In his article "Confronting the Field(note) In and Out of the Field" Gregory Barz discusses the fieldnote from an epistemological viewpoint, and argues that its role in the process of learning in the field and textualizing experience in an ethnography outside of the filed is an active, not a passive, one. He uses his own research on Tanzanian kwayas as a case study throughout the article. In practice, he explains, a fieldnote is the intermediate step between experience and textualization, but it is not a simple memory device or lifeless artifact from the field. He explains that writing notes is not the only way to learn, especially in light of the fact that members of the kwaya are expected to learn by ear. He goes on to explain that a dialogue between experience and interpretation occurs during the process of writing and reading field notes. One's "original experience" is altered by the very fact of writing and organizing one's thoughts in note, and the ethnographer may have very different views after writing a note than before. Similarly, interpreting field notes outside of the field makes the ethnographer aware of new points of view that he or she may not have understood while writing the note. In fact, writing and reading themselves are experiences distinct from the "original experience." Rather than a linear progression from field research to fieldnote to ethnography, Barz proposes a model in which the fieldnote is a movable fulcrum whose position affects the balance between experience and interpretation. Barz's article challenges ethnographers to think about the nature of the notes that they write and view them as more than simply texts.
Discussion question: In Barz's view, a fieldnote is a trigger for experience rather than a memory. The point of ethnography is to relate experience. But can an experience that must be translated and transfigured through writing, reading, and finally writing again into an ethnography really accomplish this goal?
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