Activating transrelational ethnography. Interweaves of the field in the process of energy transition

Abstract

The article presents one of the strands of empirical research on the energy transition process conducted by an anthropologist in Upper Lusatia, in the Bogatynia municipality, in the area around the Turów mining and power complex. The perspective of transrelational ethnography makes it possible to weave together the various elements of this process and look at its changing environmental/economic, political and socio-cultural conditions. The text shows some of the many interweaves uncovered in the field, in the decarbonisation process, seen in the perspective of transrelational ethnography. It focuses on the ambiguities in the worlds of the region’s residents as brought to light in the study. The author draws attention to epistemological traps, such as the category of conflict, that await the anthropologist in a field that faces an uncertain post-coal future. Also, the author stresses the lack of preparedness of the volatile, conceptually unclosed field and its unstable, complex, assemblage architecture.

Keywords

• assemblage
• anthropology of energy
• transrelational ethnography
• multi-site ethnography
• energy transition
• Turów mining and energy complex