Happenings — EMERGE

Ethnographic Salon 2025: Interference

Friday, April 11, 2025
3:00 PM - 4:15 PM PST
Hybrid; Zoom Registration: https://usc.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJIpdeivqTkoGNSzgj0CGWaFcvmdbB0s7zMI#/registration

The 2025 Ethnographic Salon–an annual event hosted by the Ethnography Studio celebrating various forms of ethnographic analysis–will explore interference as a condition for and object of ethnographic research, with our guests Meghanne Barker (University College London), Jenny Chio (USC), and Juno Salazar Parreñas (Cornell University).

Organized by the Ethnography Studio at The University of Southern California. Funded by The University of Southern California, and EMERGE.

Multimodal Interrogations of Anthropologically Unintended Media

Tuesday, March 25, 2025
12:00 PM - 1:00 PM PST
Zoom Webinar: https://ubc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_P1t_9lAlSx-7GX5I0VKAgg

Samuel Collins and Matthew Durington, co-authors of Multimodal Methods in Anthropology (Routledge 2024) present insights from their book and offer a space to think about what happens when we work in collaborative ways to create media in anthropology.

Organized by Dr. Fiona McDonald. Funded by SSHRC and the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at The University of British Columbia, Okanagan

EMERGE MATRIX: A Cabinet of Curious Ethnographic Practices

Friday, May 17, 2024
9:00 AM PDT
Canadian Anthropology Society / La Société canadienne d'anthropologie (CASCA)

This round table marks the 2nd anniversary of EMERGE: a Matrix for Ethnographic Collaboration + Practice and centers the work of our “Cabinet of Curious Ethnographic Practices” where each member of the Matrix shared knowledge about various methods used to make tacit practices visible where we move from thinking about “skill” in favour of “practice” to foster more inclusive collaboration.

Organized by Fiona P. McDonald, Round Table Participants: Derek Pasborg, Melina Campos Ortiz, Kregg Hetherington, Alisa Jordan, Pablo Aguilera Del Castillo, Emily Hertzman, Jean Chia, Nick Smith, Suzi Asa, Donna Langille, Emilie Isch, Savannah Kosteniuk. Funded by SSHRC.

Collaborative Workshop: On composite ethnography, zine-making and our encounter with the Francon Quarry at Saint-Michel

Sunday, March 24, 2024
1:30 pm ‒ 3:00 pm EDT
Concordia University

Using the Francon Quarry project (the Pit) as an example of collaborative and collective ethnographic methodology, this workshop provides an opportunity for participants to approach their own projects through composite ethnography.

This workshop is presented by Melina Campos Ortiz, Camila Patino Sanchez and Derek Pasborg. Organized as part of Concordia University’s SAGSA conference.

Ethnographic Salon 2024: Shifting Matter(s), Slippery Maps

Monday, March 4, 2024
3:00 pm PST
University of Southern California, The Ethnography Studio, THH 309K and Zoom (registration required)

Mapping is a technical, political, and imaginative practice. Join us for a conversation between Dr. Annette Kim and Dr. Shannon Mattern followed by Q&A.

Organized by Andrea Ballestero and Katie Ulrich in coordination with the Center for Science, Technology and Public Life.

Imagining Digital Tools in New Contexts: Experiences of Participatory Mapping

Friday, February 7, 2024
10:00 am ‒ 11:00 am PST
Zoom Webinar (registration required)

Ever wonder about the way digital tools can be used in your research? Join UBCO’s Collaborative + Experimental Ethnography Lab and the Earth Observation & Spatial Ecology Lab for an interdisciplinary conversation about participatory mapping by Dr. Jonathan Huck from The University of Manchester. Dr. Huck is the creator of MAP-ME.org and PAPER2GIS digital tools. This presentation will share examples of the way open-source tools can be creatively re-imagined in new contexts for qualitative research in a range of contexts from the social to the sensory and beyond. Everyone is welcome!

Organized by Fiona P. McDonald and Rebekah Ferguson and Mathieu Bourbonnais. Supported by SSHRC.

In Japan, teaching a multitude of creative anthropology practices

January 2024
Ritsumeikan University

Penn anthropologists in the Center for Experimental Ethnography led workshops at Ritsumeikan University on performance, film, mapping, sound, and collaging.

Workshops organized by members of University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Experimental Ethnography. Hosted by Professor Sayaka Ogawa and graduate student Pero Fukuda of Ritsumeikan University.

Attunement, Activation, and Other Adventures in Ethnography: A conference presentation at Experiment Ethnographie

Panel title: Anderes Wissen & anders wissen: Erweiterung ethnographischer Methodologie?" (Other knowledge & knowing differently: Extending ethnographic methodology?)

Thursday-Friday, December 7-8, 2023
Presented by Dr. Andrew Gilbert at the Gesellschaft für Ethnographie (Society for Ethnography) in cooperation with the Institute for European Ethnology at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

This presentation explores the potentials created when research objects, artefacts, and methods circulate out of their initial context of emergence and are “activated” in another research context. What values are created when we give up proprietary notions of research practice and production? What new insights are afforded through re/combination, re/contextualization, and re/mixing?

Infrastructuring Ethnography: A Collaborative Exchange

Sunday, November 19, 2023
5:30 pm ‒ 6:30 pm
University of Toronto (map)

What infrastructures can we build when we practice ethnography in collaboration, extend the field of inquiry across multiple temporalities and spatial locations, and create new networks of circulation? This roundtable was presented to the annual meeting of the AAA/CASCA 2023.

Organized by Dr. Andrew Gilbert. Funded in part by SSHRC.

Play! Infrastructures of Collaborative Ethnography

Friday, November 17, 2023
5:30 pm ‒ 6:30 pm
University of Toronto (map)

What is playful ethnography? Join us for some interactive fun with games, schemes, and diversions about ethnographic fidelity, guilt, composition, and fieldwork friendship.

Organized by Noha Fikry Ismail, Kassandra Spooner-Lockyer, Jean Chia, and Nick Smith. Funded by SSHRC.

Questions for a Sign

Monday, October 30, 2023
9:00 am ‒ 11:00 am PST
Online

Using their collective experience in design and anthropology, Dr. Stephanie Sadre-Orafai (University of Cincinnati) and Dr. Craig Campbell (University of Texas, Austin) led an experiential workshop that explored how to ethnographically engage with signage.

Organized by Dr. Fiona McDonald. Funded by SSHRC and UBCO Faculty of Arts + Social Sciences.

Making Protocols Move: Towards Protocol Sharing Across the Disciplines

Wednesday, October 25, 2023
11:00 am ‒ 12:00 pm PST
Zoom

Drawing on survey research and large-scale analysis of recent scientific publications, Marcel LaFlamme, PhD, makes the case for step-by-step protocols as a format that can foster research quality, efficiency, and equity in a wide variety of research fields, including the humanities and social sciences.

Organized by Donna Langille and Dr. Fiona P. McDonald. Funded by UBC Okanagan Library, SSHRC, UBCO Faculty of Arts + Social Sciences.

Pit Stop: Our encounter with the Francon Quarry at Saint-Michel

September 25 ‒ 29, 2023
Concordia University

This presentation at The Milieux Commons Exhibition aimed to share and sensitize locals and foreigners in an alternative manner about our mundane but profound connections with the Francon Quarry (the Pit).

Organized by Ava Weinstein-Wright, Camila Patiño Sanchez, Carlos Eduardo Olaya Díaz, Derek Pasborg, Manoj Suji, Melina Campos Ortiz. Funded by SSHRC.

Infrastructures of Ethnography: Fostering Collaborative Approaches and Creative Spaces for Ethnographic Thinking

May 26-27, 2023
Concordia University

The five labs participating in Infrastructures of Ethnography, gathered in Montreal to share the results of their first year of research and look for ways to “co-labor” in the coming years.

Organized by Kregg Hetherington and Melina Campos Ortiz. Funded by SSHRC.

Ethnographic Salon 2023: Porosity

Thursday, April 20, 2023
3:00 pm ‒ 4:30 pm PST
University of Southern California

Drawing on work with the Infrastructures of Ethnography Initiative, this salon explored the theme of Porosities. Guests included Eleana Kim (UC Irvine), Gabriela Soto Laveaga (Harvard University), and Teresa Montoya (University of Chicago).

Organized by Dr. Andrea Ballestero, Katie Ulrich, and Nick Bauch.