The Work of Anthropologists

Ziegler-Otero and other anthropologists gather information directly from the culture in which they study. Field research involves participant observation. Cultural anthropologists travel to the community they wish to study and become an active member in the culture. Long-term participation involves dedication and sometimes culture shock. Culture shock is a feeling of alienation and unrootedness in a place where the people around you do not share the same basic assumptions of life. Anthropologists must be sure to follow certain ethics when outside their own culture. They have to be careful never to put their research subjects in harm, not to interfere in their society, and not to use the information they have obtained against the culture, for example, selling information to a rival government.

Anthropologists pick the group they want to study and engage in extensive analysis of the culture previous to field research. In order to perform field research, the anthropologists must write out a proposal of their intentions. With the proper funding, the anthropologist travels to their destination.

Field work begins with integration. The anthropologist must intermingle with the community for some time before ethnographic research can begin. This is called participant observation. Joining in community activities helps in learning their ways of life. Keeping a journal is important for participant observation. Once they have a sense of coalescence, the anthropologist can begin their ethnographic research. Ethnography is a style of writing that anthropologists use to collect qualitative and quantitative data. These types of data are culturally specific to research subjects. Ethnographers keep track of personal observation avoiding criticism. Nigel Nicholson, in Article 13 of the ‘08-’09 Annual Editions, said “anthropologists are wise to be cautious of the gloss that is given to accounts of everyday life given by people flattered by the unusual attention of ethnographic inquiry.” Ethnographers must have an objective view of the information they record.

Another thing that ethnographers do is gather information through survey. They cannot do experiments but they can census the community. Nicholson notes “an interview schedule differs from a standard questionnaire in that the ethnographer talks directly, face to face, with informants, ask the questions, and writes down the answers…Questionnaire procedures…tend to be more indirect and impersonal. Anthropologists haven’t usually worked where most people are literate, so we have to record the answers ourselves.” He also states that typically ethnographers encounter many real-world obstacles in their observation, such as linguistic barriers (Nicholson).

Anthropologists, like any other discipline involving research, use other anthropologists’ research methods to aid in their own. Conrad Kottak notes his aspirations to Bronislaw Malinowski’s methods in his article in the ‘08-’09 Annual Editions. “I wanted to do things that Malinowski describes as the ethnographer’s work…especially to census the village.” Anthropologists also want to further the information of humanity in our world. Extensive research on a community that has already been studied requires review of the previous research. Anthropologists, as a community, work together, though separate, to gain access to global human information.

Anthropology is an important discipline because it gains access to information that a person would not have without their own personal participant observation. Anthropology also studies evolution of culture and globalization which is very important for new generations to understand. “Organizational life [faces] a future challenge of how to reverse the escalating growth expectations that market capitalism creates…for the imperative of globalization is moving us inexorably in the opposite direction” (Nicholson). Anthropology gathers information about globalization and culture to help improve future globalization. It is important for an understanding of how culture works before it can change.