Ethnography Caucus: Ethnography in the Age of Trump II

Session Submission Type: Paper Session: Traditional Format

Abstract

The recent election of Donald Trump showcased the widespread discontent of white working class voters, the rising impact of right-wing and alt-right ideologies, and the increased vulnerability of marginalized communities including undocumented immigrants, people of color, refugees, and Muslims. This is the second of two panels that center on the study of communities that have been harmed by neoliberal governance and economic restructuring, but who have experienced these damages in different ways and have developed vastly different political responses to them. This panel brings together ethnographers to discuss the promises and perils of ethnography in the age of Trump. In a time when so many different groups of Americans are being denigrated and silenced, good ethnography in these communities is all the more urgent. Likewise, panelists will discuss the question of how to continue ethnographic work among Trump supporters while working to resist Trump. Communities across the U.S. and world have been and will continue to be profoundly affected by Trump's presidency. This session explores how ethnography can be a tool in this time of rising authoritarianism, repression, fear, and division.

Huang draws from critical interventions on empire within American studies in order to analyze perspectives drawn from fieldwork at a “China Mall” in South Africa, a site of racialized and capitalized intimacies in a time when “world history veers south.” Johnson situates the blurred boundaries of “free” and “hate” speech within the discourse and both virtual and physical violence surrounding a talk by Milo Yiannopoulos on the University of Washington campus entitled “Cyberbullying Isn’t Real.” Krehbiel reflects on the occasion of Trump’s election as a fraught moment for considering the stakes of asking survivors of sexual violence to break their silence, one which raises ethical and political questions about collective responsibilities and differentiated vulnerabilities. Rosas interrogates the problematics faced by a scholar offering expert testimony in deportation and removal cases, a situation in which the interests of interrupting one form of state violence may require mobilizing versions of Mbembe’s “imperial racisms” in discourse that appeals to white sensibilities and risks “making dead” those whom the advocate would support. Together these papers track a terrain marked by empire and violence, intimacies and advocacies, upon which ethnographers seek critical equipment for engaging the age of Trump.

Sub Unit

• American Studies Association Annual Meeting

Chair

• C. Richard King, Washington State University

Individual Presentations

• Making Dead to Let Live - Gilberto Rosas, University of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign

• On Breaking Silence: Ethnographic Activism for Survivors - Stephanie Krehbiel, University of Kansas

• Whose Side Are You On? When Hate Circulates on Campus to Uphold Free Speech - Jessica Johnson, University of Washington

• The Ethnography of Empire: Revisiting the “Imperial Turn” Through the Global South - Mingwei Huang, University of Minnesota Twin Cities