procedures on the national and international levels. It argues that cultural anthropologists acting as experts on these levels need different sets of skills, which should be developed through special training. Thus, this paper amplifies the interdisciplinary dialogue between law and social anthropology on the topical issue of human rights adjudication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on ethnography of one family's life with diabetes in a poor settlement in Delhi's suburbs, this paper examines the relationship between emotional structures of care and kinship in the face of chronic illness. While anthropologists have argued for a relational understanding of care and discussed how, in India, modernity and social transformations have resulted in crises of familial care, less attention has been paid to the emotional terrains of care and its difficulties as they unfold in concrete relationships over time. This paper demonstrates how emotional intensities define the possibilities, limits, and ambivalence of kin care for the chronically ill. Described as care without heart, this mode of attention implies a continuation of care labour that maintains kinship ties and holds the possibility of kin futures, but is disinvested emotionally and feels unsatisfactory. The analytic of care without heart expresses a particular mode of care by which persons navigate dominant moral regimes around gendered family responsibilities and imperatives of love in relationships, but without fully subscribing to them. Care without heart at once signifies an inadequate form of care, invokes North Indian normative moral regimes around family care responsibilities and emotions, and acknowledges the shortcomings of these regimes and norms of relatedness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the ‘telling case’ and the manner and extent of its use in social research. The ‘telling case’, proposed by Mitchell as a counter to prevailing expectations of typicality, is an ethnographic case study, derived from analytic induction and focused on the exposure of new theoretical insights. By means of an evaluation of the available literature this paper summarises Mitchell’s construal of the ‘telling case’ before examining how it has been exploited by others. The evidence suggests that while authors acknowledge the source of the ‘telling case’ few offer any substantial acknowledgement of Mitchell’s conceptualisation, indicating that most ‘telling case’ research has employed Mitchell’s name somewhat disingenuously and contributed to the growth of a methodological myth. Moreover, despite its international spread, its origins seem located in the work of a small number of internationally recognised scholars and the mobility of their former graduate students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]