“There are at least three ways in which anthropology engages
improvisation as a collaborative phenomenon: a) as an element of
the idea of habitus; b) as a set of practices studied as social text or
process; and c) as an aspect of experimental research modalities.
As to the first, Pierre Bourdieu, in his critique of structuralism,
suggested that social life is ordered improvisation. … In the second instance, we find anthropologists inquiring into tradition, politics, and identity through the lens of intentional, performative improvisation. … Third, improvisation in anthropology has taken the form of performative and collaborative research.”
“Participants were explicitly taught the central dynamic of improvisational performance: always accepting offers from one’s collaborator with “yes, and” to keep communication and action flowing.”
“As he inscribes answers and prompts his interlocutors to tell him more, he may very well have asked: ‘Yes, and?’ In his commitment to understanding Trobriand society as a total system, Malinowski would have taken what he observed on its own terms. It’s not a stretch to imagine that he would have accepted rather than refuted the responses he received—a ‘yes’ rather than a ‘no, that can’t be true.’ More than that, he might have tacked on “and” in his willingness to think in tandem with his interlocutors. Although the conditions of fieldwork are certainly different now, I posit that, like Malinowski, contemporary ethnographers often operate in the spirit of ‘yes, and.’”
“could anthropologists improvise with one another and not only with their interlocutors?”
“Historically, we do fieldwork alone rather than in teams, and although we are in conversation through publications and peer review, these forms of engagement are, temporally speaking, not improvisational. When we gather at campus talks and annual conferences and listen to one another’s papers, we often participate in Q&A sessions following the presentations. The Q&A is spontaneous and responsive—is this a kind of peer-to-peer, collaborative improvisation? According to the ‘yes, and’ principle, no. We use the Q&A to constitute our own authority (for instance, in the too-common monologic style of questioning). We don’t typically agree (“yes!”) and jump aboard the analytic train of our colleagues (“and”), spontaneously entering into dialogue in a spirit of collaborative analysis.”
“Agreeing to agree in collaborative analysis could mirror what we do in the field, with the aim not of supplanting debate and critique but rather advancing a lateral analytic process.”
Hegel does not go into detail here, but she does vaguely advocate a sharing of data and preliminary analyses before they have been fully “cooked.”
She seems to argue that the epistemic culture amongst anthropologists encourages healthy collaborative relations between researchers and their interlocutors, but less healthy relationships between researchers themselves. This is rooted in academic competition for prestige and position and the “lone-wolf mentality” that characterizes traditional approaches to ethnography.
Hegel is specifically interested in the possible benefits of adopting the “yes, and” model of collaboration in the practice of data analysis. Thus, a “good collaborator” would be one who affirms their partner’s thinking and contributes by delving deeper/spinning off/backing up/ etc. That is, to Hegel, the “agreeing to agree” element of the “yes, and” model is essential.
Hegel is quite restrictive in what she considers to be collaboration. This might be due to the fact that she is trying to advocate a specific type of improvised collaboration but, at least at certain times, she seems to let this strain of collaboration stand for/define collaboration more broadly.
Hegel’s understanding of collaboration can be surmised by taking a look at what she defines it against in the following quote:
“Historically, we do fieldwork alone rather than in teams, and although we are in conversation through publications and peer review, these forms of engagement are, temporally speaking, not improvisational. When we gather at campus talks and annual conferences and listen to one another’s papers, we often participate in Q&A sessions following the presentations. The Q&A is spontaneous and responsive—is this a kind of peer-to-peer, collaborative improvisation? According to the “yes, and” principle, no. We use the Q&A to constitute our own authority (for instance, in the too-common monologic style of questioning). We don’t typically agree (“yes!”) and jump aboard the analytic train of our colleagues (“and”), spontaneously entering into dialogue in a spirit of collaborative analysis.”
Though Hegel does identify possible benefits of collaboration, these benefits are not described in detail. Rather, the reader is called to think about the possible benefits on their own.
“Although it’s not our disciplinary habit, I think it’s worth pondering the possible gains of collaborative improvisation with our peers. A model of collaborative work in which we listen and respond in real time and think through one another’s data in unfinished states, whether in the field or in lab/studio environments (as opposed to symposia or workshops, where we share mostly finished work), could enrich how we produce knowledge and make our concepts portable. Agreeing to agree in collaborative analysis could mirror what we do in the field, with the aim not of supplanting debate and critique but rather advancing a lateral analytic process.”
Hegel portrays the possibility of “anthropologists [being able to] improvise with one another and not only with their interlocutors” as an open question. Two constraints are identified. The first is the traditional “lone wolf” mentality, where the researcher and their audience assume the need to produce anthropology/ethnography individually.
Christine Hegel is fretting about what she considers to be non-collaborative about the way contemporary anthropologists analyze data. This is influenced in part by the “lone wolf” mentality inherited from traditional ethnography as well as the career-oriented temptation to use discussions of others’ works-in-progress as an opportunity to establish oneself as an authority on certain topics/theoretical domains.
Christine Hegel is primarily concerned about the missed potential of improvised collaboration between peers during the process of data analysis: “A model of collaborative work in which we listen and respond in real time and think through one another’s data in unfinished states, whether in the field or in lab/studio environments (as opposed to symposia or workshops, where we share mostly finished work), could enrich how we produce knowledge and make our concepts portable.”
Thus she is not trying to think through the mechanics/dynamics/politics of collaboration, or what differentiates successful from unsuccessful attempts to collaborate. Rather, she is calling anthropologists to adopt a specific “improvisational” breed of collaboration during data analysis that she characterizes at “yes, and.” She argues that this manner of collaboration is often employed between the researcher and their interlocutors during data production, but not between researchers during the data analysis phase. She also notes an absence of collaboration during the dissemination phase as interactions at this stage are typically non-improvisational (in the case of publications and peer reviews) or non-collaborative (in the case of Q&A sessions). That is, neither case follows the “yes, and” model. The other phases of the research process that Angela and I have identified are not included in this analysis. Yet, given that the topic of this CA series is “collaborative analytics,” it is understandable that the focus is limited.