essay

The tribulations of fieldwork

Encounter and experience; personal accounts of fieldworkHonoluluPublished In 1975 • Pages: 99-113

By: Béteille, André Marie.

AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
After a few introductory pages on general problems of fieldwork encountered by social scientists in doing ethnographic studies, the author turns to those that he specifically met and dealt with in his study of the community of Sripuram, in Tanjore District. Béteille's personal account relates to his choice of the village itself, the decision where to live in the village (i.e., in the Brahman area of the Harijan section of the community, or in a relatively neutral caste area in between), informant selection, and general relations with the village inhabitants as a whole. The document is unique in this collection in being one of the very few which makes the author's methodology the primary subject of discussion.
SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
Theoretical orientation in research and its results
Observation in research
Purification and atonement
Castes
Social relationships and groups
Tillage
cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
Tamil
HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
2009
RegionThe area the document pertains to
Asia
Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
South Asia
Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
essay
Evaluation
Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
Sociologist
Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
5: Excellent Primary Data
AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
John Beierle ; 1983
Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
1961-1962
Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
1961-1962
Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
community of Sripuram, Tanjore District, India
NotesAdditional notes
By André Béteille
Includes bibliographical references (p. 113)
LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
75902105
LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
Tamil (Indic people)