The value of single-site ethnography in the global era: studying transnational experiences in the migrant house

摘要

Since George Marcus wrote his seminal article on multi-sited ethnography, this methodology has become much used by scholars who study people's everyday life in a global and transnational context. In that same article, Marcus argued that single-site ethnography can still be a useful methodology in the global era. In contrast with multi-sited ethnography, Marcus' thoughts about single-site ethnography have rarely been elaborated and put into practice so far. The aim of this paper is to show the value of doing single-site ethnography in the field of transmigration studies. The paper concentrates on migrants' personal experiences of living in-between two countries. Drawing on recent research by Katie Walsh, I will show how both the relationality and emotionality of transnational experiences can be studied in one place: the migrant house. The crux of an ethnography of the migrant house is to regard that place as both a relational and an emotional place. Since geographers have thorough knowledge about relational and emotional senses of place, they can play an important role in further developing these single-site ethnographies.