James Clifford

James Clifford

James Clifford is an American interdisciplinary scientist and professor, best known for his contributions to anthropology. He combines anthropology, cultural studies, history, and literary analysis studies in his work and teachings.

He positions himself critically against western conceptions of 'culture' and helped transform the most common method for anthropologists, the ethnography (James Clifford, n.d.)

The self-reflexive turn

When people started to think of ethnographies as subjective or partial, new ways of writing emerged.

In anthropology, this wave is called the self-reflexive turn. This approach consists of researchers accounting for their positionality in the field and their relationship with the informants. There are multiple ways to do this. The most common are:

• By elaborating on the researcher's positionality and how it influenced their fieldwork.

• By discussing the relationship with the research participants in the ethnography, and considering if the power relation is balanced or not.

• By incorporating other styles of writing. There are many different takes on how to do this. One way is by solely writing in the first person to show that the ethnography is made from a subjective perspective. Another trend that followed in the wake of the self-reflexive turn is the use of literary techniques.

These literary techniques or poetics (Clifford, 1986), make use of creative and artful ways to present culture. Unlike the linear storylines used in the classic ethnography, literary accounts combine the expressiveness of culture with art to create a story. The result is a fictitious story that is in some ways more real than traditional ethnographies.