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jp 5 ny

David Wästerfors

Professor

jp 5 ny

Businessmen as folk ethnographers

Author

  • David Wästerfors

Summary, in English

Before the rise of professional ethnography, untrained methods to investigate ‘other’ cultures prevailed among various Westerns actors: travelers, missionaries, colonial administrators, and traders. This article analyzes how such informal ethnography is still treated as an epistemic guide in a post-colonial and transnational business world. A particular case is examined: Swedish and Swedish-Polish businessmen

working in emerging markets in Poland and neighboring countries in Eastern Central Europe after the fall of Communism. Situated in what they regard as commercially attractive but relatively unknown cultures, these

businessmen oscillate between classic fieldwork and profitable control, pragmatically linking their eagerness for knowledge with their ambition to get things done. The overall vision is a folk version of ethnography,

rhetorically celebrated but practically complicated.

Department/s

  • Sociology

Publishing year

2008

Language

English

Pages

235-256

Publication/Series

Ethnography

Volume

9

Issue

2

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

SAGE Publications

Topic

  • Sociology (excluding Social Work, Social Psychology and Social Anthropology)

Keywords

  • folk ethnography
  • sociologi
  • emerging markets
  • business
  • rhetoric
  • culture
  • Eastern Europe
  • sociology

Status

Published

Research group

  • Kriminal- och socialvetenskapligt nätverk

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1466-1381