Are reports of the death of conventional fieldwork in anthropology greatly exaggerated? This book takes a critical look at the latest developments and key issues in fieldwork. The nature of 'locality' itself is problematic for both research subjects and fieldworkers, on the grounds that it must now be maintained and represented in relation to widening (and fragmenting) social frames and networks.



Such developments have raised questions concerning the nature of ethnographic presence and scales of comparison. From the social space of a cybercafe to cities in India, the UK and South Africa among others, this book features a wide range of ethnographic studies that provide new ways of looking at the concepts of 'locality' and 'site'. It shows that rather than taking key fieldwork processes such as globalization and mobility for granted, anthropologists are well-placed to examine and critique the totalizing assumptions behind these notions.

About the editors

Simon Coleman is Professor of Anthropology, University of Sussex.

Peter Collins is Senior Lecturer in Anthropology, University of Durham.

Contents

* Introduction: 'Being…Where?' Performing Fields on Shifting Grounds

Simon Coleman, University of Sussex, and Peter Collins, University of Durham



* Studying Down, Up, Sideways, Through, Backwards, Forwards, Away and at Home: Reflections on the Field Worries of an Expansive Discipline

Ulf Hannerz, University of Stockholm



* Beyond the Verandah: Fieldwork, Locality and the Production of Knowledge in a South African City

Leslie Bank, Rhodes University



* Fieldwork on Foot: Perceiving, Routing, Socializing

Jo Lee and Time Ingold



* Rendering and Gendering Mobile Subjects in a Globalized World of Mountaineering: Between Localizing Ethnography and Global Spaces

Susan Frohlick, University of Manitoba



* Post-Diasporic Indian Communities: A New Generation

Anjoom Mukadam, Lancaster University, Centre for Excellence in Leadership, and Sharmina Mawani, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London



* The Internet, Cybercafes and the New Social Spaces of Bangalorean Youth

Nicholas Nisbett, University of Sussex



* Out of Proportion? Anthropological Description of Power, Regeneration and Scale on the Rai Coast pf Papua New Guinea

James Leach, Cambridge University



* Far from the Trobriands? Biography as Field

Sigridur Duna Kristmundsdottir, University of Iceland



* Diaspora, Cosmopolis, Global Refuge: Three Voices of the Supranational City

Nigel Rapport, Concordia University of Montreal