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Chapter 10 Technology and the end of ethnography

New Frontiers in Ethnography

ISBN: 978-1-84950-942-8, eISBN: 978-1-84950-943-5

Publication date: 21 December 2010

Abstract

To begin, therefore by establishing certain parameters to both delimit and evoke the discussion, one might first note before side-stepping the well-recognised ethical issues that announce themselves within these early ethnological texts (see for instance Hsu, 1979). The ‘pith-helmet’ terminology and exoticised intentionality, borne with such unselfconscious assurance, can in fact serve to effect complacency on the part of the contemporary ethnographer – were they to believe that one could completely escape such tendencies. In fact, Western thought has always displayed just these acquisitive geometries in its surveying, arraying and apprehending of the world.1 Obviously, therefore, this is not to criticise in a naive or petulant manner a fundamental comportment of the Western intellectual tradition, which clearly structures this and every enquiry couched within its terrain. Nor is it to suggest that certain keywords (‘colonialism’ for example) might somehow name this tendency without repeating its form, or that earnest mantras concerning ‘emancipation’ or ‘respect for alterity’ immediately authorise its continuation. For one to deal responsibly with the ensuing philosophical and ethical motifs would require a measured and careful analysis beyond the remit of the present discussion. Nonetheless, the basic geometry of this disposition is assumed for ethnography in the analysis that follows. Ethnography, that is to say, is actively oriented towards an object, here referred to variously as ‘lived experience’ or ethnos, and is always to some measure engaged in the apprehension and transmission of that object.

Citation

Love, K. (2010), "Chapter 10 Technology and the end of ethnography", Hillyard, S. (Ed.) New Frontiers in Ethnography (Studies in Qualitative Methodology, Vol. 11), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 177-195. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1042-3192(2010)0000011013

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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