Constructing the Field: Ethnographic Fieldwork in the Contemporary World, edited by Vered Amit

Amit describes the difference between Anthropology and Sociology to be the practice of field work via participant observation. Could one also say that the difference between the two is that Anthropology deals with more “unfamiliar” territory, and Sociology deals with what is relevant at home?
“Yet she insists that the quintessence of what makes ethnographic fieldwork anthropological continues to be a commitment to a process of utter social immersion”.(p.5).
The question of “objectivity” in the field has always been a fascinating one to me. Amit tells us that the norm for the anthropologist in the “field” is to continue with personal obligations in addition to the work... can objectivity still be achieved if the anthropologist relates to the personal demands of his or her life while in the "field"? When objectivity is questioned in the wake of relationships made during the fieldwork itself, Amit suggests that it is possibly not the relationships that are threatening objectivity and that instead we should learn to redefine “total immersion” in the said culture.(p10). “It is the circumstance which defined the method rather than the method defining the circumstance”.(p.11). I like what he says here. I think it is a very important concept to remember when we are attempting to define ethnography as well as attempting to discredit objectivity. Amit says that ethnographers cannot separate themselves from themselves while in the "field". When discussing the question of objectivity, we need to remember this which will subsequently lead us to redefine objectivity in the "field". We cannot expect the impossible and must keep in mind that there is still much to be learned from the results of participant observation and fieldwork without "absolute objectivity".
Very interesting introduction by Vered Amit. Here is one of the most important debates regarding the definition of ethnography as well as the differences between anthropology and sociology: if we define ethnographic fieldwork as participating fully in a culture that is not our own by traveling away from “home”, we are left with having to remember that “home” for many anthropologists is in many different places. Ethnographers typically have a nomadic lifestyle, so how do we define what is away from “home”? “To the extent that the personal, professional and fieldwork involvements of ethnographers are mutually constitutive, the construction of ethnographic fields is not a one-way process of accommodation to the fieldworker’s already existing associations and commitments, for these are also inevitably altered”.(p.9).
“Thus the answer to what happens to anthropology if its practitioners adapt their fieldwork practices to the exigencies of new circumstances is that it would not remain as anthropology if they didn’t”.(p.17). For one to insist that the very essence of anthropology is defined by strict guidelines and closed-minded rules is to forget the very open and curious nature that truly defines anthropology.