18 February 2013

Up in Nipigon Country: Anthropology as Personal Experience

Reviewer: Kelsey
Author: Edward J. Hedican
Format: Paperback
Pages: 156
Rating: 5 out of 10

Summary (love Goodreads): Arguing that modern day fieldwork has much to offer a social anthropologist, this study takes the author's experience as a worker in a First Nation community in Northern Ontario as an example of how basic research can be linked to theoretical thinking and result in epistemological value.

Summary (love Me): Hedican, an anthropologist, studies a town in Northern Ontario. This novel is about his experiences there and what he learned. This novel is often used as a textbook for Anthropology students (like me). 

My Take: Okay, I only read this novel because I had to for class. For the most part, it was interesting. He records many of his experiences and he writes them in story format. It was more like a short story book than a textbook. Sadly, we only get pieces of the story which he interrupts with how he came to certain conclusions or technical jargon. The stories are fascinating enough and I knew there would be a lot about his conclusions since it was my textbook but that doesn't mean that I had to like it. As far as ethnographies (the type of book this is) go, this is one of the better ones. If you ever wonder what cultural anthropologists do for a living, this is a solid look into that. 

In Conclusion: This is interesting for the type of book it is but I wouldn't just read it for fun and I'm an anthropology student! If you are curious, you'll be able to finish it but I wouldn't rush out this second to buy it.

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