ethnography

What happens when the field is not entirely foreign but you might be? Dispatches from the Field

Psychologist, Surveyor, Journalist, Historian?: The Illegibility of Anthropology in the Field

Inquiries about an anthropologist’s purpose reveal a lot about why anthropology remains illegible to people working for the welfare of Muslims in Hyderabad, India. This blog post reflects on a common question asked by my interlocutors over different ethnographic settings: “What do anthropologists even do?”

From buckwheat to white rice: transforming food systems and multispecies relations in rural Bhutan

Elena Neri, a visiting PhD fellow at Leiden University, explains her research on transforming food systems, multispecies relations, and more-than-human health in a community of rural villages in western Bhutan, where she carried out fieldwork between March 2024 and March 2025.

Why do the Dutch never get tired of everyday sandwiches, the boterham?

At lunchtime on university campus one thing stands out: the boterham (sandwich). Coming from Japan’s elaborate bento culture, I was puzzled that so many students eat the same thin sandwich every day. I kept wondering, "Don’t they ever get tired of it?". This blog is a brief participant observation of that daily ritual.

"We are the ones who marry our husbands."

Paying attention to gender relations in north-eastern Gabon leads to an emphasis on ethnography's propensity to provide access to the ‘minor mode of reality’: what flaws, signs of change or everyday resistance reveal a different perspective on gender relations in the country?

Communicative Possibilities: Reflections on the Ethnographic Interview

In social scientific projects, methodology and ethics are inextricably linked. In this blog post, I explore how the ethnographic interview contains possibilities for both connection and rupture with interlocutors via reflecting on my own fieldwork.

Diversity

“Dance, Sister! Dance!” New Ways of Doing Ethnography in the City

“Dance, sister! Dance!” Dina is prodding my side, encouraging me to stand up and dance. “My friend is asking you to dance!” She points at her smartphone, which is videotaping us. The word ‘live’ shows that we are broadcasting live on Facebook.

Diversity

Learning and Belonging in Ladies-Only Kickboxing

Kickboxing has been promoted to young Muslim and Moroccan-Dutch women as a tool for empowerment. How can we understand their participation in sports? How are their practices influenced by dominant discourses, policies, and media on the female Muslim body?

Diversity

Provisioning Activism

An increasing body of literature identifies and compares various strategies for alternative provisioning, namely procuring food and other goods and services in a consciously oriented way. Why is this anthropologically interesting?