with Marion Bottero, Associate Member, EASt; Researcher at Crebis & Miyako Hayakawa, Postdoctoral Researcher, EASt, ULB

This seminar will explore the challenges of writing ethnography from both insider and outsider perspectives. Marion Bottero and Miyako Hayakawa will share their experiences and insights on subjectivity, distance, and legitimacy in fieldwork.

Presentation Abstracts

1. Caught in the Web of Gendered Relations: Becoming an "Indigenous" Researcher Among Japanese Migrants in France Speaker: Miyako Hayakawa

While the notion of "anthropology at home" is increasingly recognized as legitimate, the challenges faced by "indigenous" researchers often remain underexplored. This presentation examines how the process of distancing and denaturalization is crucial for critically analyzing one’s own field.

2. Writing the Ethnographer’s Subjectivity: Challenges and Pitfalls of Fieldwork in Kalimantan, Indonesia Speaker: Marion Bottero

This presentation is based on three months of fieldwork in the jungle of Kalimantan, Indonesia, conducted for an environmental conservation NGO. The study focused on the Dayak people, an ethnic group known for hunting and consuming orangutans, which the NGO rehabilitates and releases into a nearby nature reserve.

Marion Bottero holds a PhD in Anthropology from Paris Nanterre University. Her doctoral research focused on economic, sexual, and emotional exchanges between Westerners and locals in Malaysia and Thailand. She is currently a researcher at Crebis, a collaborative research center in Brussels specializing in social inequalities. She continues her research in Southeast Asia, particularly in Indonesia, where she explores environmental protection NGOs and the interactions and representations between Westerners and local communities.

Miyako Hayakawa is an anthropologist and postdoctoral researcher for the AspirE project at ULB. She obtained her PhD from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in France. Her research focuses on Japanese migration, gender dynamics in international mobility, and the anthropology of family and kinship.

Wednesday 5th March 2025, from 12 pm until 1 am

Salle de réception
Building De1 - Level 3 - Room R.3.105
Avenue Antoine Depage 1
1000 Bruxelles

Would you like a sandwich? ?Please register here

The event will be bilingual (French/English). Miyako Hayakawa will present in French, but questions can be asked in English if needed.