Ethnography refers to in-depth participant observation research and to the written report that results, and is often described metaphorically as a type of “cultural translation.” Little attention has been paid, however, to the actual linguistic translation that occurs in the process of research and writing, even in the interdisciplinary field of Latin American Studies, in which research is often conducted in a language other than English and written up in English. The privileging of academic Standard English in ethnographic texts creates dilemmas for ethnographers whose research participants speak “foreign” languages. These dilemmas are rarely discussed in the ethnographic texts or the literature on ethnographic methodology. Based on content analysis of 47 book-length ethnographies on Latin Americans, we investigate how ethnographers typically deal with language difference in their texts and why language matters. Language is intimately connected to power dynamics in the field, and ethnographers’ decisions about how to represent language can indicate rigor and thoughtfulness about their position vis-à-vis participants, yet such linguistic reflexivity is rare.
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Appendix
Latin American Ethnographies Reviewed in Latin American Research Review
1999–2009
Auyero, Javier
2000Poor People’s Politics: Peronist Survival Networks and the Legacy of Evita. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Babb, Florence E.
2001After Revolution: Mapping Gender and Cultural Politics in Neoliberal Nicaragua. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
Caldwell, Kia Lilly
2007Negras in Brazil: Re-envisioning Black Women, Citizenship, and the Politics of Identity. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Carey, David Jr.
2001Our Elders Teach Us: Maya-Kaqchikel Historical Perspectives. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press.
Carrier, James
1995De los Otros: Intimacy and Homosexuality among Mexican Men. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Carrillo, Héctor
2002The Night is Young: Sexuality in Mexico in the Time of AIDS. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Cohen, Jeffrey H.
2004The Culture of Migration in Southern Mexico. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
Coyle, Philip E.
2001Náyari History, Politics, and Violence: From Flowers to Ash. Tucson, AZ: University of Arizona Press.
de la Cadena, Marisol
2001Indigenous Mestizos: The Politics of Race and Culture in Cuzco, Peru. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Downey, Greg
2005Learning Capoeira: Lessons in Cunning from an Afro Brazilian Art. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
DuBois, Lindsay
2005The Politics of the Past in an Argentine Working-Class Neighbourhood. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press.
Ehlers, Tracy Bachrach
2000Silent Looms: Women and Production in a Guatemalan Town. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Gledhill, John
1991Casi Nada: A Study of Agrarian Reform in the Homeland of Cardenismo. Albany, NY: Institute for Mesoamerican Studies.
Goldstein, Daniel M.
2004The Spectacular City: Violence and Performance in Urban Bolivia. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Goldstein, Donna M.
2003Laughter Out of Place: Race, Class, Violence and Sexuality in Shantytown. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Gutmann, Matthew C.
1996The Meanings of Macho: Being a Man in a Mexico City. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Gutmann, Matthew C.
2002The Romance of Democracy: Compliant Defiance in Contemporary Mexico. Berkley, CA: University of California Press.
Hagedorn, Katherine J.
2001Divine Utterances: The Performance of Afro-Cuban Santería. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Books.
Hendrickson, Carol
1995Weaving Identities: Construction of Dress and Self in a Highland Guatemala Town. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
Lester, Rebecca J.
2005Jesus in Our Wombs: Embodying Modernity in a Mexican Convent. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Little, Walter E.
2004Mayas in the Marketplace: Tourism, Globalization, and Cultural Identity. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
Lundgren, Inger
2000Lost Visions and New Uncertainties: Sandinista Profesionales in Northern Nicaragua. Stockholm: Almquist & Wiksell Intl.
McAlister, Elizabeth
2002Rara! Vodou, Power, and Performance in Haiti and Its Diaspora. Berkley, CA: University of California Press.
Meisch, Lynn A.
2002Andean Entrepreneurs: Otavalo Merchants and Musicians in the Global Arena. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
Mendoza, Zoila S.
2000Shaping Society through Dance: Mestizo Ritual Performance in the Peruvian Andes. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Miguez, Daniel
1998Spiritual Bonfire in Argentina: Confronting Current Theories with an Ethnographic Account of Pentecostal Growth in a Buenos Aires Suburb. Bloomington, IN: University of Indiana Press.
Monaghan, John
1995The Covenants with Earth and Rain: Exchange, Sacrifice, and Revelation in a Mixtec Sociality. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
Nájera-Ramírez, Olga
1997La Fiesta de los Tastoanes: Critical Encounters in Mexican Festival Performance. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press.
Nugent, Daniel
1993Spent Cartridges of Revolution: An Anthropological History of Namiquipa, Chihuahua. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
O’Dougherty, Maureen
2002Consumption Intensified: The Politics of Middle-Class Daily Life in Brazil. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Orta, Andrew
2004Catechizing Culture: Missionaries, Aymara, and the “New Evangelization.” New York: Columbia University Press.
Ottman, Goetz Frank
2002Lost for Words?: Brazilian Liberationism in the 1990s. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press.
Pessar, Patricia R.
2004From Fanatics to Folk: Brazilian Millenarianism and Popular Culture. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Richards, Patricia
2004Pobladoras, Indígenas, and the State. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Romberg, Raquel
2003Witchcraft and Welfare: Spiritual Capital and the Business of Magic in Modern Puerto Rico. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
Rosendahl, Mona
1997Inside the Revolution: Everyday Life in Socialist Cuba. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Salzinger, Leslie
2003Genders in Production: Making Women Workers in Mexico’s Global Factories. Berkley, CA: University of California Press.
Sanford, Victoria
2003Buried Secrets: Truth and Human Rights in Guatemala. New York: Palgrave MacMillan.
Sawyer, Suzana
2004Crude Chronicles: Indigenous Politics, Multinational Oil, and Neoliberalism in Ecuador. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Segal, Ariel
1999Jews of the Amazon: Self-Exile in Paradise. Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society.
Sheriff, Robin E.
2001Dreaming Equality: Color, Race, and Racism in Urban Brazil. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Starn, Orin
1999Nightwatch: The Politics of Protest in the Andes. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Turino, Thomas
1999Moving Away from Silence: Music of the Peruvian Altiplano and the Experience of Urban Migration. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Warren, Jonathan W.
2001Racial Revolutions: Antiracism and Indian Resurgence in Brazil. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Waxer, Lise A.
2002The City of Musical Memory: Salsa, Record Grooves, and Popular Culture in Cali, Colombia. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.
Wilson, Carter
1995Hidden in the Blood: A Personal Investigation of AIDS in the Yucatán. New York: Columbia University Press.
Zur, Judith
1998Violent Memories: Mayan War Widows in Guatemala. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
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