In “Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection,” Tsing demonstrates the level to which numerous factors play into global issues. While, at first glance, many of these factors are seemingly disparate, the confluence at which they meet (or clash) can be analyzed ethnographically. Tsing uses numerous metaphors to describe the various issues/topics/peoples (everything from weeds, to nature lovers, John Muir, Corporate scandal, local classification of species in Borneo, ecofeminism) that she details throughout the book, all of which suggest a type of movement or travel. While it works very well in terms of writing style, and words such as friction and frontier make perfect sense, I question the viability of the travel metaphors that she uses throughout. Is this intended to be a type of poetics, or an analytic device? Beyond the fact that the various forces at work within Indonesian environmental politics do clash and collide at various points, I am unclear as to how these repeated notions of movement and travel are to be conceptualized beyond her notion of friction.
Anna Tsing employs “patchwork anthropology” as her method in "Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection". The patchwork is composed of different approaches -- ethnographic, historical, experiential. I appreciate this approach for its ability to show interconnectedness and “friction,” but I wonder about its limits. What’s being obscured by this approach?
In terms of intellectual traditions, I think Tsing draws on James Clifford’s work on traveling cultures and translation. I’m paraphrasing here, and likely not very well, but I recall Clifford arguing that we need to view culture as a mobile rather than static thing -- something not tied specifically to location. He argues that meaning is created in the flow between cultures. Tsing seems to expand this argument. She pays particular attention to the way things travel, but also attends to the idea that “location matters” (215). She shows this in her discussion (Chapter 6 – Movements) of mobility and mobilization, especially in the section “Tracking Traveling Stories”. Her discussion of the way the stories of Chico Mendes and Chipko have moved and been remade show the relationship between movement and locality. Maybe we can discuss the development of the concept (is it a concept?) of “traveling” as it’s used in anthropology?
Tsing’s engagement with the concept of the universal is one I find particularly useful. In her introduction she suggests post-colonial theory’s challenge to posit scholarly research somewhere between the idea of the universal and the culturally specific, limited social scientists and historians’ analysis to the latter. In my own academic endeavors, I have always equated the trope of universal with that of colonial (or fill this in with any other form of hegemony) power. But I appreciate that she suggests for scholars to stop with the culturally and historically specific ‘makes dialogue impossible” and “misses the point” (7). Her distinction of engaged universals allows a separation of formal abstraction (‘universal reason’ as used in colonial discourse to mark forms of knowledge and power) and ‘actually existing universalisms’. It is in the realm of the latter that her ethnography of global connection takes place. A connected manifestation of the universal/culturally specific dichotomy is that of the local/global, which I also think she handles interestingly. She suggests a way out of this dichotomy is by paying attention to the making of scale (which she defines as “the spatial dimensionality necessary for a particular kind of view” [my copy of the book cut off the page numbers, sorry]. In her mock-diagram she outlines three scale-making projects (all of which are related to spectacular accumulation): finance capital, which is related to global hegemony, franchise cronyism – a nation-making project, and frontier culture, which is the articulation of a region. These three projects are intimately connected and have to be analyzed as such. To understand these projects in conjunction with each other challenges the simplistic view of globalization as a top-down process and the opposing ‘resistance’ of the local. I found her analysis, with emphasis on friction, difference, collaboration, etc. useful categories through which to think about the complexities of global connections. [I wonder if we could make a connection between these concepts and that of interstitial space as discussed by Bhabha, for example? It’s been a while since I’ve read him, but thinking about her conceptual tools made me think of him.] I’m also interesting in discussing the connection (or lack of connection) between Tsing and Strathern’s conception of scale.
3 Comments:
At 12:26 PM,
Jenny K. said…
In “Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection,” Tsing demonstrates the level to which numerous factors play into global issues. While, at first glance, many of these factors are seemingly disparate, the confluence at which they meet (or clash) can be analyzed ethnographically. Tsing uses numerous metaphors to describe the various issues/topics/peoples (everything from weeds, to nature lovers, John Muir, Corporate scandal, local classification of species in Borneo, ecofeminism) that she details throughout the book, all of which suggest a type of movement or travel. While it works very well in terms of writing style, and words such as friction and frontier make perfect sense, I question the viability of the travel metaphors that she uses throughout. Is this intended to be a type of poetics, or an analytic device? Beyond the fact that the various forces at work within Indonesian environmental politics do clash and collide at various points, I am unclear as to how these repeated notions of movement and travel are to be conceptualized beyond her notion of friction.
At 1:23 PM,
melinda said…
Anna Tsing employs “patchwork anthropology” as her method in "Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection". The patchwork is composed of different approaches -- ethnographic, historical, experiential. I appreciate this approach for its ability to show interconnectedness and “friction,” but I wonder about its limits. What’s being obscured by this approach?
In terms of intellectual traditions, I think Tsing draws on James Clifford’s work on traveling cultures and translation. I’m paraphrasing here, and likely not very well, but I recall Clifford arguing that we need to view culture as a mobile rather than static thing -- something not tied specifically to location. He argues that meaning is created in the flow between cultures. Tsing seems to expand this argument. She pays particular attention to the way things travel, but also attends to the idea that “location matters” (215). She shows this in her discussion (Chapter 6 – Movements) of mobility and mobilization, especially in the section “Tracking Traveling Stories”. Her discussion of the way the stories of Chico Mendes and Chipko have moved and been remade show the relationship between movement and locality. Maybe we can discuss the development of the concept (is it a concept?) of “traveling” as it’s used in anthropology?
At 2:30 PM,
rheabonita said…
Tsing’s engagement with the concept of the universal is one I find particularly useful. In her introduction she suggests post-colonial theory’s challenge to posit scholarly research somewhere between the idea of the universal and the culturally specific, limited social scientists and historians’ analysis to the latter. In my own academic endeavors, I have always equated the trope of universal with that of colonial (or fill this in with any other form of hegemony) power. But I appreciate that she suggests for scholars to stop with the culturally and historically specific ‘makes dialogue impossible” and “misses the point” (7). Her distinction of engaged universals allows a separation of formal abstraction (‘universal reason’ as used in colonial discourse to mark forms of knowledge and power) and ‘actually existing universalisms’. It is in the realm of the latter that her ethnography of global connection takes place.
A connected manifestation of the universal/culturally specific dichotomy is that of the local/global, which I also think she handles interestingly. She suggests a way out of this dichotomy is by paying attention to the making of scale (which she defines as “the spatial dimensionality necessary for a particular kind of view” [my copy of the book cut off the page numbers, sorry]. In her mock-diagram she outlines three scale-making projects (all of which are related to spectacular accumulation): finance capital, which is related to global hegemony, franchise cronyism – a nation-making project, and frontier culture, which is the articulation of a region. These three projects are intimately connected and have to be analyzed as such. To understand these projects in conjunction with each other challenges the simplistic view of globalization as a top-down process and the opposing ‘resistance’ of the local.
I found her analysis, with emphasis on friction, difference, collaboration, etc. useful categories through which to think about the complexities of global connections. [I wonder if we could make a connection between these concepts and that of interstitial space as discussed by Bhabha, for example? It’s been a while since I’ve read him, but thinking about her conceptual tools made me think of him.]
I’m also interesting in discussing the connection (or lack of connection) between Tsing and Strathern’s conception of scale.
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