XCOL Logo
An Ethnographic Inventory

Call for Inventions

In our first Call for Inventions (CfI) we are particularly aiming to inventory accounts of ‘field devices’: the inventive social and material arrangements undertaken, created, made or repurposed in the course of doing fieldwork with others.

What we have in mind are texts of at least 2000 words accounting for these field devices in at least two senses: (1) fleshing out the context as well as the social and material arrangements of particular ‘field devices’ as they are put into practice in empirical situations; and (2) hinting at the particular modes of ethnographic inquiry they enable or make emerge.

We particularly welcome texts experimenting with genres in between recipes or instruction manuals and ethnographic descriptive accounts.

Deadline: February 18, 2022

You can check here for the full content of the call, as well as examples and guidelines to prepare your proposal!

Inventions in this bundle

How to ‘device’ an ethnographic infrastructure

Glossary terms in this bundle

Field devices

Field devices are the situated and relational expressions of ethnographic modes of inquiry. A field device may have the form...

Xpositions in this bundle

Call for Inventions 1.0: Field Devices

In our first Call for Inventions (CfI) we are particularly aiming to inventory accounts of ‘field devices’: the inventive social and material arrangements undertaken, created, made or repurposed in the course of doing fieldwork with others. What we have in mind are texts of at least 2000 words accounting for these field devices in at least two senses: (1) fleshing out the context as well as the social and material arrangements of particular ‘field devices’ as they are put into practice in empirical situations; and (2) hinting at the particular modes of ethnographic inquiry they enable or make emerge.

Convocatoria para contribuir con invenciones 1.0: dispositivos de campo

Solicitamos textos de unas 2.000 palabras que den cuenta de dispositivos de campo que incluyan dos aspectos: (1) que contextualicen y describan las condiciones sociales y materiales de estos 'dispositivos de campo' en las situaciones empíricas en las que se han puesto en práctica; y (2) que expliciten los modos particulares de indagación etnográfica que esos dispositivos permiten desarrollar. Estamos especialmente abiertos a textos que experimenten con géneros híbridos, entre el formato de recetas (o manuales de instrucciones) y los relatos etnográficos de carácter descriptivo.

Writing inventions: A how to guide to approach the description of ‘field devices’

The different inventions we aim to inventory in xcol call for particular writing genres beyond established ones. This form of writing can be a complicated task. In this text we have put together our first 'how to' guide to the different genres we aim to inventory: 'field devices.' We believe these are peculiar writing pieces. Here we share a suggestion on how to approach their writing and a proposal with the structure of sections.