Keywords:
knowledge production, methodology, normativity, positionality
Abstract:
The call invites for an analysis of concomitant shifts in knowledge and practice of anthropology. In that mode, the consequences resulting from privileges and restrictions can be assessed. While the Lonely Hero pattern (Gottlieb 1995) of field research has passed its zenith after 100 years and collaborative knowledge production among peers or in training situations has become more common in the field, the reverse question of the family ties of individual research personalities in the field has still been little addressed. Not only, but especially in the so-called post-doc phase, fewer and fewer researchers are "alone" in the field. Although there are isolated, reflective reports on the dynamics of family situations in the field (Cassell 1987; Braukmann et al. 2020), a more comparative analysis of the connection between family and field-specific embedding is still lacking. The silence about the roles of the various 'accompanying persons' (researching or non-researching partners, children, ...) in the process of ethnological knowledge generation presents itself as a missed opportunity for the reflexive generation of empirical knowledge in view of the local differences in normative concepts of family life. The "relational self" of the researcher ultimately formulates the "doings and undoings" of anthropology. The panel invites contributions with fresh empirical data on the above-mentioned topics. We are particularly interested in the following topics: - Accompanied fieldwork - Shared knowledge production (with reference to family) - Normativity of the researcher and accompanying individuals - Positionality in the field - Care-work in the field - Ethical questions (with reference to family and shared knowledge production) - Questions of embodiment