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In the fourth chapter of Rethinking Digital Anthropology, Tom Boellstoff (2012) explores the relationship between the virtual and the real in the first part. In the second part, the author studies anthropology through the cases in the virtual world “Second Life” game. In the third part, the author analyzes the theory of the first partContinue reading “Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of digital ethnography based on Tom Boellstoff’s “Rethinking Digital Anthropology” (2012), comparing it to visual analysis.”

The Camera Lucida was Roland Barthes’ last work in 1981. The book seems to be composed of delirious thinking and scattered essays, but in fact, a kind of phenomenological thinking throughout. In this way of de-theorizing, conceptualizing, and systematizing, Barthes constructed his unique theoretical framework of visual analysis, namely “Get back to Photography” (p.7). InContinue reading “Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of visual analysis based on Roland Barthes’ “Camera Lucida” (1981), comparing it to discourse analysis.”

After reading Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight, what most impresses me is that Cifford Geertz discoursed: “Societies, like lives, contain their own interpretations. One has to learn how to gain access to them.” It means that if we need to understand and know about the culture a society conveys, it is essential toContinue reading “Reading Reflection on Cockfight”

In the article “Rethinking digital anthropology”, Tom Boellstoff (2012) attempts to figure out the complex relationships between the virtual (the online) and the actual (the physical or offline), as he defined the digital anthropology ‘an approach to researching the virtual’ (Boellstoff, 2012, p.40). He concerns on a mistaken belief that the virtual and the actualContinue reading “Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of digital ethnography based on Tom Boellstoff’s “Rethinking Digital Anthropology” (2012)”

Within his rethinking around understandings of digital anthropology, Tom Boellstoff (2012) presumes knowledge of ethnography on behalf of the reader. Therefore, to offer a definition:  ‘ethnography is not a single method but an approach that draws on numerous sources – observation, interviews, documents, artefacts – while maintaining a focus on how people experience their dailyContinue reading “Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of digital ethnography based on Tom Boellstoff’s “Rethinking Digital Anthropology” (2012), comparing it to visual analysis.”

In Roland Barthes’s book Camera Lucida (2000), he talked about visual analysis by focusing on his own perspectives of photograph and photography, instead of talking more about photograph technologically and professionally. His book is more like a “diary” that can be read in spare time and can bring some thoughts at the same time. HeContinue reading “Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of visual analysis based on Roland Barthes’ Camera Lucida”

A picture is a message. Take the press photograph as an instance. “ Considered overall this message is formed by a source of emission, a channel of transmission is the staff of the newspaper, the group of technicians certain of whom take the photo, some of whom choose, compose and treat it, while others, finally,Continue reading “What pictures convey”