Ethnography is the human science that is dedicated to the study of peoples or communities through their customs, rites, tools and ways of life.
Discipline that studies peoples based on customs and rites ...
Meanwhile, it is of notable relevance when it comes to knowing for sure the identity of a human community that develops in a given socio-cultural context.
It is one of the branches of anthropology and also sociology, both sciences that are interested in the analysis of the complex phenomenon known as human society. Ethnography means in Greek 'the study of a people' since ethnos means town, folklore and graphos writing or analysis.
For many, ethnography is not a science but a mode of study that sciences such as anthropology or sociology apply in their analysis of the human being. However, ethnography is gaining more and more place in the scientific world because it is interested in giving an integral vision to the study of human communities. This means that when an ethnologist seeks to approach a past community or society to understand it, he does so through the analysis of its customs in a complete way, of its rites, of its ways of understanding the world, of its systems of punishment and of the social relationships of different kinds that may exist in it.
The need for field work
The work of ethnography does require a specific field work, that is, the ethnographer, who is the professional who dedicates himself to this discipline, must observe the group under study in situ for a considerable and determined period of time.
In this way, the interpretation of it and the conclusions it draws about its uses and customs, among other issues, will be much more precise and forceful.
It is also common and of great help during this field work that the ethnographer conducts personal interviews with people who make up the study group. Face-to-face interviews allow us to observe issues that may go unnoticed in the group and also allow to gather more information and obtain more data than probably at first glance who does not integrate the observed culture will find it difficult to understand or see.
Another common action of the ethnographer is to join the activities, rites and practices that the culture under study develops and displays. This action will allow you to get involved in the first person and thus better understand everything inherent to the civilization studied.
Freeing oneself from ethnocentrism to obtain a pure and objective work on the people studied
However, it is very important that the ethnographer frees himself from any ethnocentric tendency to carry out his work because if this is the case, his work will have no value whatsoever.
When this inclination prevails, the professional will tend to judge, qualify customs, beliefs and languages as desirable and superior to the rest.
It will be considered common for people who make up the culture to have this tendency to consider and describe their own beliefs and customs in a positive way and criticize those of others, but of course, the professional in charge of this analysis should be as objective as possible, away from prejudices and be as neutral as possible so that the analysis yields the most impartial description.
So, not falling into ethnocentrism should be the path that should guide the work of the ethnographer.
Ethnography is also interested in the study of all the individuals that make up a society and does not give primacy to those who have power or good economic position since the rules, customs and rites are established in a generalized way and when they establish differentiations between some and others, that also contributes to a better understanding of each specific community.
Ethnography can use different elements to carry out its studies. In the first place, elements that are considered cultural are used to get closer to the mentality and way of understanding the world of a community: works of art, crafts, tools, clothing, etc. Then, you can also have other types of material such as written documents (if they exist) or archaeological analyzes.
