A collaborative methodology between photography and performance in ethnographically informed research

This article starts from the discussions in Writing culture that provided a new perspective on ethnographic writing. The author acknowledges that there has been a proliferation of ‘sensory’ approaches in the social sciences and ethnography, and ‘ethnographic’ projects in the arts. The article explores some of the critiques that both perspectives (art and ethnography) received because of the blurred distinction between their respective methodologies and the privileging of experience over interpretation in their claims to ‘truth’. The author engages in this discussion by reconsidering the relationship between photography and ‘reality’ and repositions the role of the photographer-researcher as co-creator of ethnographic knowledge. By focusing on the study of a Danish micro-community in Argentina, she explores the possibilities and challenges of performative photography as a (collaborative) ethnographic methodology. The author discusses the critical and experimental possibilities of a performative photographic approach in ethnographically informed research, and reflects on a collaborative project that involved staged photography and dance.