Mutual interpretation of identities and local knowledge: Anthropological fieldwork training programs among ethnic minorities in yunnan and rural communities in pearl river delta in guangdong

Abstract

This chapter focuses on different educational experiences undergone during the study of local history and culture in rural communities of Pearl River Delta in Guangdong, and ethnic minority communities of Yunnan in Southwest China. The author argues that, when undergraduate college students want to study local knowledge during an anthropological fieldwork training program, there occurs a special experience of mutual interpretation about identities between local informants and students, because they are in a certain dialogue when introducing themselves for different purposes. For the local informants, when they share their understanding of local history and culture in an everyday life context, they feel the need to be selective and strategic when considering how to explain their lives. However, when students share their own experiences with the informants about their understanding of local knowledge, the fieldwork training program becomes a dialogue between the students and the informants. Both parties view the opposite side as their “Other,”� or reference when they think about the “Self.”� Once the interview or participation goes deeper, the style and attitude of self-representation also changes to cope with the “Other’s”� behavior. In this process of interaction, local informants will be pushed by the students to respond to questions. This kind of response, therefore, becomes a reflexive judgment or an assessment to recall their life history while facing the questioners. In general, this kind of fieldwork training program provides a real-life situation for students and local people: the two parties are mutually taking the opposite side as their “Other”� to redefine their self-images, which is a common course of action taken when trying to redefine identities by working with others through communication and interaction. Meanwhile, another gain of this training program for both students and local informants will be the interpretation of local culture and local knowledge.