Areas of empirical research

Abdel Hernandez San Juan

Empirical research

1-Urban popular markets

since 1994 Abdel Hernandez San Juan started to develop studies and research in the urban popular markets of venezuela including three years of inmersive participant observation and a research on the visual imageries of the markets since the colonial centuries from XV century through collections of photography, paintings, publicities and artifacts, to modern and posmodern capitalist markets

Such as research focussed originaly in venezuelan folklore and culture and evolutioned later to be urban studies in general both on caracas and later since 1997 when hernandez stablished in texas.. 

2-The inclusion of art into sociology and anthropology research projects

Since 1988 Abdel Hernandez San Juan started in havana a theoretical research adressed to meta/discuss and practice the posibilities to develop cultural theorization projects of sociology focussed in the studies and research of social groups understanded as cultural groups and based in participant observation inmersion into the urban, suburban or rural spatialities of such groups, it included inmersion into a variety of social groups, from urban groups of rockers, young urban people living around rock as urban culture as well as punks and socalled frikis or friki frikis (Abdel individual research), to Patineters, entertaiment groups, barmans and urban neighbordhoods.

Abdel also developed an inmersive research into rural communities, one of the main characteristics of this investigation focussed in including very experimental art medias and languages into projects of social sciences or at least geeting sometimes results of sociological art, many years later, from caracas, venezuela, 1996, Abdel reconsidered his theoretical endeavor from a new perpective and proposed a curatorial practice of exhibits exploring the relation between art and anthropology

The new renewed efforts born from the venezuelan art scene and mainly with venezuelan artists and was presented as a co-curatorial practice by Abdel Hernandez San Juan and Surpik Angelini at several exhibits space at rice university, like hernandez, angelini developed since the later eighties and nineties interdiscipliary projects in communities such as in matamoros and her urban architectural projects, all this, including her curatorial practices of 1989 of texan artists defined the precendents of the exhibits presented at rice university a half of which consisted in works of anthropology and a half of which consisted in works of ar

3-urban studies and cultural analysis

urban studies and research is a major area of Abdel Hernandez San Juan empirical research since ever, on the one hand, urban studies was a major component under his earlier old school of sociology and cultural theory based in immersion into social groups understanded as cultural groups

later the urban nature of Hernandez fieldwork and research continued since he emigrated to caracas, venezuela during the nineties defining his fieldwork into venezuelan popular markets research on folklore, while later it evolutioned to a be a research on caracas as city under Abdel ealier writings

Indeed, since 1998 when Abdel defined his lab of ethnomethodology in sociology, ethnography and performativity of research in houston, this modality of production basis his upcoming single author books, travels and dialogues, urban studies adquiered thus from texas a more relevant place yet from his books on medias and technologies such as The presentational linguistic, being and monad or the given and the ungiven, including books as self and acervo or the intramundane horizont to his sociology of culture books such as Rethinking intertextuality: research method in the sociology of culture,  The Semantique Elucidation: semiotic theory, sociolinguistic and the semantique of culture, the indeterminist true and rethinking urban anthropology

Hence, urban studies might be defined as abdel main area of research

4-Semiotic of art and cultural anthropology

since 1998 in houston, texas Abdel Hernandez San Juan choiced to include into his research of sociology and anthropology the semiotic theory analysis of art exploring cultural analysis from semantic research at semiotic and thus encompassing art critique with cultural anthropology, it was from houston that he realized to turn the compendiums of his writings in the semiotic of art as compositing books of cultural anthropology. 

The result was a conjunction of intercultural and transcultural compendiums discussing artists from texas, united states in general, venezuela and cuba

5-Bilinguism, intercultural, transcultural and transnational cultural identity formations

This variety of issues might be defined as one of Abdel Hernandez San juan progresive pivotal areas of empirical research since he emigrated and stablished in houston, texas from the late nineties.

The issue itself evolve many things entailed with urbans studies and the markets, but must be understanded too as a progressive attention not only to intercultural, transcultural and transnational cultural identity formations in the united states, mexico and venezuela but also as a later focuss on bilinguism, multiculturalism and diasporas

The Hernandez self sociology and self anthropology research on the subjectivities of emigration started first with his writings on subjectivity in caracas but evolutioned to a more developed level at his seminar "Living between cultures" he discussed from the hispanic institute of culture of houston with argentinian-americans and mexican-american  emigrants including himself (cubanamerican)

6-The Restauration of colonial patrimonies in its interactions with tourism and habitad 

This research have progresibly become a major area of empirical focuss in Abdel Hernandez san Juan books

The interest started during 1998 when he traveled through a variety of villages and little colonial cities of texas meeting borders villages between texas and mexico, since such a time abdel started an interest to unveil and discovery how the restauration of the colonial memory of architecture and villages evolve a relevant issue to the research and theory of culture specially when it evolve the mise in scene of such restauration of memory to tourism, he started to be interested in how restauration of colonial patrimonies, tourism and habitat interact

The issue might be read by the moment in a chapter titled performativity of research fully focussed on this phenomena as expressed in the restauration of the colonial old havana, this chapter must be find at the end of his book Rethinking Intertextuality

7-The empirical study and research of religion 

This research developed by Abdel from the perspective of the sociology of religion and based in the sociology of common sense must be defined as indeed the main result of his earlier fieldwork of rural communities in south orient of Cuba

Hernandez sociological fieldwork was initially entailed with the study of the village of pilon through family's interaction and studies of proxemic and cinesis in the semiotic research of intercorporeal and interjectural spatiality's, but it later evolutioned to be focused in religion from the study of religion under families', including coffee mountain farmers habitat in rural bohios, to the discovery of a unique regional religion defined as "espiritismo de cordon"

he visited and studied several times "the start of orient" temple of spiritism in niqueros including photography's to later unveil the conexion of this temple with a whole proliferation of this religion in the south orient.

At the same time there was in pilon another religion, additionally to christianism primacy, a mixing modality of yoruba religion. 

Later during 1995 hernandez become interested to add research on yoruba into his investigation of religion which from fieldwork to writing evolved both cultural anthropology and ethnography, camdomble and umbanda from brazil as well as regla de ocha in cuba started to be studied by abdel

two chapters on yoruba might be read at hernandez book The Semantique elucidation: semiotic theory, sociolinguistic and the sociology of culture

8-anthropology as practice 

It is is progresibly becoming an empirical area in Abdel Hernandez San Juan discussing anthropology from the perspective of ethnomethodology in sociology, literary criticism and cultural anthropology,

hernandez is also discussing issues of meta/anthropology of regard and relevance to his own positioning as research under his books like for example, proposing the eye of the museum in fieldwork, defining metonyms in fieldwork and discussing museums of anthropology museographies, abdel have also discussed material culture and issues of fieldwork regarding traditional regions of anthropology such as south asia in general from india to birmania, japan, new guinea and the trobriant islands, and as well as discussing his critiques on Malinowsky and levis strauss. 

9-The issue of the eye

the museum eye, the observer eye, the idea of the observer itself, participant observation, the observer observed and the observed observer, between another forms of the observer is becoming an often area of empirical research in several of abdel hernandez san juan books, while abdel theory on this regard is moving beyond observation toward on the one hand considering writing as part of the hermeneusis of the socalled observed culture, exploring, on the one hand, how the observer is already meaninfull to its object and subject and as such signified by that culture. According to hernandez writing must be redefined hermeneutically and phenomenologically not only transforming fieldwork itself into an hermeneutical and phenomenological practice and research but including the observer observed and the observed observer in the hermeneusis of the supposed to be observed culture.