Nino Bariola Gonzales Friday, Dec 13th, 2024, 5:00 – 6:00 pm, Room 330- Ethnography Lab Boardroom What stories can food recipes and cookbooks tell us about racial hierarchies and nation-building? In the last few decades, historians, anthropologists, and cultural theorists started using cookbooks to reconstruct the histories of beliefs and debates about gender roles, class … Continue reading
On October 10, 2024, a design workshop led by Koray Caliskan will explore how social scientists can utilize design to understand economic dynamics within organizations, focusing on Google’s search engine as a case study. The workshop aims to empower participants in design, emphasizing the relevance of social theory in economic design. Continue reading
n the summer of 2012, when the war between the Kurdish guerrillas and the Turkish army reached a crescendo, I started my ethnographic research in Gever (Yüksekova in Turkish), a Kurdish border town in the southeastern tip of Turkey. As I was spending my first days with my family and friends and slowly getting ready to embark on my first extensive fieldwork, the town was shaken up by the news that the Turkish helicopters, fighter jets, and artilleries were pounding the mountainous terrain in the neighbouring town of Şemzînan, located just 50 kilometres to the southeast of Gever. Everyone in the town was sure that Gever would be the next battleground. Conducting ethnographic research under these conditions as a native anthropologist was a considerable risk for me, my interlocutors, and my family and friends. Instead of immediately “writing down” or digitally recording my fieldwork data, I turned to the Kurdish oral tradition and devised storytelling as the primary mechanism to tell and retell the stories I collected during my research. Postponing the process of “writing down” was a tactic I developed during my fieldwork as I learned how local Kurds used waiting as a distinct temporal orientation to evade state control, organize political action, and navigate highly militarized borderlands. By elaborating on the methodological tactics I developed by combining Kurdish oral tradition with the everyday strategies of my research participants, namely waiting, this paper will offer some practical advice to researchers on developing flexible research designs and learning from their research participants how to navigate repressive or militarized settings. Continue reading
The City of Toronto History Museums are working to diversify the stories they present. Students in ANT465: Ethnographic Practicum – Toronto Tours conducted research to explore visitor experiences and perceptions of diversity at the Spadina Museum and Fort York National Historic Site. The research findings will be shared on September 6, 2024. Continue reading
Ethnography Lab Speaker Series 2018-2019 While the ethnographic method is conventionally understood as a combination of fieldwork, participant observation, notetaking, and textual analysis, the speakers in this series reflect on their practice and commitment to alternative ethnographic methods such as videography, performance art, map-making, sonography, and poetry. There is a long history of experimental ethnographic … Continue reading
The Ethnography Lab would like to announce an upcoming talk by Dr. Jerry Flores, Assistant Professor in Sociology at the University of Toronto. The talk, entitled Video Ethnography and Policing Mental Health in the US, will be held on Wednesday, October 17th, from 6:00-8:00 pm in the Ethnography Lab, Room 330, Department of Anthropology, 19 … Continue reading
For the 2017/2018 academic year, the Ethnography Lab is excited to present Methodological Extensions, a series of panel presentations exploring non-traditional methods or sites of ethnographic research. The series consists of four separate panel discussions, each presenting the work of faculty members, graduate and undergraduate students, who are working either collaboratively or independently, with specific … Continue reading
The Urban Ethnography Lab is holding a workshop about experimental ethnographic methods for urban research on August 29 – 30, 2017 in Toronto. Apply to attend by sending a CV and statement of motivation! Continue reading
The Ethnography Lab in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto will be running a week-long anthropology program for high-school students interested in culture, social change, and history. Students from local high-schools will have a chance to explore Kensington Market’s history as one of Canada’s most celebrated multicultural neighborhoods. As they learn about … Continue reading
You are invited to a graduate student workshop on Friday May 5th in the Department of Anthropology, room 246 from 10:00 – 5:30 pm. Please find the Workshop Poster and the Workshop Agenda here. Continue reading
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