Publication: Etnografías de lo digital: Remediaciones y recursividad del método antropológico
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2018
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Asociación de Antropólogos Iberoamericanos en Red (AIBR)
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Abstract
Los mundos digitales han planteado a lo largo de las últimas dos décadas toda una serie de desafíos metodológicos que, según la descripción habitual, obligan a la etnografía a adaptarse, transformarse o renovarse. En este artículo reformulo la cuestión del encuentro entre la etnografía con lo digital en otros términos, para argumentar que lo que está en juego en el estudio de lo digital no es la manera de proceder en nuestro trabajo de campo, sino la forma adecuada de describir la etnografía en esos encuentros. A partir de tres trabajos de campo donde lo digital se presenta con distintas expresiones, describo cómo mi etnografía sobre medios digitales es re-mediada, y cómo otra etnografía sobre prototipos resulta prototipada. Dos instancias que me llevan a argumentar que, en su encuentro con lo digital, la antropología tiene la posibilidad de re-aprender su método acompañada de otros, y redescribirlo mediante los vocabularios conceptuales que descubre en su encuentro empírico. Llamaré a eso una relación de recursividad metodológica, por la cual el objeto de estudio etnográfico se torna en la fuente para la descripción del método etnográfico. La recursión metodológica evidencia un doble efecto: la incorporación de las prácticas vernáculas como parte del repertorio metodológico del etnógrafo, y la re-descripción de la etnografía a partir del vocabulario conceptual del campo.
Digital worlds have posed anthropologists for the last two decades a whole set of methodological challenges that according to the traditional tale of the field has forced ethnography to adapt, transform or renew. In this paper I reframe this question to argue that the key issue when we study digital worlds is not just how to proceed but how to find the appropriate account to describe ethnography in these particular encounters. Drawing on three of my fieldworks focussed on different expressions of digital cultures, I describe how one of my ethnographies on digital media is re-mediated, and how other ethnography on prototypes is prototyped. Two instances leading me to argue in the encounter with digital worlds anthropology has the opportunity to re-learn its methods in the company of others and re-describe it drawing on the conceptual vocabularies that discovers in its empirical encounters. I will call it a relation of methodological recursivity in which the ethnographic object turns into the source to re-describe the ethnographic method. Methodological recursion evinces a twofold effect: The incorporation of vernacular practices as part of our method, and the re-description of ethnography drawing on the conceptual vocabulary of the field.
Digital worlds have posed anthropologists for the last two decades a whole set of methodological challenges that according to the traditional tale of the field has forced ethnography to adapt, transform or renew. In this paper I reframe this question to argue that the key issue when we study digital worlds is not just how to proceed but how to find the appropriate account to describe ethnography in these particular encounters. Drawing on three of my fieldworks focussed on different expressions of digital cultures, I describe how one of my ethnographies on digital media is re-mediated, and how other ethnography on prototypes is prototyped. Two instances leading me to argue in the encounter with digital worlds anthropology has the opportunity to re-learn its methods in the company of others and re-describe it drawing on the conceptual vocabularies that discovers in its empirical encounters. I will call it a relation of methodological recursivity in which the ethnographic object turns into the source to re-describe the ethnographic method. Methodological recursion evinces a twofold effect: The incorporation of vernacular practices as part of our method, and the re-description of ethnography drawing on the conceptual vocabulary of the field.