Hello all,
Thanks again for the many responses and helpful suggestions.
My own summary of this email trail is as follows:
1) Quite a few weren't happy with the intention to explore British culture
and suggested a more regional perspective, which I agree with. Exploring
cultural traits in relation Britain was seen as questionable, not a serious
scholarly pursuit.
2) Many of the ethnographic studies suggested focus on marginal and
minority groups within the UK (travellers, BME, working class or rural
communities) and very little exploring white middle class Britain (or any
of its regions).
3) From the many references to Kate Fox's Watching the English, which I
enjoyed reading, I infer that:
a. She's a gifted author and had many satisfied readers
b. There are almost no alternatives
At the same time, it was mentioned in several responses that she's not an
academic scholar and doesn't have a PhD. Other references suggested - which
I look forward reading - relating to mainstream Britain, are also not
regarded as 'proper' academic writing. Somehow 'proper' academics don't
write about the topic.
4) It is intriguing to see that in an anthropological mailing list where
studies are regularly shared in which generalisations are made in relation
to endless numbers of Asian, African and South-American cultures, the
possibility of applying the cultural lens to British society raises so many
objections or reservations and that the anthropological studies of white
middle class British culture are so rare and practically don't exist. This
non existence of white middle class British culture as an object for
anthropological research renders it invisible.
During my own anthropological training, I learnt about the Crisis of
Representation during the 1980s that was followed by a shift to doing
'Anthropology at Home' as was also mentioned by Cathy Baldwin, but this
might relate more to the American anthropological tradition?!
5) All of this leaves me wondering whether this might be just another case
of how being invisible serves the interest of the powerful. We all know
that the assumption that men have no gender, and white people have no race
is rife among these groups, so maybe it shouldn't be a surprise if a
similar assumption that white middle class Brits have no particular culture
is also common?
Happy to be corrected.
Best wishes,
Yohai
*Dr. Yohai Hakak*
Senior Lecturer In Social Work
Admissions Tutor and Athena Swan SAT Lead
*T* +44(0)1895 265844 | *E* [log in to unmask]
*Brunel University London*
Inst of Env., Health and Societies (Welfare, Health and Wellbeing theme)
Department of Clinical
Sciences
Brunel University London, Uxbridge, UB8 3PH, United Kingdom
*T* +44(0)1895 274000
*www.brunel.ac.uk* <http://www.brunel.ac.uk/>
http://www.brunel.ac.uk/people/yohai-hakak
On Sun, Jul 21, 2019 at 7:18 AM Nikolai Ssorin-Chaikov <
[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> a very interesting study that touches on the issue of the history of
> English manners etc, is actually not in anthropology but in the history of
> science. I highly recommend this:
>
> Steven Shapin. A Social History of Truth: Civility and Science in
> Seventeenth-Century England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.
>
>
> >
> >
> > On Sat, 20 Jul 2019 at 12:11, Yohai Hakak <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> >> Hello all,
> >>
> >> I am looking for recommendations on literature exploring key British
> >> cultural characteristics in daily interactions such as:
> >>
> >> - the British understatement
> >> - the tendency to avoid direct talk or the difficulty in calling a
> spade 'a
> >> spade'
> >> - queuing
> >> - British manners, for example apologising and saying thank you
> >> - minimal bodily contact
> >> - anything else you think is uniquely British and might manifest itself
> in
> >> every day interactions
> >>
> >> Thanks a lot in advance,
> >>
> >> Yohai
> >>
> >> Dr. Yohai Hakak
> >> Senior Lecturer In Social Work
> >>
> >> Admissions Tutor and Athena Swan SAT Lead
> >>
> >> T +44(0)1895 265844 |
> >>
> >> E: [log in to unmask]
> >>
> >> Inst of Env., Health and Societies
> >> Department of Clinical Sciences
> >> Brunel University London, Uxbridge, UB8 3PH, United Kingdom
> >>
> >> http://www.brunel.ac.uk/people/yohai-hakak
> >>
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