Roundtable

Reviewed by: Society for Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology

Of interest to: Practicing and Applied Anthropologists, Students, Those Involved in Mentoring Activities

Primary Theme: Ethics

Secondary Theme: Identity and Equity

(3-0145) Participatory Research and Ethics in Mesoamerican Fieldwork

The places where we situate our research are as important to the research as the people with whom we work. Our field sites are communities, cities, marketplaces, and forests, and are imbued with nuanced social and political meanings. This is true in many places, however Mesoamerica represents a unique scenario because of the cultural and historic diversity in a compact space. Join a conversation with scholars from the US, Great Britain, Mexico and Guatemala at all career stages about field research in Mexico and Guatemala, including such topics as methods, ethics, participatory research, current topics, challenges, and new perspectives, as well as the unique aspects of conducting ethnographic research in Mexico and Guatemala.

Mesoamerica represents a key site for which to discuss the complexities of ethnographic research. Because of the regions’ cultural and historic diversity in a compact space, anthropologists and Mesoamerican collaborators are in close, regular contact across different projects. The places where we situate our research are as important to the research as the people with whom we work. How we conceive of our research, do it, and then disseminate what we learn is frequently done in a space of multiple ethnographers, collaborators, and others in and outside of academia.

Our field sites—communities, cities, marketplaces, and forests—are imbued with nuanced social and political meanings, like many places, that pose numerous challenges for ethnographers, because of the regions’ linguistic and cultural diversity and historical legacies of colonialism but, also, anthropological. Early ethnographers, like Ruth Bunzl, Maude Oakes, Robert Redfield, and Sol Tax provide us with early example of collaborative, participatory research that are often overlooked today. Some even helped launch the anthropological professions of their Guatemalan and Mexican collaborators. The participants in this roundtable will reflect on the current conditions of research in Mesoamerican with these legacies in mind. They will offer suggestions for how they surmounted the dilemmas they encountered in their field sites and successfully conducted research.

Join a conversation with scholars from the US, Great Britain, Mexico and Guatemala at all career stages about field research in Oaxaca, Yucatan, Valley of Mexico, and Guatemala, including such topics as methods, ethics, participatory research, current topics, challenges, and new perspectives, as well as the unique aspects of conducting ethnographic research in Mexico and Guatemala.

Organizer(s)

• Martha Rees

  Agnes Scott College

Chair(s)

• Walter Little

  Professor
  University at Albany, SUNY

Presenter(s)

• Rachel Hall-Clifford

  Assistant Professor
  Agnes Scott College

• Sarah Taylor

  California State University, Dominguez Hills

• Matthew Lebrato

  Indiana University

• Catherine Whittaker

  Guest lecturer
  University of Edinburgh

Discussant(s)

• Gabriela Vargas-Cetina

  Professor
  Autonomous University of Yucatan