MEDIADAS PREVENTIVAS Y CORRECTORAS Fase de construcción.

What are the conventions of ethnography and oral history and how have these influenced my study? A common characteristic of both ethnography and oral history is the value they ascribe to documenting and preserving the voices, lives, and

cultures of people who might otherwise not be represented in more conventional historical documents, studies, and memoirs (Di Leonardo 1987: 3-4). To do this, researchers working in both disciplinary fields gather data from oral sources by engaging in close face-to-face encounters and interviews with numbers of people. From this common base, conventions for anthropology and oral history diverge in several ways, and these ways were usefully explored from an anthropologist‟s perspective by Micaela di Leonardo in a review of oral history as an ethnographic encounter (Di Leonardo 1987: 4-7). I set out these differences here, and discuss how they have influenced this study in which I employed oral histories within a

participant observation methodology.

The first broad area of difference between anthropology and oral history is that oral history interviews are typically dyadic encounters whereas anthropologists usually consider individual life histories in a context of ethnographic encounters involving large numbers of people. Di Leonardo also thought that this individual/group distinction was reversed when noting that anthropology is founded on the notion of the heroic individual ethnographer in contrast with the tradition of oral historians retaining relative anonymity within projects which are, instead, focused on creating oral archives of participants. In this study, dyadic oral history interviews were an

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important part of the ethnographic fieldwork. In other settings within the field my encounters were with larger numbers of celebrants at times, in small and large groups, in formal and informal settings. Overall, the study relies more strongly on how ritual-makers talked about their ritual-making than it does on how I observed and interpret them ritualising.

Secondly, Di Leonardo considered ethnographic fieldwork essentially as an act through which anthropologists define themselves, while oral history interviewing is regarded more as a means of information gathering. I do not disagree with this. Noting the difference in emphasis does not mean that the two perspectives are mutually exclusive, though. My study is conceptualised within an anthropological framework and it incorporates oral histories. Now, twenty four years after Di Leonardo pointed out differences between ethnography and oral history, recording oral histories is regarded as an established ethnographic research approach

(Fetterman 1998, Thompson 2000:87). Another distinction which I do not think is a binding convention now, more than two decades on, is Di Leonardo‟s view that ethnographies tended to be cross-cultural whereas oral historians researched intra- culturally. That said, my use of oral histories in this study where I am an insider in the community means I am conforming to the historical convention of the oral historians researching within their own culture. Additionally, the relative emphasis oral historians place on understanding the past was presented as a point of difference from anthropologists who in Di Leonardo‟s view, tended to research the present. Once again, my interpretation of this point is not that the author meant to suggest that the two foci - past and present - were necessarily mutually exclusive. Certainly in this study, being the first of its kind in New Zealand focusing on independent celebrants as ritual makers, I set out to explore the topic broadly and I did not feel constrained by past conventions of either anthropology or any other discipline, and I delved in to historical aspects, how celebrants operate today, and examined changes which have occurred from the twentieth to the twenty-first centuries.

Di Leonardo regarded the key difference in conventions between anthropology and oral history as the varying emphases practitioners place on modes of data collection, with anthropologists typically combining narrative and behavioural evidence

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study I placed a strong emphasis on the importance of information gathered through the oral histories method. These oral histories were nonetheless only one part of my participant observation method, and these various sources together contributed to my overall understanding of this group of ritual-makers. Di Leonardo also described an ethnographic tradition of sheltering the privacy of informants and she distinguishes this from oral historians‟ typical approach which is to make oral historical materials available as public records. She pointed out, 24 years ago, that there were also anthropological studies which included life histories and so were counter to this general rule, where the participants‟ names and backgrounds are not hidden from readers. Participants in this study were identified by their real names and some detail was included about their experience and the rituals they were involved in.

Recordings with them were placed in a public archive during the period of the study and became immediately accessible to the public. This feature of the study has undoubtedly affected the ways in which celebrants have contributed in their oral history interviews. Naturally, celebrants will have wanted to present themselves in the best possible light, both from the perspective that they were being researched, which inherently involves the researcher making judgments, and also because celebrants were aware that the recordings, accessible in the archives, might potentially be scrutinised by others as well.

Di Leonardo concluded that as well as the differences faced by ethnographers and oral historians, they shared three major problems in common: how to approach fieldwork so as to ameliorate power differentials between researchers and

participants, how to be self-conscious about how researchers affect the information given to them, and how to construct texts so as to indicate as honestly as possible the specific personal collaborations that produced the narratives researchers present (di Leonardo, 1987 18-19). The oral history interview is, as Vincent Crapanzo suggests, „a text, not social reality and this text is itself the product of a complex collaboration‟ (Crapanzo, 1984: 359). Interpreting oral histories involves the researcher being reflexive, in the same ways that they must be in all social science research,

consciously analysing the purpose of the research, the politics and subjectivity of the researcher, the inter-subjectivity of the interview, and the effects these have on the text produced. Each oral history interview is a „response to a particular person and set of questions, as well as to the narrator‟s inner need to make sense of experience.

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What is said also draws upon the narrator‟s linguistic conventions and cultural assumptions and hence is an expression of identity, consciousness, and culture‟ (Shopes, 2002: 7).

Who was talking in the oral history interviews gathered in this research? What makes up the social identities of the celebrants participating? There are several aspects to operating as a celebrant which will have impacted on how celebrants have portrayed themselves to me as an ethnographer in this study. Celebrants operate in a relationship of trust with their clients. The public expect and rely upon them to be honest, trustworthy, and competent in ritual-making in order for them to fulfil their legal and social functions as celebrants. The role of a celebrant is a public one, they are constantly visible to the clients and groups of people who gather for the

ceremonies they facilitate. They are accountable to the government agency for their actions, to their professional peers through membership of professional associations, and to their clients. Expectations are for them to be focused on delivering what their clients want and doing this in a careful and competent manner. They are also reliant on having a favourable reputation on such matters, as this impacts on their ability to attract clients on an ongoing basis. (Celebrants are not guaranteed work by virtue of being registered or available.) All of these factors combined mean that celebrants have a vested interest, whilst taking part in oral history recordings, to want to appear serious, thoughtful, caring, and skilled in relation to their celebrant selves.

Theoretically, they may have felt a need to „build up‟ their work to protect it from being something anyone might read about and feel they could do, too, to convey it as more substantial and so more difficult for new people to take up. In addition to this, some of the personal information they come to hold about their clients from working with them in creating ceremonies can be sensitive, and is confidential between them and their clients, and I needed celebrants to be mindful of this throughout our recording sessions to ensure that they respected their clients‟ privacy.

Who am I as a researcher and as an interviewer? What are my own personal views and politics? What is my motivation to do this research? What do I care about, and believe in? How am I perceived by the participants? How do I deliberately (and unconsciously) come across in the interviews and other encounters? Participants were all aware that I was a marriage and civil union celebrant myself, as well as a

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student researcher on this project. Most also knew that the way I made my living is as a professional researcher in applied health and social services research. Relative to many of the celebrants I was young (in my thirties) and „new‟ to celebrant work (I commenced in 2001), so I might have been regarded as inexperienced by some, a naive beginner, perhaps. Another component of my celebrant person relates to me having trained in Celebrant Studies prior to becoming a celebrant, which the majority of celebrants had not. This may have meant I was regarded warily by some

celebrants who might have felt vulnerable because there was a new, curious, qualified celebrant enthusiastic and full of questions, who was in a position to be potentially critical of them and their ritual-making in my research. Mainly, though, as I have mentioned, being a celebrant myself was helpful in several ways; I was

accepted as interested and favourably inclined towards the efforts of celebrants, enthusiastic about the material I was gathering. Through doing this study I have become aware of how, as a celebrant myself, there is the potential for me to have unconsciously colluded with my participants through my questioning, through avoiding generating critical dialogue, and in the wider discourse for me to have assisted my research participants to show themselves in the research at their best. Reflecting back on the study, I have come to appreciate, better, the importance of being aware of the potential for this dynamic and the need to have strategies to mitigate it.

At the outset of the study there was nothing published in New Zealand about this group of ritual-makers and I embarked on this study as an insider. I therefore had the luxury, to an extent, of choosing which areas to emphasise. Commenting on the interpretive complexities of oral history interviews, Shopes stated, „there is no doubt that the single most important factor in the constitution of an interview is the

questions posed by the interviewer‟ (2002:8). My questions provided the intellectual framework for the interview and give it direction and shape. They are inevitably derived from a set of assumptions about what is important and there is a fine line between empathy and collusion. I addressed the same broad set of topics with each participant, to the extent that this was relevant to their engagement with celebrancy. Balanced with these topics, there was space in the interviews for celebrants to raise additional areas which they felt were important to them, and throughout the interview I followed up on the responses provided by participants in order to deepen and

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extend on what they had said where I felt there was more to explore and explain than had been first given. Over the period of study my own knowledge of areas which are important and contentious in anthropology has grown. With this hindsight, I could now fine-tune the topic areas to more deliberately lead participants to talk more about these areas, such as appropriation, and I could have emphasised this more in my thesis.

In interpreting the oral history material, I did not take it at face value, however. In chapter six, for example, I build on the issue some celebrants described of feeling a calling to their work. Examining the consequences of personalisation in ritual which celebrants described as a fundamental characteristic of their work, I augment this oral history material with information shared in a group development session where celebrants talked about tensions and difficulties which can sometimes arise. In chapter seven I expand on the practices of eclecticism described by many celebrants and consider them from the angle of appropriation, and the effects of this.

The oral history method was a highlight for me personally, and as discussed earlier, I included it precisely because it was a way of attributing clearer ownership of the contributions of particular celebrants and visibility for them and their work within the context of my thesis. On these matters I am satisfied with how it worked. However information from many other sources contributed to my understanding, such as my thoughts and collated notes from one-on-one conversations and group discussions, interviews, recordings of conference speeches, emailed information, full copies of some ceremonies, partial descriptions of other ceremonies, and also

different information from the same research participant but gathered at a separate time from the recordings. Some of my most fruitful learning came from

conversations and discussions outside of the oral history recording processes, with the same celebrants as whom I was doing recordings with, and with celebrant friends and informal discussions such as at local CANZ branch get-togethers. Overall, I was left with a sense of the oral histories being slightly less effective as an ethnographic information gathering tool than I had expected they would be. However, this was not problematic from an anthropological point of view since the oral history recordings were only one of several sources of material included in my analysis.

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During the interviews I followed the interview guide, whilst also went with the flow of conversation with each individual celebrant so that they could introduce other relevant material. I intervened minimally, because this is what I understood oral histories ought to be like. In certain interviews, such as ones where I knew the celebrant prior to the study, I was frustrated with the expectation that I „stay out‟ of the interview as much as possible to allow the participant‟s voice and views to dominate. Sometimes this felt too unnatural. I felt the participants were expecting me to contribute more to the conversation, and I thought that in doing so I would be better able to stimulate them to explain further what they were raising. By engaging in a real way, feeding back how I was interpreting what they were saying and checking this, contributing my own experiences and how well they had worked, sharing in what felt like a more „natural‟ conversation, I could engage more

comfortably and also I could keep the conversation going longer as it was, at least in my opinion, more balanced, stimulating, and mutually satisfying. In several of these interviews where I abandoned my self-conscious oral history interviewing style, I felt I was able to get better information. I could get beneath the first answers and grapple with more of the complexity which sometimes sat behind a particular answer.

Overall, I felt my best understanding and interpretation came from natural

conversations I had with people, rather than when I was interviewing and some of the best conversations were when the tape recorder was off.

By setting up the study, and particularly by gathering knowledge from other

celebrants, especially those from professional organisations I do not belong to, I have reached my current „in between‟ place. This puts me in a unique position in relation to other celebrants. I sense that some celebrants are curious, even wary, as to how I „use‟ the material gathered for the study, knowing the vulnerability that is associated with being a research participant. There have been expectations for me to get

involved in issues which are important to various communities within the celebrant profession, and I have been asked to advocate for particular perspectives based on my researcher status. To date I have not taken on these roles, mainly because my priority has been working towards completion of the writing. I have made an effort to keep celebrants up to date on my progress towards completion, via the CANZ and Celebrants Guild newsletters in which the initial publicity featured, through conference papers, and also informally. This thesis is one story, my interpretation,

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narrated within the parameters of an anthropological thesis. I do not claim it to be the definitive „truth‟ about how celebrants see themselves or are seen by others. In my thesis, to convey the essence of the ways in which celebrants told their stories to me, I have included excerpts from a selection of celebrants‟ narratives around their identities and ways of working. Each celebrant is a talented storyteller in their own right, and the energy and generosity they have displayed for this research has been tremendously motivating.

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3 Ritual theory

Celebrants create and facilitate a range of rituals, most commonly rites of passage such as namings, weddings and commitments, and funerals. In this chapter I review key anthropological theories on ritual and the people who perform ritual, and I discuss the context this body of theory provides for my study of celebrants and the meaning and significance of their work to New Zealand culture and spirituality. I outline theoretical concepts of ritual and its functions with a particular focus on rites of passage. The roles and influences of the ritual-makers who performed rite of passage ceremonies in the past are compared with those of one type of ritual-makers (celebrants) today. I look then at ritual change, how and why new rites of passage come about and traditional ones change, and the role of ritualists in these processes of creation and adaptation. My study shows that independent celebrants as ritual makers are actively engaged in changing ritual traditions. Their role is no longer one of performing and perpetuating religious traditions or ritual forms. It is to create