January 21

Last class we had an activity where we ranked individuals based on a story. This was an interesting analogy to research in which I would like to discuss. This relates to us because everybody had a different view on which people in the story appealed to them more. Not only that, we had to judge these people based on only a small story. While in Tonga, we're only getting a small 3 month story and we can only make assumptions on the people there based on that chapter of Tonga.
Additionally, every team had their own biases when looking at the story, and individuals in each group had their own biases as well. These include, religion, values, ethics, culture, gender, age, experience, etc. This relates to our study in Tonga, because we will all go in with our own biases.
Dallin asked me if it's possible even for a little bit, to study a culture without your own biases and how the best way to do that is. My opinion is that the reflexive approach to studying people is probably the best way to study people, yet not exactly because it eliminates biases. By that I mean, the study of people knowing that the study not only reflects these people but also reflects who is studying it. It all depends on your audience from this sort of reflexive approach. For example, if my audience are Tongan people I would have to study them in relation to how they would study themselves through their way of thinking. I probably would not be a good candidate for something like that since I am not a native Tongan and the way I think, and the way I see the world is not the same as theirs. However, because I am writing to an audience similar to myself, it gives validation to my biases in that I want my audience will probably have those some understandings of society, through which we use to understand another.
A critique of this type of study would be that we can never know what is truth, because we can't know what affects our own ontological and cultural assumptions and then how it in-turn affects how we see other people and therefore cannot separate our biases from skewing the "truth" or "reality." To that I would say that as long as we acknowledge our biases and that they have probably altered what "reality" is to the people you're studying, then your research is still valid. This is because the way I understand a people (to an audience who thinks similar to myself) would be similar. Additionally, "truth" or "reality" is entirely subjective, and I would argue that there is no scientific way to define a truth that is universal to all beliefs and people, nor does anybody have a method to do so . For example, a way that science uses to discover truth is through the "scientific method." But, you cannot use the scientific method to prove the scientific method is the best way to find truth. This is not to say that all research is ambiguous and contains no truth. But, when we acknowledge where we are coming from in our study, how we look at things, and look at people subjectively rather than objectively, then we can really look at people as they are in relation to us. And that's really as far as we can go and as close as we can get to the truth.

Ideas for next time: Advantages of anthropological approaches to studying people.