Fieldwork Under Fire is a path-breaking collection of essays written by anthropologists who have experienced the unpredictability and trauma of political violence firsthand. These essays combine theoretical, ethnographic, and methodological points of view to illuminate the processes and solutions that characterize life in dangerous places. They describe the first, often harrowing, experience of violence, the personal and professional problems that arise as troubles escalate, and the often surprising creative strategies people use to survive.
In "writing violence," the authors give voice to all those affected by the conditions of violence: perpetrators as well as victims, civilians and specialists, black marketeers and heroes, jackals and researchers. Focusing on everyday experiences, these essays bring to light the puzzling contradictions of lives disturbed by violence: the simultaneous existence of laughter and suffering, of fear and hope. By doing so, they challenge the narrow conceptualization that associates violence with death and war, arguing that instead it must be considered a dimension of living.
Fieldwork Under Fire Contemporary Studies of Violence and Culture
About the Book
Reviews
"Required reading for anyone about to leave for the field. . . . A timely, deserving, and original contribution to a rapidly growing body of literature on the study of violence."—Jean-Paul Dumont, George Mason UniversityTable of Contents
INTRODUCTION
The Anthropology and Ethnography of Violence and Sociopolitical Conflict
Antonius C. G. M. Robben and Carolyn Nordstrom
PRISONERS OF LOVE
With Genet in the Palestinian Field
Ted Swedenburg
RUMOR
The Beginning of the End
Anna Simons
ACCIDENTAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Witnessing the 1989 Chinese People's Movement
Frank N. Pieke
SEDUCTION AND PERSUASION
The Politics of Truth and Emotion among Victims
and Perpetrators of Violence
Antonius C.G.M. Robben
FEAR
Living in a State of Fear
Linda Green
CREATIVITY AND CHAOS
War on the Front Lines
Carolyn Nordstrom
RAPE ATTACK
Ethnography ofthe Ethnographer
Cathy Winkler, with Penelope] Hanke
COMING HOME
The Croatian War Experience
Maria B. Olujic
FACE
The Anthropologist as Terrorist
Joseba Zulaika
EPILOGUE
Ethnographic States of Emergency
Allen Feldman
ENDPIECES: THE DOING OF
ANTHROPOLOGY
Myrna Mack
Elizabeth Oglesby
Reflections on an Antropologia Comprometida:
Conversations with Ricardo Falla
Beatriz Manz
Reflections on Managing Danger in Fieldwork:
Dangerous Anthropology in Belfast
Jeffrey A. Sluka
CONTRIBUTORS
INDEX