Discomforting ethnographic knowledges

Abstract

This special issue aims to deepen emerging theoretical engagements with discomfort, in relation to recent debates on affect and emotion, and grounded in ethnographic research. It is based on a joint project of bringing together scholars from different backgrounds to examine the methodological and conceptual affordances of discomfort. This project started in the 2019 AIBR (Iberoamerican Anthropology Association) annual conference, where the editors of this special issue made a call for contributions that examined discomfort from original and committed approaches. The quality and the breadth of perspectives moved the editors to collaborate on this publication proposal. The focus on discomfort is a way for the authors of the special issue to bring together approaches from across disciplines, to challenge fixed frames, and inhabit disciplinary borderlands. This common thread also allows the authors to bring together research from contexts and disciplines that might not otherwise be brought into conversation.