Anthropological Research on Transnationalism and "Street" Phenomena

Prof. and Dr. Monika Salzbrunn attends two Conferences with Prof. Yasumasa Sekine

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:31:19 +0900

Dr. Monika Salzbrunnを迎えての研究会・シンポのご案内 Monika Salzbrunnさんは、ドイツのご出身ですが、長年パリのベルヴィルという移民の多い地区で空間性を意識した深い調査をしてきた方です。昨年パリを訪ねたとき面白い場所を案内してくださいました。今回はストリートの科研で関根が招請しまして、東京を中心に日本の都市のフィールドワークを共同で行う意図で、２月２５日~３月１０日の期間、滞日します。下記のように、東京で２月２８日、大阪で３月４日、二度の研究集会を開催します。ご興味がありましたら、奮ってご参加ください。残念ですが、旅費をお出しすることはできません。ご参加いただく場合は、下記の関根宛メールに必ずご一報ください。問い合わせも同じメールです。 muttamman@gmail.com 成城大学でのミニ・シンポジウム小田亮さんの主宰するコミカル研究会・上杉さんの主宰するグローカル研究会と関連付けて集会の場をセッティングしてくださいました。以下の要領で開催します。シンポジウムタイトル: 「現代都市における共同性・複数帰属・ストリート」 Multiple Belonging and the Street：Urban Communality in the Era of Reflexive Modernization. 日時　2月28日（日）午後　14：00～18：00 会場　成城大学（3号館3階大会議室）構成発表１ “Multiple Belonging in Urban Neighbourhoods: How Festive Events Create Communality” 　Monika Salzbrunn (Prof. Dr. Monika Salzbrunn（Fuculty of Social Science, 　　Ruhr-University Bochum, & Researcher at the CRIA (CNRS-EHESS), 　Paris）発表２ “Toward an Anthropology of the Street：Street Phenomena in the Era of Reflexive Modernization” Yasumasa SEKINE　(Japan Women’s University) 司会　上杉富之（成城大学）コメンテーター　植村清加（東京国際大学）　泉水英計（神奈川大学）未定質疑は日本語で通訳あり国立民族学博物館共同研究会竹沢尚一郎（民博）さんの主宰する共同研究会「移民と国民国家」の研究集会で場を提供していただきました。以下の要領で開催します。私の発表は添えものです。２０１０年３月４日（木）１３：３０～国立民族学博物館　大演習室（４階）発表１“From Immigration to Diversity in Urban Spaces: a View from the Street” Monika Salzbrunn（Prof. of Fuculty of Social Science, Ruhr-University Bochum, & Researcher at the CRIA (CNRS-EHESS), Paris）発表２「英国ロンドンにおける南アジア系移民社会の近年の動向を巡って」関根康正（日本女子大学）総合コメント　　野村雅一（総合研究大学院大学副学長）

In the International Symposium held at Kyoto university, Pfof. Sekine presented his paper on "An Anthropology of Street"

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 16:03:29 +0900

International Symposium: “The Future of Anthropology and Ethnological Museum” First Day: “The Future of Anthropology” December 7th 2009, 10:30-17:00 at Siran Kaikan of Kyoto University Chairperson: Suehara Tatsuro, Professor, Kyoto University Program: 10:30-11:30 Key Note Speech: Maurice Godelier, Professeur, EHESS, France ”In Today’s World Anthropology is More Important than Ever” 13:00-15:00 Presentations: Sekine Yasumasa, Professor, Japan Women’s University “Toward an Anthropology of the Street: Street Phenomena in the Era of Reflexive Modernization” Kasuga Naoki, Professor, Osaka University “Toward the Science of Human-Nature” Takezawa Shoichiro, Professor, National Museum of Ethnology “Anthropology, Museum and Seeing: Reconsidering the Representation” 15:30-17:00 Discussion 1800-20:00 Party

2009 report

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:36:38 +0900

2009 report under construction

An Anthropology of the Street

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:30:39 +0900

An Anthropology of the Street under construction

2007 report

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:27:39 +0900

2007 report under construction

2008 report

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:27:39 +0900

2008 report under construction

publications

Thu, 21 Jun 2007 17:19:47 +0900

publications test

Other information

Thu, 21 Jun 2007 17:19:20 +0900

Other information test

Meetings conferences test entry

Thu, 21 Jun 2007 17:06:15 +0900

Meetings conferences test entry

!test! Research in Progress

Sun, 17 Jun 2007 14:00:49 +0900

!test! Research in Progress

Research Background

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This research project is entitled ‘Anthropological Studies on Transnationalism with special reference to “Street” Phenomena’ (Toransunashonarizumu to ‘Sutoriito’ Genshō no Jinruigakuteki Kenkyū), or more informally as the ‘Street Anthropology’ project. It is headed by Prof. Yasumasa Sekine of Japan Women’s University and was launched in academic year 2004, after being selected for a grant by the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka, Japan. Members meet at the museum four times a year (three times in the first year); meetings are conducted in Japanese. Originally designed as a three-year project, it has recently been approved for a fourth year which will take it into spring 2008. To date it has met ten times, hearing presentations from researchers active in a wide variety of fields that relate to street phenomena. Abstracts of presentations may be seen (in Japanese only) at this address:
http://www.minpaku.ac.jp/research/jr/04jr070.html

This venture has its roots in a previous research project also held at the National Museum of Ethnology, entitled ‘Toshiteki-naru Mono’ towa Nanika?’ (What is the Urban?), also led by Yasumasa Sekine. The fruits of that project were published in a book entitled ‘Toshiteki-naru Mono’ no Genzai: Bunka Jinruigakuteki Kōsatsu (The Present Condition of the Uraban : Cultural Anthropological Inquiries), published in February 2004 by University of Tokyo Press. The present street anthropology project was designed to build on the achievements of the urbanism project.

The fact that this project builds on two previous ones gives it an extremely firm foundation, without which the present project could never have been imagined. The continued discussions between project members and guest speakers with a rich variety of fields and research interests constitutes a valuable asset and a shared foundation for continued research. We view this as part of an on-going process in which members will take with them the perceptions gained in debate at our meetings as they return to the field to make further and deeper studies of street phenomena. We place great emphasis on the research contributions of the senior members of the group, while also strongly encouraging the younger members to engage in relevant fieldwork. The developments of present-day society will surely live most vividly in the fieldwork conducted by young researcherswho are sensitive to the trends of the times, and we keenly anticipate fresh insights from their endeavors. While we have held regular meetings for three years now, we are keenly aware that there has still not been enough fieldwork done, and that an intense need remains to carry out more detailed observation and recording of street phenomena in locations around the world.

Assignment

Sun, 17 Jun 2007 13:17:21 +0900

Research Objectives We define the concept of ‘the street’ as a broad field that constitutes one of the major challenges confronting contemporary anthropology. Why, now, do we need an anthropology that focuses on the street? To put it simply, the fact is that a dramatic trend towards a society based on ‘space of flow’ in a Castells' sense has come to define the post-modern condition. That reality is of course a continually developing research theme that is now increasingly occupying the whole spectrum of the social sciences, under the banner of such concepts as globalization and transnationalism. In sociology, a different discipline but one that is drawing steadily closer to anthropology, we see for example the increasing application of media theory in a bid to ask what is going on in everyday life and elucidate the reality hidden behind it. Though the fruits of such research are most meaningful, they do tend to seek for ever more refined methodologies rather than doggedly recording reality, and as a result, reality tends to become dwarfed to the impetuous theoretical gaze. The knife is sharp, but whether it cuts to the heart of the matter is a different question. These impetuous attempts to use theoretical frameworks to ‘understand at one blow’ tend to leave the theoretician observing from up in the sky, at risk of missing the finer points of reality within the panoramic view. Reality is complex and in constant flux. The vital feature of anthropological research is its constant use of the heuristic approach, a methodology that emphasizes a gradual closing-in on understanding by a series of trial-and-error personal learning experiences. This anthropological research style, with its willingness patiently to close in on our incomprehension of reality, and then to continue its relationship with that incomprehension [for as long at it takes to come to terms with it], is where we sense the possibility for anthropology to make a distinctive contribution within the social sciences. As one may see from this methodological feature, anthropological research has a close natural affinity to “the view from below,” with which there is a need to describe and analyze contemporary reality, as presently being studied under the ambit of the space of flow, globalization, transnationalism etc. This research project emerged from an awareness that applying the above anthropological methodology and perspective to the ‘street phenomenon’ could be highly effective in developing one branch of the transnationalism research that is of such vital importance for the world today. That is to say, the word ‘street’ as used here includes two meanings. The first meaning is relatively literal: it signifies the street phenomenon in all its multilayered complexity, covering a range of research targets, from actual streets themselves to the globalization of people, things and words or the dimension of streets as transnational pathways. The second meaning of the term is the ‘view from below’ – the street as a methodological vantage point. In other words, the term denotes ‘transnationalism from below’ – a methodological viewpoint fitting to the objective of describing the kind of reality that cannot be described from the transcendental perspective which is ‘transnationalism from above’ (Smith and Guarnizo 1998). Such was the thinking that led us to define our research objective as ‘Anthropological Studies on Transnationalism with the special reference to the “Street” Phenomenon.’ Steven Vertovec, a leading figure in transnationalism research within the discipline of anthropology, divided the analytical framework for that research into six main sub-fields: “transnationalism as a social morphology, as a type of consciousness of belonging, as a mode of cultural reproduction, as an avenue of capital, as a site of political engagement, and as a reconstruction of ‘place' or locality” (Vertovec 1999). In this project we recognize the need to remain aware of all six elements in this schematization, but propose to focus primarily on the two that are most susceptible to the anthropological approach: cultural reproduction and reconstruction of place. We hope to investigate the problems that arise in relation to change and reconstruction in specific localities and local cultures as they are buffeted by the storms of globalization. Tomiyuki Uesugi, in the course of a paper summarizing recent developments in transnationalism research, emphasizes the possibility for anthropology to make a contribution in one of Vertovec's sub-fields, that is, ‘type of consciousness of belonging,’ an area that Uesugi sees as under-researched, covering issues such as the multiple consciousnesses of international migrants and their multifaceted networks (Uesugi 2004). While taking due account of this view, we principally want to look at the hitherto under-theorized fields of locality and translocality. This is because we think that the realities of local spaces await a more detailed analysis even than that expressed in the term ‘transnationalism from below.’ This is a project that cannot be accomplished except by the kind of intense empirical survey that goes beyond the work of our rivals in the field of cultural studies, to generate accurate descriptions of change and creation in local spaces – those most delicate of fieldsites. In order to describe that delicate reality in contemporary local spaces, Yasumasa Sekine, currently head of this project, has stressed the importance of maintaining a clinical separation between two types of locality: ‘victorious localities’ and ‘defeated localities’ (Sekine 2005). The idea of the distinction between two types of locality is borrowed from Walter Benjamin's Arcades Project (1999), where Benjamin coined ‘the history of the defeated’, often taking the narrative form of a natural history of ruined sites, in contradistinction to the history of the victors based on the so-called 'theory of progress'. This research project has adopted the hypothetical perspective outlined above with a view to excavating the history of ‘defeated localities.’ However, rather than contenting ourselves with micro-level studies, we hope to take on the challenge of re-locating these micro-level realities within the macro-structure of contemporary society. This signifies an attempt to make a more accurate analysis, a finer dissection, of realities that hitherto have been rather roughly expressed in such terms as ‘globalization’ and ‘alter-globalization.’ In that sense, the concept of ‘street phenomena’ is an ideal tool for thinking not just about ‘victorious localities,’ which have been verbalized and incorporated in contemporary discourses, but also the ‘defeated localities’ that have tended to be left on the other shore or to be hidden in the shadows cast by victorious localities. ‘Street phenomena’ include those of the center and those of the margins. That is what gives us the concrete image of victorious and defeated localities. Since the 1990s, Sekine has been continuing research on street phenomena in the major Indian city of Chennai (Madras). An example of dominant street phenomena would be Vinayaga Chatrthi, a city festival organized by Hindu nationalist elites, in which Hindu idols are paraded around the streets on giant floats. In contrast, an image of marginal street phenomena would be the construction of ‘pavement temples,’ mainly by members of the poverty class, some of them homeless and living on the sidewalks. Far from being unrelated to the trend toward transnationalism brought on by economic liberalization, Sekine has found that this kind of micro-level practice is actually made possible by that very trend (Sekine 2004). Both phenomena are proceeding in parallel, and it is impossible to meaningfully discuss just one of them. However, we will not get any closer to the reality of marginal phenomena if we continue to view them simply as ‘marginal.’ In order to get a clear view of ‘defeated localities’ it is necessary to move into the ‘margins,’ and to switch our perspective to that of the marginal location. With this switch of perspective, the ‘margins’ are transformed into ‘boundaries,’ places with the potential for creative living, and the landscape changes at a stroke. A new kind of place comes into view, a borderland in which difference itself is the stake, and which conceals the possibility of imagining/creating a ‘world as it might have been’ in the space between ‘the world as it is’ and ‘the world as it is not.’ Based on this kind of vision and perspective/methodology, this research project sets as its basic objective a concrete and detailed description of street phenomena, with all the multiple dimensions concealed within it, through intensive fieldwork carried out by members of the project team and other collaborators in a variety of local societies around the world. During this four-year project, and especially in the final two years, we plan to use this detailed description as a foundation for inquiry into the methodological and theoretical prospects for delineating ‘defeated localities’ within the context of ‘transnationalism from below.’ That is to say, this project's anticipated outcomes include an accumulation of data and a degree of theorization of that data. The point of this anticipated research outcome lies in what should be the perception at the very core of the transnationalism research perspective, namely a movement or shift of the gaze with which we look upon the world. Put simply, this is a shift from a gaze that views movement as an abnormal condition seen from a fixed point of residence to one that acknowledges that mobility is in fact the reality of the world we live in. In the material accumulated to date in transnationalism research, realistic empirical studies on this perception have not been adequate to match its importance as a subject of study. This research project aims to directly take on the challenge of remedying this deficiency. The significance of this project's research findings, which will be derived by learning from detailed observation of reality the need for this kind of shift in perspective, will lie in its contribution to an accurate grasp of the reality of the so-called ‘fourth world’ problem – that is, the problem of homeless populations within first-world societies. Homelessness here is broadly defined, with the understanding that people with fixed abodes are also in a sense becoming homeless. The fourth world has actually become more apparent as society enters the phase of post-modernity. If we fail to adopt a field of vision that grasps the reality of this shift of perspective, and continue to gaze upon modern society from a fixed/settled perspective, we will not be able to find appropriate responses to the various problems occurring continuously before our very eyes in contemporary society – problems that have ‘the appearance of abnormality’ – and the situation will merely become more chaotic while solutions are postponed amid unnecessary prejudice and misunderstanding. It is therefore fair to describe this research project as basic research that has good prospects of contributing to society by putting to use the strengths of anthropology as a mode of study that is ready and able to change the gaze with which it looks upon the world. Works Cited Benjamin, Walter, 1999, The Arcades Project (originally published in German as Passagenwerk, 1927-40). Cambridge, Mass. and London: Belknap Press. Smith, Michael P. and Louis E. Guarnizo, eds., 1998, Transnationalism from Below. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers. Vertovec, Steven, 1999, Conceiving and Researching Transnationalism, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 22-2. Sekine, Yasumasa, 2004, ‘Toshi no Heterotoporojii: Minami Indo, Chennai (Madorasu)-shi no Hodō Kūkan kara’ (The Heterotopology of the City: As Seen from the Space of a Sidewalk in Chennai [Madras], Southern India). In Sekine Yasumasa, ed., ‘Toshiteki-naru Mono’ no Genzai: Bunka Jinruigakuteki Kōsatsu (The Present Condition of Urbanism: Cultural Anthropological Inquiries). Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 472-512. Sekine, Yasumasa, 2005, ‘Contemporary Popular Remaking of Hindu Traditional Knowledge: Beyond Globalisation and the Invention of Packaged Knowledge.’ In Christian Daniels ed., Remaking Traditional Knowledge; Knowledge as a Resource. Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. Uesugi, Tomiyuki, 2004, ‘Jinruigaku kara Mita Toransunashonarizumu Kenkyū: Kenkyū no Seiritsu to Tenkai oyobi Tenkan’ (Transnationalism Studies Reviewed from an Anthropological Perspective: The Formulation, Development and Paradigm Shift in the Concept of Transnationalism). Nihon Jōmin Bunka Kiyō (Annals of the Japan Popular Culture Institute), 24: 126-184.

List of members

Sun, 17 Jun 2007 13:16:10 +0900

研究代表者

Yasumasa SEKINE, Japan Women's University

研究分担者

Masaichi NOMURA（Kyoto University of Foreign Studies）
Makoto ODA（Seijo Universutty）
Motoji MATSUDA（Kyoto University）
Toru KONMA（Kanagawa University）
KLEINSCHMIDT Harald（University of Tsukuba）
Hiroyuki MATSUMOTO（Nara Women's University）
Satoshi TANAHASHI（Ochanomizu University）
Hiroyuki SUZUKI（Kokushikan University）
Tom P. GILL（Meiji Gakuin University）
Masahiro KATO（Ritsumeikan University）
Ippei SHIMAMURA（The University of Shiga Prefecture ）
Yasuko TAMAKI（Osaka Sho-in Women's University）
Takaaki CHIKAMORI（Japan Women's University）

研究協力者

Toshiharu ABE（Saitama University）
Yumiko ASAHI（Sophia University）
Sayaka UEMURA（Seijo Universiy）
Mizuka KIMURA（National Museum of Ethnology）
Akiko KUNIHIRO（Kanagawa University）
Junko NAITO（Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Japan Women's University）
Yoshinari MORITA（Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Osaka University）
Kaori YAMADA（National Museum of Ethnology）

!test! 研究会情報：民博共同研究「ストリートの人類学」2007年度第1回研究会

Sun, 17 Jun 2007 13:14:56 +0900

民博共同研究「ストリートの人類学」の一年間延長が決定しました。最終年度第１回目の開催日程・内容は下記の通りです。 6月30日（土）13:30～19:00 13:30～16:00西垣有「モンゴル・ウランバートル市におけるトランスナショナルな場の生成」 16:00～19:00田沼幸子「あの人たちには文化がない：革命キューバのストリート(calle)」 7月 1日（日）10:00～15:00 　１）特集「ストリートの人類学」についての討論　２）報告書内容に関する討論

!test! seikahoukoku

Sun, 17 Jun 2007 13:12:00 +0900

2006年度成果報告 今年度は代表者および分担者のうち5名が、また研究協力者6名の合計11名が本科研課題に関する国内外の現地調査を行った。それぞれが、グローバル化する世界のなかでの近代の徹底化を足もとから問い直そうとしており、とりわけ西欧型近代化の限界問題を考える格好の場所としてストリート(現象)にアプローチしている。研究代表者関根康正は、イギリスの南アジア系移民社会の生活空間の構築を検討し、本科研が意識的に取り上げる二重の次元のストリートを探索する。トランスナショナルな交通としての移民現象という次元のストリートに加えて、そこでの場所としての物理的なストリート空間の役割を現地調査で解明を試みた。研究分担者のトム・ギルは、イギリスでのホームレス問題からストリート現象にアプローチした。ロンドンでは「セイント・マンゴーズ」というＮＧＯが運営しているホームレス施設を、リバプールでは、「ホームグラウンド」というホームレス青年用施設を、に１週間泊まりながら、オックスフォードでは、「オックスフォード・ナイト・シェルター」をそれぞれ体験的に調査した。イギリスの膨大なホームレス支援システムを三ヶ所の都市では草の根レベルで見ることができ、比較資料を蓄積でき大きな成果をあげられた。加藤政洋は沖縄那覇市において、戦後の那覇と大阪でほぼ同時期に形成された売春街を例に取り、比較検討した。どちらもいわゆる「風俗」街として存続しているという点で共通しているが、とくに後者ではコリアタウンの形成や新興宗教の拠点形成など、異他なる社会が共在するヘテロトピア的ストリート性を強めている。玉置育子は東京での化粧文化研究の資料収集後に、台北において化粧に関する現地調査を行った。まず、陽光社会福利基金会に出かけ、火傷患者のリハビリ及び社会復帰への支援について調査を行った。顔の皮膚の皮下組織までが破壊されケロイド状になっている患者に対して化粧を施すことで社会に復帰を支援している話しを中心に伺った。その後、台北医科大学において化粧品、情報の入手方法、購入場所、化粧に対する考え方等に関するインタビュー調査を行い成果をあげた。見られる場、みせる場であるストリートというアリーナの基礎資料を蓄積した。近森高明はパリ・ベルリンにて街路の利用形態を対象とする実地調査を行った。パリでは、歴史的建造物の作るストリートであるパサージュが、現在では高級ギャラリーや、移民によるインド料理街、服飾関連の問屋街など、種々に転用されている状況を調査した。ベルリンでは、Ｗ・ベンヤミンの描いた1900年前後のベルリンの地誌を現状と比較しつつ、大戦と冷戦の記憶を保存する博物館都市としての面と、記憶が抹消された都市という面が共存する、特異な都市的記憶の構成をストリートにおいて考察する資料を収集した。 6人の研究協力者は、それぞれの以下のような課題をめぐって現地調査を進めて基礎資料を収集できた。國弘暁子はインド・アフマダバード北方のバフチャラ女神字寺院においてヒジュラとストリートという課題に取り組んだ。森田良成は東インドネシア、西ティモールに滞在し、都市部へ出稼ぎに来て廃品回収業に従事する農民の仕事の様態からストリートにおいて村と町がどのような力で接しているのか、その原理を不器用な人々の「耐久力」に探った。朝日由実子は東南アジア地域におけるグローバル化の中でのローカリティの問題を検証すべく、マレーシア、カンボジアにて伝統的染織の実態に関してマクロな力とミクロな対応との両面調査を実施した。山田香織はドイツのミュンヘンにおいて規則によって強く秩序化されたストリートでの公私の狭間で起こる微細で微妙なストリート現象をめぐって実地調査した。木村自は多様な移住者が集まる上ビルマのトランスナショナルな社会空間タウンジーにおいて、雲南から流入した中国ムスリムが有する災因論が多宗教・多民族状況のなかでどのような影響をうけているのかについて調査を行った。内藤順子はチリのサンチャゴ市のスラムにおけるストリートの実態調査から、上からの施策立案を貫く貧困像と貧困者の生活実感からの実践とのズレが浮き彫りになったことは貴重な収穫であった。このようにトランスナショナリズムと「ストリート現象」について多岐にわたる地域と主題が扱われ、初年度に相応しい実績の蓄積がなされたことにより、来年度以降の具体的展開に確実な足がかりを得た。