Amit Saurabh

Doctoral Research Scholar, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai

Contact Email : [email protected]

This article is a reflection and recollection of accessing my field during the coronavirus or the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic and the ensuing “lockdown” presented a rare and scary situation for ethnographers. This article briefly presents my unique experiences as a researcher/ethnographer in the field. Toward the end of the article, I argue how ethnographers’ experiences (on the field) during the pandemic can contribute something new to methodological frameworks and theory.

Introduction

Generally, professors in standard research methodology classes conducted for sociology students argue that theory can only guide you to the field/fieldwork; once you approach or arrive in the field, the field takes over. The pandemic posed a situation that was neither covered in the research methodology theory nor classrooms. My research project (Ph.D.) deals with university campuses and student movements. I am doing an ethnography of/on student movements and mobilization keeping Indian university campuses in the center. Hence, for me, physical space, that is, university campuses, become crucial. Through this piece, I share my experience of accessing the ‘field’ (in this case, Allahabad University campus) that was shut down during the pandemic. In a way, this part of fieldwork that I conducted during the pandemic also became an exercise in accessing the in-accessible or partially accessible space. The fieldwork was done during the months of August-October 2021.

Reaching the city

Travelling and ethnography generally go hand in hand and traveling logs make the ethnographic descriptions rich. In classical ethnographic studies you will find how the experiences of traveling and reaching the field have shaped the research and data collection of the researcher. I booked a train ticket to reach the city of Allahabad (my destination) from Mumbai. I reached the platform on the desired date and time. Platforms were usual in their appearance but unusual in the feel. There was hardly any crowd, only a few travelers. The snacks and tea sellers who generally make the Indian railway platforms rich with their presence were conspicuous by their absence. In designated shops on the platform only packed snacks and tea were available.

The train I took was also not jam-packed which generally is the case with any train that travels between Uttar Pradesh and Mumbai as Uttar Pradesh remains one of the states from where a considerable number of people migrate to Mumbai in search of education, livelihood etc. So, a less crowded train itself indicated that this pandemic had severely affected the movement of the people. In order words, we can say that free movement is an indication of normal times, and restriction on movement generally is a characteristic of non-normal times.

Quarantine period: An extra layer of ethics

In normal times after reaching Allahabad, I would have taken a room on rent in a lodge or hotel near the university so as to facilitate interactions with student leaders and student organizations. However, as a result of the changed circumstances, before starting my journey I got in touch with one senior research scholar who did his PhD from Allahabad university and with his help I managed a room in one the hostels of the university for the first few days so that I could complete my quarantine period while also trying to develop some contacts over phone. Luckily, I got a room in the hostel as most of the students were home due to the ongoing pandemic. The tiffin was arranged as during the quarantine period I wanted to keep my physical interaction at minimal and did not want to put anyone at risk. During my quarantine period and throughout my fieldwork I realized that quarantine has added an extra layer of ethics for us researchers as whenever I interacted (keeping the social distance) with the respondents upfront I told them I had completed my quarantine period and took all the required precautions to keep them safe. I could have started my interactions post two or three days after reaching the city but that ethically would have been unfair to the people I was going to engage with. This experience also developed a very interesting sense of bodies and being which was not there earlier. You could be a potential threat (in case you contracted Covid 19) to others and vice versa just by mere presence. This sense made me extra careful towards the well-being of my respondents i.e., my co-knowledge producers.

An ‘outsider’ at a public space and ‘mask’ as an identifier

As my key respondents were students and student leaders, after completing my quarantine period, for my initial informal and formal interactions I was asked by the concerned student or students to reach some tea shop near some hostel in the evening. Tea shops near universities and hostels are a very significant public space which play a massive part in the life of a student as these are the spaces where relations brew. In my case as a researcher, it acted as the entry point to the life of the students and at the very gate I was made conscious of the fact that I wanted to access a space I was not a part of. Let me cite one of the instances.  One fine evening a student called me to one of the tea shops near one hostel and promised to give me two-three contacts which further will help me in my research. I reached the tea shop before time and while waiting for the student I thought of having a cup of tea. “You are not from Allahabad, right?” the tea seller asked me while serving the tea. “No” I answered, “but how do you know?” I asked. “You are wearing a mask. “Now, no one wears a mask in Allahabad, ‘ he replied. At that very moment, I realized that except me no one else at the tea shop was wearing the mask. I belong to the state of Uttar Pradesh and in normal times it would have been difficult for the tea seller to tell if I was an outsider even if I did not belong to the city of Allahabad but the very practice of wearing the mask which was the part of my normal in my campus (IIT Bombay) was not the part of the normal of the city I was in. I was marked as an outsider and this very interaction and experience became my entry point in the field just like the incidents around the cockfight became for Clifford Geertz. A simple apparatus like a mask was more than enough for people to identify me as an outsider, which mostly would not have been the case in normal times.

To Conclude

Pandemics are ruptures. Pandemics are once in a century kind of incidents or accidents. In my humble opinion research methodology classes, at least in sociology do not cover this situation and therefore do not prepare a researcher for such situations i.e., ruptures. I argue that as we all have experienced the pandemic firsthand, how to conduct fieldwork and negotiate fieldwork during such a situation should be a part of the research methodology pedagogy. It eventually will equip the researcher to be prepared for ruptures even in regular times.