The anthropology of storytelling and the storytelling of anthropology
Journal Title: Journal of Comparative Research in Anthropology and Sociology - Year 2014, Vol 5, Issue 2
Abstract
These research notes concern what anthropologists currently do, and can do, with stories. Although pleas for narrative have become increasingly widespread in contemporary anthropology, an anthropologist of storytelling cannot but recognise that all anthropological production is to a certain extent a story. A question ensues: what kind of story is an ethnography? These research notes propose an answer by providing, first, a working definition of story tailored to this specific purpose. Secondly, they propound a brief illustration of the three main thematic interests of the anthropology of storytelling: the relational dynamics between the people involved in the storytelling situation; the content of the story, and the storytelling techniques. Thirdly, these aspects are examined in order to claim that an anthropology of storytelling among contemporary anthropologists is a necessary condition to respond concretely to the above-mentioned plea for narrative.
Authors and Affiliations
Rodolfo Maggio
Collective narrative: the narrative on Croatian language from academic to far-right discourses in Serbia
The paper presents a case of under-represented narrative data which I call “collective narratives”. Drawing upon the concept of group-defining stories, it is argued that these narratives embody an antidote to the ’canoni...
Misunderstanding opportunities: (post-)resettlement issues in the Recea neighbourhood of Alba Iulia
Although its gold mining project has been locked in public debates and permit reviews for over a decade, a Canadian-Romanian company privately negotiated with the inhabitants of Roşia Montană commune, Romania, to buy the...
A time of meta-celebration: Celebrating the sociology of celebration
Editorial
A case of auteur cinema in a changed cultural context: “Funny Games” (1997) and “Funny Games, US” (2007) by Michael Hanek
The article is a case study of a cross-cultural auteur film-remake by Michael Haneke of his earlier film: Funny Games, US (2007) and Funny Games (Austria 1997), that is a part of a PhD project devoted to...
Paratext and meaning-making in indie games
The essay discusses the role of paratext in framing players’ experience of videogames, focusing on the indie game scene and specifically examining three types of paratext: game title, game description, and the readme fil...