Teoría de la inteligencia emocional.

The main advantage of fieldwork is the physical presence of the researcher in the field and his or her interaction with research participants and their environments. Ethnography, to use one last definition by Alvesson and Sköldberg (2009: 85), might after all be summed up as “an anthropologically oriented method based on close contact with the everyday life of the studied society or group over a fairly long period of time.” For Geertz (1988: 4-5) then, the reader should get the impression that the author’s claims stem from his or her having “been there.” He himself admits that this “offstage miracle” is hard to put into words, but that it nevertheless might be the lifeblood of ethnographers (Ibid.). In that spirit, I want to discuss why and how I applied the two classical methods of qualitative research, participant observation and interviewing, for this particular research to get the most of my fieldwork experience whilst ‘being there’ in this subsection. I chose not to strictly separate both methods; I have somewhat of an ironic attitude towards them and believe that, ultimately, the analysis is enriched not by a meticulous application of methods, but by the wealth of the empirical material as a result of this Geertzian ‘presence.’29 This is perhaps most clear in Chapter Four, when I step away from the analytical rigour of the previous chapter and proceed to enquiries of a more psychological nature.

As I became more and more comfortable (and critical) with the field context I moved from conversations (i.e. largely unstructured interviews) and watching my surroundings (i.e. unstructured observations), to more focused questions during interviews (i.e. semi-structured interviews) and paying attention to specific elements when observing (i.e. focused observation). As I have mentioned already in this section, immersing myself in the world of Khoisan activists through observations helped me to familiarize myself with the research context, fine-tune my research questions to the local ‘realities,’ and develop and reassess hypotheses on a continuous basis. (Participatory) observation is thus a way of collecting data

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When I was at an event, for example, I did not feel that I was ‘applying participant observation,’ but that I was ‘simply’ paying attention. Reflections, to give another example, are I believe not a result of concentrated and dedicated methodology, but are of a more sudden nature. Another final example is the fact that many of the claims I make in the thesis are not ‘translated’ by a completely discernible process from the data; they are rather constructed from the empirical material that I have constructed myself. In other words: my own thoughts, which derive as much from the fieldwork experience in general as from specific interviews, are used in the analysis and thesis. The bridge between analysis and data is then not that straightforward. Though this leaves the researcher open to criticism of ‘weak’ methodology, I would argue that it invites researchers to think through methodology in a relativistic and open-minded debate instead, musing on the profession of anthropology in the process.

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but also of formulating hypotheses (De Walt & De Walt 2011: 10). Participation did not really occur in the strict sense of the word. I did, for example, not partake in traditional ceremonies and was once literally assigned to sit where the spectators sat (Ibid. 159). That being said, my presence as a young white male European researcher undoubtedly did not go unnoticed. For example, as I discuss in Chapter Three, I got the feeling that my presence sometimes (though definitely not always) caused research participants to engage in “ethnographic self- fashioning” (Wicomb 1998: 92) and tried to convince me of their cultural authenticity and indigeneity.

Figure 3: Inauguration of Cochoqua chiefs at a traditional !Nau ceremony in Atlantis, Cape Town (Author’s photograph)

I started out with attending all sorts of events (meetings, protests, traditional ceremonies, conferences, etc.) where I believed that I could learn more about Khoisan identity, land claims, and the activists themselves (De Walt & De Walt 2011: 89). I then considered observation to be a fitting attitude for the exploratory and inclusive character of this research, rather than an explicit method. As a result, I refrained from excessive (see below) note-taking while observing, and was more concerned with the general experience of being there

Reflexive fieldwork in an elusive context

(Emerson et al. 2007: 354, 356). The field notes I jotted down in a small notebook during events, should then not be seen as “representations of an observed ‘reality’,” but as “personal descriptive accounts of events” (Ibid. 353).

Figure 4: Symbolic burial ceremony in Athlone, Cape Town - researcher is visible in the far right (Social media)

One of the ways I definitely ‘participated’ in the field is by engaging with people in the form of conversation and interview. While I consider both informal and formal forms of conversation to be of equal value for this research, they both have their particular advantages and downsides. Often, for example, I did not want to spoil the flow of a good conversation by asking to turn it into a formal interview and start recording it. In general then, I did not record most of my interviews as I felt that it put pressure on the interviewee to be more ‘correct;’ I instead made some casual notes and wrote a more comprehensive report later on. On the other hand, I sometimes found there to be two specific comparative advantages of formal interviews. They allowed me to set up an adequate timeframe in accordance with the interviewee to address the specific topics that I wanted to cover. Furthermore, they made it possible to focus with interviewees on specific details and personal information. In line with this view, I then had a very preliminary and continuously changing topic guide and my questions frequently came about spontaneously (Arthur & Nazroo 2003: 115-116).

I found it important for the interviewee to be able to express himself or herself freely, even when the conversation was getting off-topic (which happened often, see Chapter Four), as I dealt with sensitive and emotive topics and with strong opinions. As I felt that some of these topics (specifically injustices, histories, and identities) were difficult to talk about, I usually started an interview (or conversation) with biographical questions rather than questions about feelings and meaning, a common technique for interviewers (Arthur & Nazroo 2003: 113). Another way of letting the interviewee feel at ease was by letting him or her pick the language in which to communicate. Most of them preferred Afrikaans, the most common mother tongue, over English. My knowledge of Afrikaans was sufficient for casual conversations and had two distinct advantages: it helped me create rapport with research participants as they could express themselves freely in their mother tongue30 and as a result, I could pick up on the gossip. As I show in Chapter Five, gossip is a not to be underestimated source for this research.

However, while I eventually got to talk with them about, for example, ‘the meaning of land’ (see Chapter Four), it is important to scrutinize (and not praise) the efforts of the researcher in this matter. As Robert Gordon pointed out in his famous book The Bushman Myth: The Making of a Namibian Underclass (1992: 217), this would endow the researcher with a dangerous and “smug sense of ethnographic superiority” and rob the Khoisan of their agency (and complicity) once more (see above). It is important, in other words, to point out the fact that researchers always co-construct their data by being present at observations (see above) or by phrasing their questions in a specific way (Alvesson & Sköldberg 2009: 215). When I asked an activist, for example, if land had a specific meaning for him, it is highly unlikely that he or she would have answered a simple ‘no.’ Instead, as all interviewers, I pushed him or her in a specific direction and prompted him or her to think about something which perhaps he or her had not considered before (Ibid.). But the power dynamics of an interview can be in both directions. Indeed, I felt at times that the interviewees were using something akin to the “grand narrative of restitution,” as land restitution expert Cherryl Walker (2000: 3) has called it, and use specific politically successful tropes of loss and indigenous rights to argue for their demands and grievances (see Chapter Three). Although I did not feel that it was that present in my research, the warning that “a successful claim requires being able to tell compelling stories of loss that can enlist the sympathy of powerful outsiders” remains relevant (Fay &

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This was often, though not always, the mother tongue of research participants.

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Reflexive fieldwork in an elusive context

James 2009: 15). As I have already stated in the previous section, however, I am interested in the stories for their own sake, not in judging their authenticity. Romantic images and uses of the past, something which is equally typical for land claims, is then not a problem for this research but a valuable primary source (Field 2001: 118).

The co-construction of data does not mean that the data are invalid, but that the researchers and the researched) are involved not only in its interpretation, but also in its construction (see pervious section). Although I tried to be subtle and reflexive, I still wonder to what extent both my specific research questions and the stereotypical images and ideas surrounding ethnic identity and ‘traditional cultures’ (unconsciously) influenced my attitude and analysis. In the next subsection, I make an effort to reflect on these and other important issues for any contemporary anthropological research.