Epistemological Vigilance as Ethnographic Practice

Abstract

With “In Praise of ‘Thick Construction,’” Loïc Wacquant offers a welcome manifesto for ethnography infused with Bourdieusian epistemology. Continuing in that spirit, I elaborate the need (and offer practical tips) for epistemological vigilance—that is, to reflexively interrogate one’s own thinking—in the face of prenotions that threaten the thick construction of ethnographic objects. To illustrate the allure of prenotions and analytical struggles against them, I offer brief notes on some practical avenues to foster epistemological reflexivity: recognition, purposive reading, curious skepticism, patience, and intellectual record-keeping.