Ethnography for action – can we go from planning by external specialists to co-creating our communities? Experience from anthropology and ethnographic fieldwork. Helga Ögmundardóttir University of Iceland, Faculty of Human and Social Sciences, Reykjavík, Iceland helgaog@hi.is Qualitative research, such as has long been practiced by anthropologists and many other so-cial scientists, is based on close interaction between researcher and the ones researched. Not only that; it is based on trust, mutual interest in sharing information, ideas and values, con-scious consent and general interest in the human condition, locally experienced and ex-pressed, but understood and evaluated in a wider context, even a global one. That said, it has of course gone through historical changes as the methods of all other disciplines, even trans-formation, not least since the middle of last century, when the innocence of the grand enter-prise of human progress and development was revealed as wrought with power-struggles, in-terest agendas and other not-so-noble processes and forces. With a changing view of what society is about and where they are going with their research, anthropologists and other social scientists realised that their methods, theories, and not least, products in the form of texts had to be re-evaluated and their potential uses and abuses ac-knowledged. One could at least try to prevent the negative effects of one’s research-findings, on the marginalised and powerless, by starting out with a transparent agenda, laid out for the subjects of the research to judge, if they wanted to be in or not, and what they would gain out of it, if anything at all. Empowerment and agency became buzzwords and the researcher was to do the science as much for the natives’ enhancement as his or her own career. Critical the-ory and later postmodernism took over the stage from positivism and interpretive social sci-ence in social scientific research, not least with the aid of feminist theory and other ap-proaches, critical of research being just one more layer of oppression from the colonial establishment, patriarchy and ruling classes. Ethnography for action or whatever else potentially empowering social research is called; ac-tion research, co-research, etc., belongs to a wide scale of methodological approaches where one is always conscious of the potential uses and effects of one’s findings, where research in the form of fieldwork is itself a transformative process, and where one of the premises of the enterprise itself is to remember that knowledge is never value-free but a historically produced and situational tool for whoever to use. So, if one wants to make a change, one can very well begin by lending a hand in communities where change is needed, in a way that the inhabitants will benefit the most. I have been involved in several research projects through the years which have been more or less empowering for the people under scrutiny, at least pers

1. Ethnography for action
Talk given at the TU1204 MC/WG meeting in Glasgow March 23rd 2015
Helga Ögmundardóttir
Anthropologist
Faculty of social and human sciences
University of Iceland
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2. My agenda today:
• A little bit about me and why I‘m here...
• A little about the historical context of qualitative fieldwork as a
platform of co-research
• Anthropological participant observation and ethnography: mutual
involvment built on trust and willingness to give
• My experience of qualitative fieldwork the last 15 years or so...
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3. I
• Icelandic, live in Reykjavík, lecturer/assistant professor in
anthropology at the University of Iceland, studied in Sweden and
Denmark, PhD from Uppsala Univ., a dozen of research projects of
varied lenght on different topics, all based on qualitative
fieldwork/participant observation/interviews /document analysis, etc.
• Mark Dyer invited me here – thanks to him and all of you for being
willing to listen and I hope we‘ll have a fruitful discussion today!
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4. Historical context
• Change of focus and methods in social sciences and
humanities from positivism to critical perspectives on
the role of research and the scientist-society
relationship: who do we serve, what is our agenda,
what right do we have to probe people‘s lives?
• From research ON to research WITH: co-research
• See also my Abstract
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5. Anthropology and ethnography
• Anthropology, as an academic discipline, grew out of colonialism:
know the natives =˃ better control
• Emic view, thick description, small scale focus, empathy, participation in
people‘s lives for extended periods, sharing of space and information, stand
up for the weak and marginalised, understand the human condition
everywhere, what unites people instead of what divides them,
transparency, trust, responsibility, activism, empowerment, objectivity is
dead, funding, multiple voices, text production: for whom, by whom?, study
on people becomes study with people ...
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6. My fieldwork (1)
• My first lesson about the power of fieldwork:
• Icelandic-indigenous relations in Manitoba and North-
Dakota in the late 19th and early 20th c.: ongoing
processes and politics today – what is an entertaining
story in one place is the hard fact of life in another;
multiple voices, telling the stories, etc.
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7. My fieldwork (2)
• Alternative vehicles in Reykjavík – hybrid cars and
their owners – how novelties are introduced /come
about, and are mainstreamed in communities:
connections already out there, processes ongoing; a
researcher can for instance concretise, encourage,
and document and thus help to make a change
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8. My fieldwork (3)
• CONVERGE – Greenschools in the Reykjavík-
area – pioneers, leaders and visionaries and
the power of youth in making a change: nourish
the grassroot, listen to leaders and visionaries,
bring them into the spotlight so that they‘re
acknowledged for their work
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9. My fieldwork (4)
• Invasive species in Iceland – Stykkishólmur
municipality in western Iceland: the social, political
and cultural prerequisits and impacts of getting rid of
alien plants which spread because of climate change
effects (rising temperature)
• Creating and recreating ties between specialists, local
authorities, and the public
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10. My fieldwork (5)
• The shepherds of Þjórsárver - my PhD research
• Local resistance to development projects of the nation-state:
fieldwork for 5 years among farmers in southern Iceland
who‘ve been resisting the dam-building Norðlingaölduveita in
their community‘s highland commons for over 40 years
• Contribution to local empowerment, part of a democratic
process of environmental decision-making, life-long
friendships, strengthen the rural-urban ties, role of ENGOs ...
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11. My fieldwork (6)
• NordStar: fieldwork in 4 Nordic communities: Reykjavík, Trondheim,
Sønderborg and Växjö
• Emission and energy-use reduction: the importance of extended
participation, revisiting, follow-up, feedback to participants, view from
within, personal involvement, unexpected networking across spaces;
tying the unconventional and contextualising local realities
• “Societal outreach” is not something you do isolated from research,
but should be a fundamental part of the project, apathy towards the
impacts of the scientists, but the agenda has to be set from the start…
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12. While in the field...
• A local perspective, local effects, local understanding
• A comprehensive group, for the fieldworker, for the members: identities, roles,
connections, expectations
• Processes already going on: “grab the goose”!
• Connections already made and new ones constantly in the making and to be
made
• Work with what‘s going on rather than try to create new phenomena, but when
new ones are, they better be in line with the local culture
• Responsibility, trust, negotiations, clear roles, “I scratch your back, you scratch
mine“, transparent agenda and positioning, creative interactions, facilitate instead
of force or command, no one is “right“ or knows better…
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13. Some texts/bibliography
• Crate, S. and M. Nuttall (eds.). 2009. Anthropology and Climate Change. From
Encounters to Action. Left Coast Press, USA.
• Dove, M.R. (ed.). 2014. The Anthropology of Climate Change. An Historical
Reader. Wiley Blackwell, UK.
• Hennink, M., I. Hutter and A. Bailey. 2011. Qualitative Research Methods. Sage,
UK.
• Jackson, M. 2005. Existential Anthropology. Events, Exigencies and Effects.
Berghahn Books, Canada.
• Jackson, M. 1995. At Home in the World. Duke University Press, USA.
• THANK YOU!
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