Far away, so close: Some notes on participant observation during fieldwork in Nepal and England

Authors

  • Michael Wilmore UCL

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22582/am.v3i1.140

Abstract

Participant observation has been the subject of intense debate amongst anthropologists in recent years, but it continues to be the methodological foundation of research within our discipline. Little thought has been given, however, to the extent to which a researcher’s participation in a social milieu can be properly assessed. I examine this issue in the light of two periods of participatory research in contrasting social environments, that of academic archaeology in the UK and a rapidly modernising, urban community in Nepal. I argue that participation is not simply a matter of ‘acting like’ or ‘doing things like’ people of another society. Instead, a researcher’s participation is a concomitant of his or her own changing socio-political position, and must be compared with the diversity of subject positions within the host society if the character of this participation is to be properly understood.

Author Biography

Michael Wilmore, UCL

Mike Wilmore holds degrees in archaeology and social anthropology. He is currently writing a PhD thesis about Nepalese media. He is an external student of the University of London, and will have a paper based on his research into archaeological fieldwork practice published in the coming year. He teaches at University College London and with the Open University.

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