5 research outputs found
Engaging the Religiously Committed Other: Anthropologists and Theologians in Dialogue
Anthropology has two tasks: the scientiïŹc task of studying human beings and the instrumental task of promoting human ïŹourishing. To date, the scientiïŹc task has been constrained by secularism, and the instrumental task by the philosophy and values of liberalism. These constraints have caused religiously based scholarship to be excluded from anthropologyâs discourse, to the detriment of both tasks. The call for papers for the 2009 meetings of the American Anthropological Association (AAA) recognized the need to âpush the ïŹeldâs epistemological and presentational conventionsâ in order to reach anthropologyâs various publics. Religious thought has much to say about the human condition. It can expand the discourse in ways that provide explanatory value as well as moral purpose and hope.We propose an epistemology of witness for dialogue between anthropologists and theologians, and we demonstrate the value added with an example: the problem of violence
Belief-Inclusive Research Does Strategically "Bracketing Out" a Researcher's (Religious) Beliefs and Doubts Limit Access to Ethnographic Data?
This article outlines a methodological posture that I consciously adopted during recent ethnographic fieldwork. I call this methodological posture âbelief-inclusive researchâ (BIR), and I see it as a complementary contrast to existing methodological frameworks that suggest the bracketing out of a researcherâs own beliefs. I offer BIR as a distinctive methodological posture for ethnographers who work in and with religious contexts. I demonstrate that the long-standing tradition of bracketing out questions of metaphysical truth during the writing-up phases of anthropology seems to have also impacted the fieldwork phase. I explore the ways that some degree of shared beliefâwhich, crucially, I do not limit to doctrinal beliefsâbetween researcher and informants has the potential to widen a researcherâs access to certain types of data. In highlighting that the long-standing practice of bracketing has limited a researcherâs access to some kinds of data and in offering BIR as a new methodological posture, this article lays the groundwork for anthropology to construct new conceptual spaces that actively encourage a researcher to include their own (religious) beliefs and doubts in the midst of fieldwork
Belief-Inclusive Research Does Strategically Bracketing Out a Researcher's (Religious) Beliefs and Doubts Limit Access to Ethnographic Data?
This article outlines a methodological posture that I consciously adopted during recent ethnographic fieldwork. I call this methodological posture belief-inclusive research (BIR), and I see it as a complementary contrast to existing methodological frameworks that suggest the bracketing out of a researcher's own beliefs. I offer BIR as a distinctive methodological posture for ethnographers who work in and with religious contexts. I demonstrate that the long-standing tradition of bracketing out questions of metaphysical truth during the writing-up phases of anthropology seems to have also impacted the fieldwork phase. I explore the ways that some degree of shared belief-which, crucially, I do not limit to doctrinal beliefs-between researcher and informants has the potential to widen a researcher's access to certain types of data. In highlighting that the long-standing practice of bracketing has limited a researcher's access to some kinds of data and in offering BIR as a new methodological posture, this article lays the groundwork for anthropology to construct new conceptual spaces that actively encourage a researcher to include their own (religious) beliefs and doubts in the midst of fieldwork