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The vulnerable observer : anthropology that breaks your heart
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The vulnerable observer : anthropology that breaks your heart

Author: Ruth Behar
Publisher: Boston : Beacon Press, ©1996.
Edition/Format:   Book : EnglishView all editions and formats
Summary:
In classical anthropology, subjects of study are seen as vulnerable while their observers are instructed to remain detached and objective. Yet with the emergence during the last decade of a group of anthropologists with recognizable connections to the cultures in which they work, the lines between participant and observer, insider and outsider are no longer so easily drawn. In The Vulnerable Observer, the  Read more...
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Details

Additional Physical Format: Online version:
Behar, Ruth, 1956-
Vulnerable observer.
Boston : Beacon Press, c1996
(OCoLC)656448134
Document Type: Book
All Authors / Contributors: Ruth Behar
ISBN: 0807046302 9780807046302 9780807046319 0807046310
OCLC Number: 34476409
Description: xii, 195 p. ; 21 cm.
Contents: The vulnerable observer --
Death and memory: from Santa María del Monte to Miami Beach --
My Mexican friend Marta who lives across the border from me in Detroit --
The girl in the cast --
Going to Cuba: writing ethnography of diaspora, return, and despair --
Anthropology that breaks your heart.
Responsibility: Ruth Behar.
Local System Bib Number:
422994

Abstract:

In classical anthropology, subjects of study are seen as vulnerable while their observers are instructed to remain detached and objective. Yet with the emergence during the last decade of a group of anthropologists with recognizable connections to the cultures in which they work, the lines between participant and observer, insider and outsider are no longer so easily drawn. In The Vulnerable Observer, the award-winning anthropologist Ruth Behar offers a new theory and practice for this humanistic anthropology. No longer looking over others' shoulders, she becomes one of the subjects of study as she reflects upon the observer as well as the observed. Eloquently interweaving ethnography and memoir, Ruth Behar reflects on fieldwork in Spain, Cuba, and the United States through her personal stories of loss as a young Cuban Jewish immigrant. Beginning with a poignant essay exploring the refuge she found in her fieldwork as her grandfather died, she proposes an anthropology that is lived and written in a personal voice in the hope that it will lead us toward greater depth of understanding and feeling for those about whom we write.
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