INTRODUCTION:

From the beginning, the proposed work of ethnographic criticism led to several ideas
being rooted by my head; Something related to music, perhaps seeking a relationship
between music and cultures at the level of how we perceive certain melodic and
harmonious patterns depending on our belonging and, therefore, enculturation in a
given region and how from them we give them a concrete emotional meaning.
Perhaps some ethnographic critique based on some sociological account, because
before beginning this degree I attended Psychology with mention to the social
spectrum in that same center, the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Specifically,
"The Social Dynamics of Family Violence" by Angela J. Hattery, which deals with
patterns and behavioral constructs that ultimately derive from the submission of the
other, all based on fear that anxiety ease control in order to disappear, but which does
nothing but become a smoke curtain and, ultimately, increase by itself.
Finally, none of these was chosen, because I have chosen a more daring purpose in
order to leave the comfort zone and enter into other social and humanitarian fields
such as Ethnographic Anthropology. This proposal implies to me a great opportunity
to revise and learn at many levels; Firstly, to review the anthropological baggage of
feminism, because we are now more than ever at a point where this movement
sounds and exposes without fear, giving us knoweledge about many things that until
now had gone unnoticed as they passed through the filter of the dominant patriarchal
man even when they're about to get exposed. Second, analyze and understand, the
called by the author ,"Experimental anthropology" in which the way of writing and
exposing the facts, for example, in the case of annotations and field diary, is not
entirely orthodox in Critical anthropology parameters. And finally the constant
relationship that it has with the postmodernist movement throughout the book and
how it influded directly in obliging this one, and also others, to revise and redefine
themselves
This essay, then, will be developed and based on these three items. How did the fact
that Margery Wolf was a woman influenced her work? How has the perspective
changed since she wrote the texts so far? Why does she self-label her as experimental
anthropology? What does it mean? How does Postmodernism affect and impact on
experimental ethnography?
It influded directly in obliging this one, and also others, to revise and redefine
themselves"
CRITICAL REVIEW:

Margery Wolf, (1932-present), was a leading feminist anthropologist in her field.

Born in Santa Rosa in 1933 and graduated from Santa Rosa Junior College at the age
of 20, she moved to New York after obtaining his degree to marry his first husband,
also an anthropologist, Arthur Wolf. There, she began to work as a research assistant
of a Social Psychologist called William Lambert in the field of social sciences and
behavior, and was finally considered a remarkable figure in the trajectory of the
Stanford Center for the Advanced Study of Behavioral Science. Later, with Arthur,
moved to Taiwan, to a small island in eastern China, where they lived for 2 years.
Once there, they carried out extensive field work in the rural areas of Taipei making
possible the first publication of Margery; "The House of Lim; A Study of a Chinese
Farm Family ", published in 1968. Finally,thanks to its large number of ethnographic
publications on the rural areas of Taipei it made possible a great relationship between
the USA and China, as it was granted a scholarship by the American government by
the time to obtain cultural data about the Asian country after it has opened its doors
to Western academics. With "Revolution Postponed: Women in Contemporary
China", Margery concluded her stage about Oriental studies and returned to America
where she met her second husband, teacher and anthropologist at the University of
Iowa, Mac Marshall, where she generated his latest academic publication before
retiring "A Thirce Told Tale: Feminism, Postmodernism and Ethnographic
Resposability."
Margery Wolf's "Thirce Told Tale: Feminism, Postmodernism and Ethnographic
Resposability" (1992) is an experimental ethnography written by herself based on
facts that happened in Peihotien, a small town in Taiwan, in 1960. Throughout the
book is exposed the story of a woman who, resolutely and on several occasions, acts
suicidal in addition to presenting symptoms of cognitive bias and mental illness as
well as being possessed. From that moment on, and adding that it was considered an
outsider, because to be considered a "real" member of a tribe you had to be a part of
it for at least one generation and she was only 10 years old, they take it to a
psychiatric hospital where they have it under the influence of drugs and physically
limited (tied to a bed). After that, and when she returned to the village, she was
considered by some as a "Tang-ki" or "Shaman", understood as an individual with
healing abilities and notions to predict the future. For others as someone who simply
lost the presence of a soul (something very common there) and finally as someone
chosen by God to communicate with the earthly, which was considered a relevant
status.
This story is structured and explained in 3 parts. Each of them explains the same but
with differences among it's language and technical depth.
The first one is exposed to us as a brief narrative, simply exposing the facts in a
direct way. At the end of this one, there's a comment from Margery where there are
several things. The first is the anthropological and gender perspective that reigned at
that time; Margery was nothing more than the wife of an anthropologist, because her
recognition was based on her gender. At the point a woman applied the term
"experimental" in Anthropology, this one, was interpreted as self indulgence. When a
man did that, he acquired the "experimental" meaning in all its magnitude. As she
quotes in the book "In other words, men explore new paradigms; women mess
around on the fringes of knoweledge / art / literature / whatever. "
Also remark that anthropology is a discipline with very permeable borders; It really
gets information and data from many other fields that can provide answers to the
questions that are asked, so do not be surprised when it is being labeled and criticized
by postmodernism. Well as I said, this first chapter called "The Hot Spell" can be
interpreted as mere Entological fiction, since it is nothing more than a descriptive and
detailed narrative of what happened. In fact, the same author warns that this could
happen, but she prefers to see it as a "confessional tale", because she seeks the
empathy of the reader, not her sympathy.
The clearest comparison of this point against postmodernist critique about the search
for a reasoning method to look for the truth, is that the experimental ethnography
maybe shouldn't be included in these investigation lines that seek the truth, as
perhaps it isn't as reliable as it belongs to the magnitude of this objective.
The second is a collection of annotations from field journals done by her teammates
and her, we can find technical comments and exhibit descriptions of other authors
made by the author in the same body of the chapter for the first time. Well, we
should also consider the reliability and importance of the field notes. The
determining factor of the field note is its relevance for the reader, but also for the
writer. For the one who is reading, contributes to built a reality where he gains
knowledge and for the writer works as an internal dialogue in a way that gives
prespective and may change the point of view if they are read later in time and in a
different place from where they were taken . As Margery says; "Fieldnotes can
challange memory". To conclude, for many anthropologists, explains Margery, are a
determining when it's about collecting information, ordering and writing it. For her
they were merely powerful information, because if you did not analyze them they did
not have any type of wealth.
Finally, in "Chapter Four", the same story is again exposed to us, but this time with
much more cure in the language and with a cadence of facts much more well-written.
On a personal level, it turned out to be a little redundant, so, the same plot is read so
many times, but I actually found interesting the differences shown in all the chapters
well she was exposing the same but in different ways. The first one is exposed
without any aesthetic pretense, the second is merely informative and complementary,
and this third could be understood as an amalgam between both.
In "The Woman Who Did not Decome a Shaman", the relationship between the
author's book and the criterion of experimental ethnography appears notoriously.
Before, however, it must be said that both chapers exposed before were created in
another lifetime, because we can observe a much more mature and critical Margery
Wolf in this one than in the first two deliveries. It has to be said that the audience of
the first chapter is related to a general profile while in the second it varies to a much
more limited audience, because initially she did not have any intention to distribute
and make public these data. In the latest chapter, the target is intentionally an
audience with a certain path in the territory of anthropology and feminism. This,
reverses directly the affirmation of Margery, where she says that the important thing
is the meaning, not the form of it, so she is convinced that the readers and the
anthropologist mates will evaluate his work not for the quality of the continent, but
for the quality of the content. This makes us understand that the will of experimental
ethnography to control the aesthetics of general ethnography is not healthy. So, the
relevant and nutritious thing is the author and the message, not the presentation.
To sum up, this allows us to conclude that this book has not been written as an
Orthodox Ethnography, and that we do not have to label it as experimental
ethnography either. It gives us a valuable perspective when it comes to assessing
ethnography as an informational tool and helps us to be aware of it and the
responsibility it faces against the critique of postmodernism.
Finally, a reflection wich I find interesting to be exposed before going into the
conclusions of the work is that the feminist movement has always been under
suspicion for the same things that postmodernist critics nowadays celebrate; To
question the absolute objectivity, rejecting the detachment and to display
contradictory outlooks.

CONCLUSIONS:

After this critical analysis, we can draw several important conclusions based on the
informative exposition done by Margery Wolf. Actually the true content of the book
is not the succession of facts lived by Mrs. Tan, no. Is the critical background of this
one towards anthropology and the relevance of doing ethnographic fieldwork adding
the fact of beeing a woman.
First of all, lets focus on the constant mention that Margery does to postmodernism
through analyze her work and her role as an anthropologist. Based on this, we can
conclude that, according to Margery, the postmodernist movement has been useful in
the sense that it has forced Anthropology to redefine itself, forcing it to be more
attentive and responsible exposing the facts , to describe situations and to use more
empirical and descriptive methodologies. It must also be said that, for her, what will
continue to maintain living anthropology and preserving it as a discipline is its
content force, not its aesthetic.
Finally, we can deduce the concept of "ethnographic responsibility" which lets us
understand that the author must gain consciousness and contemplate his object of
study and result of it as a representative sample of society, wich should be taken into
account trying to be as careful as possible when it comes to make their searches and
publications.

To sum up, identify Margery as a true social icon highlighted at many levels; being a
woman and carrying out all the work and function that she did, in the way and the
moment she did it, positions her as a pioneer in the field of teaching social research,
second wave of the feminist movement, work of anthropological field and applied
ethnology of the 20th century.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Wolf, M., A Thrice Told Tale: Feminism, Postmodernism and Ethnographic

Responsibility, Stanford University Press, (California 1992).

Pere Portero Tresserra.

NIU: 1427887