Working the Field: Accounts from French Louisiana

(Hardback)

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Description

This book presents accounts of fieldwork conducted in French Louisiana by anthropologists and folklorists between the 1970s and 2000 and looks at the personal, ethical, political, and scientific issues researchers need to confront and resolve when they attempt to explain a modern complex culture by using the traditional tools and methods of anthropology, participant observation, and interviews. The study casts a critical look at the core anthropological concepts of field, informants, and knowledge. In line with the ongoing reassessment of these concepts, it proposes that the field, identities, and knowledge acquired through research are not set, given entities but rather are a matter of construction. It shows how the personal profiles of the researchers (native or outsider, activist or academic, man or woman, black or white) contribute to frame the research. It illustrates the shifting of these identities during and after the research in response to personal, relational, and political circumstances. It also considers the application of the knowledge derived from research in the fields of tourism, cultural activism, and language policy in the context of the cultural renaissance experienced by Cajuns and Creoles over the past decades.

Reviews

[a] thoughtful book that provides a base for understanding the methods used in the study of Louisiana Cajun culture within the wider disciplinary debates in anthropology regarding research process and field methodology....should appeal to all who seek to understand modern Cajun culture....Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above....a very enjoyable and useful book.-Choice
[w]ill be of interest both to people concerned with fieldwork in general and those interested in Louisiana and its cultures, especially the Cajuns. The various authors do a fine job of telling how the fieldwork was done and what a problems existed, and in revealing insights about culture in Louisiana.-Multicultural Review
"a thoughtful book that provides a base for understanding the methods used in the study of Louisiana Cajun culture within the wider disciplinary debates in anthropology regarding research process and field methodology....should appeal to all who seek to understand modern Cajun culture....Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above....a very enjoyable and useful book."-Choice
"will be of interest both to people concerned with fieldwork in general and those interested in Louisiana and its cultures, especially the Cajuns. The various authors do a fine job of telling how the fieldwork was done and what a problems existed, and in revealing insights about culture in Louisiana."-Multicultural Review
"[w]ill be of interest both to people concerned with fieldwork in general and those interested in Louisiana and its cultures, especially the Cajuns. The various authors do a fine job of telling how the fieldwork was done and what a problems existed, and in revealing insights about culture in Louisiana."-Multicultural Review
"[a] thoughtful book that provides a base for understanding the methods used in the study of Louisiana Cajun culture within the wider disciplinary debates in anthropology regarding research process and field methodology....should appeal to all who seek to understand modern Cajun culture....Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above....a very enjoyable and useful book."-Choice

Author Bio

JACQUES HENRY is Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette. SARA LEMENESTREL is on the faculty of the National Center for Scientific Research, Paris, France.