Abstract

CASTRO NEIRA, Yerko. Anthropology, violence, and fieldwork the ethnographic turn in a Mexico in crisis. Alteridades [online]. 2021, vol.31, n.62, pp.71-84.  Epub Feb 21, 2022. ISSN 2448-850X.  https://doi.org/10.24275/uam/izt/dcsh/alteridades/2021v31n62/castro.

The objective of this article is to analyze the changes that have occurred in ethnographic fieldwork as a result of the multiple forms of violence that have increased and expanded in Mexico in the last twenty years. With the use of diverse documentary and theoretical sources, the author combines his experience as a graduate thesis director to trace an autoethnographic reflection that leads him to question the role of ethnographers in the face of the whole situation. The article offers, in this sense, a balance of the affectations to ethnographic fieldwork in the context of violence as well as the strategies elaborated to face it. Given that it is not possible to cancel fieldwork and that it is fundamental to document what is happening, the article ends by proposing to strengthen collective work and collaboration in the field, promoting creativity and self-care.

Keywords : ethnographic turn; anthropology; ethnography; field work and violence.