I am anthropologist – But where is the field? On fieldwork, intimacy, and home

Abstract

This article was prompted by a question: how can one be anthropologist when access to the field is denied? Drawing on the experiences of the author, who experienced a number of losses including access to the field during the COVID-19 pandemic, it shines a light on how, in a context of anthropology at home, intimate knowledge and memory fragments can be used to draw the field nearer when physical access is denied. In doing so, it reflects on how senses of home often go deeper than usually acknowledged. It suggests that knowledges produced at the hearths of homes become embodied aspects of ourselves that come into play especially in anthropology at home but that are always part and parcel of our engagement with the worlds around us. This in turn prompts the question of whether the old argument that fieldwork at home may preclude necessary analytical distance, still holds value.