Writing Anthropology: Essays on Craft and Commitment
Duke University Press, 2020
Editor: Carole McGranahan
From the Introduction to this edited volume: "Many of the essays in this volume were part of a two-year long series on writing I edited on the group anthropology blog Savage Minds: Notes and Queries in Anthropology (now Anthrodendum) from 2014-2016. Although writing had become an open topic of concern in anthropology, I was hungry for more conversation about it. I wanted to think out loud about writing, but I mostly wanted to hear and learn from others. Knowing colleagues craved the same, I created a weekly space for anthropologists to write about writing. I invited scholars from across the subfields, the generations, and countries. Some are known for being leaders in, and even pioneers of, ethnographic writing. Others were scholars I knew who were good writers, or who I thought had something valuable to say. These were not necessarily the go-to” scholars for a conversation on writing. This volume puts together new essays with many of the original essays from the series. All are short, roughly 1,000-1,500 words, and are examples that showcase the possibilities of the new online essay genre. My instructions to the authors were simple: write something on writing. Each of the authors responded to that request in their own creative, inspired way.
The book you hold in your hands, or read on your screen, compiles these essays in one neat and untidy package. Fifty-two essays, spilling over into each other, some contained within their own narrative, others deep in conversation with what came before, and yet each offering us new thoughts, prompts, and agitations for writing. The essays are organized in ten sections: Ruminations; Writing Ideas; Telling Stories; On Responsibility; Crisis, Politics, and the Urgency of Now; Writing With, Writing Against; Academic Authors; Ethnographic Fiction and Poetry; Becoming and Belonging; and Writing and Knowing."
Contributors are: Whitney Battle-Baptiste, Jane Baxter, Ruth Behar, Adia Benton, Lauren Berlant, Robin Bernstein, Sarah Besky, Catherine Besteman, Yarimar Bonilla, Kevin Carrico, C. Anne Claus, Sienna Craig, Zoë Crossland, Lara Deeb, Kristen Drybread, Jessica Falcone, Kim Fortun, Kristen Ghodsee, Daniel Goldstein, Donna Goldstein, Sara Gonzalez, Ghassan Hage, Carla Jones, Ieva Jusionyte, Alan Kaiser, Barak Kalir, Michael Lambek, Stuart McLean, Lisa Sang-Mi Min, Mary Murrell, Kirin Narayan, Chelsi West Ohueri, Anand Pandian, Noel Salazar, Bhrigupati Singh, Matt Sponheimer, Kathleen Stewart, Ann Laura Stoler, Paul Stoller, Nomi Stone, Paul Tapsell, Katerina Teaiwa, Marnie Thomson, Gina Athena Ulysse, Roxanne Varzi, Uzma Rizvi, Sita Venkateswar, Maria Vesperi, Sasha Su-Ling Welland, Bianca Williams, and Jessica Winegar. Scroll down for the Table of Contents.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
On Writing and Writing Well: Ethics, Practice, Story | Carole McGranahan
Section One | Ruminations
1. Writing in and from the Field | Ieva Jusionyte
2. List as Form: Literary, Ethnographic, Long, Short, Heavy, Light | Sasha Su-Ling Welland
3. Finding Your Way | Paul Stoller
4. The Ecology of What We Write | Anand Pandian
5. When Do Words Count? | Kirin Narayan
Section Two | Writing Ideas
6. Read More, Write Less | Ruth Behar
7. Pro Tips for Academic Writing | C. Anne Claus
8. My Ten Steps for Writing a Book | Kristen R. Ghodsee
9. Slow Reading | Michael Lambek
10. Digging with the Pen: Writing Archaeology | Zoë Crossland
Section Three | Telling Stories
11. Anthropology as Theoretical Storytelling | Carole McGranahan
12. Beyond Thin Description: Biography, Theory, Ethnographic Writing | Donna M. Goldstein
13. Can’t Get There from Here? Writing Place and Moving Narratives | Sarah Besky
14. Ethnographic Writing with Kirin Narayan: An Interview | Carole McGranahan
15. On Unreliable Narrators | Sienna R. Craig
Section Four | On Responsibility
16. In Dialogue: Ethnographic Writing and Listening | Marnie Jane Thomson
17. Writing with Community | Sara L. Gonzalez
18. To Fieldwork, To Write | Kim Fortun
19. Quick, Quick, Slow: Ethnography in the Digital Age | Yarimar Bonilla
20. That Generative Space between Ethnography and Journalism | Maria D. Vesperi
Section Five | The Urgency of Now
21. Writing about Violence | K. Drybread
22. Writing about Bad, Sad, Hard Things | Carole McGranahan
23. Writing to Live: On Finding Strength While Watching Ferguson | Whitney Battle-Baptiste
24. Finding My Muse While Mourning | Chelsi West Ohueri
25. Mourning, Survival, and Time: Writing through Crisis | Adia Benton
Section Six | Writing With, Writing Against
26. A Case for Agitation: On Affect and Writing | Carla Jones
27. Anti-Racist Writing | Ghassan Hage
28. Writing with Love and Hate | Bhrigupati Singh
29. Peer-Review: What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger| Alan Kaiser
30. When They Don’t Like What We Write: Criticism of Anthropology as a Diagnostic of Power | Lara Deeb and Jessica Winegar
Section Seven | Academic Authors
31. Writing Archaeology “Alone,” or a Eulogy for a Co-Director | Jane Eva Baxter
32. Collaboration: From Different Throats Intone One Language? | Matt Sponheimer
33. What Is an (Academic) Author? | Mary Murrell
34. The Writing behind the Written | Noel B. Salazar
35. It’s All “Real” Writing | Daniel M. Goldstein
36. Dr. Funding, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Grant Writing | Robin Bernstein
Section Eight | Ethnographic Genres
37. Poetry and Anthropology | Nomi Stone
38. “SEA” Stories: Anthropologies and Poetries Beyond the Human | Stuart McLean
39. Dilations | Kathleen Stewart and Lauren Berlant
40. Genre-Bending, or the Love of Ethnographic Fiction | Jessica Marie Falcone
41. Ethnographic Fiction: The Space Between | Roxanne Varzi
42. From Real Life to the Magic of Fiction | Ruth Behar
Section Nine | Becoming and Belonging
43. On Writing from Elsewhere | Uzma Z. Rizvi
44. Writing to Become… | Sita Venkateswar
45. Unscholarly Confessions on Reading | Katerina Teaiwa
46. Guard Your Heart and Your Purpose: Faithfully Writing Anthropology | Bianca C.. Williams
47. Writing Anthropology and Such or “Once More, With Feeling” | Gina Athena Ulysse
48. The Anthropology of Being (Me) | Paul Tapsell
Section Ten | Writing and Knowing
49. Writing as Cognition | Barak Kalir
50. Thinking through the Untranslatable | Kevin Carrico
51. Freeze Dried Memory Crumbs: Fieldnotes from North Korea | Lisa Sang-Mi Min
52. Writing the Disquiets of a Colonial Field | Ann Laura Stoler
53. On Ethnographic Unknowability | Catherine Besteman