Activist anthropology as a cultivating of participant observation.

Abstract

The text describes a consideration of activist anthropology, which I treat as an extension of participant observation. It stems from and builds upon the methodological eclecticism of anthropology/ ethnology. For me, activist anthropology is the closest to the original premise of participant observation because in this view the researcher’s participation is possibly closest to that of the research partners. I present the theoretical foundations on which it is based and the circumstances of my research-activist practice in which my interpretation of it was developed. I demonstrate in the text its features that reinforce the need to distinguish the term activist anthropology as a specific practice of participatory observation and anthropology itself.

Keywords

• activist anthropology
• ethnography
• participant observation
• activism
• field research
• method