Reading: Rabinow, Reflections on Fieldwork in Morocco
Geertz, "Deep Play"

1) How did each of these anthropologists become a kind of "insider" within the societies they studied? How would their methods compare with Rappaport's, Malinowski's, Kondo's, or Mead's?

2) How does Rabinow describe his relationship with his informants? What role do issues of power, conflict, and interpretation play in these relationships?

3) Geertz describes the cockfight as "... a Balinese reading of Balinese experience, a story they tell about themselves" (448). What are the Balinese saying about themselves? Do you agree with Geertz's interpretation of these cultural facts?

4) Geertz states: "The culture of a people is an ensemble of texts, themselves ensembles, which the anthropologist strains to read over the shoulders of those to whom they properly belong" (452). Would Rabinow agree with this? Why or why not?

 

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