Transcultural Ethnography: Reciprocity in Indonesian-German Tandem Research

Abstract

Following at least four decades of critical reflection on the issues of power and the politics of representation in the social sciences, a renewed interest in knowledge divides has recently emerged. The World Social Science Report (International Social Science Council 2010) revealed many of the inequalities and asymmetries that have shaped the production of scientific knowledge and the reproduction of disciplines. Accused of academic and methodological imperialism, due to the fact that most methodological knowledge has been developed in the context of Western universities and has often been used for Western research in non-Western contexts, the North has become the subject of much criticism (Ryen 2011, 439). Indeed, it must be conceded that although contemporary postcolonial approaches have considerable impact on important theoretical debates, relatively few efforts have been undertaken to decolonize social science methodologies in order to work out practical research approaches based on equality and exchange (see Kaltmeier 2012, 20). In this chapter we want to present and discuss our experiences in developing such an approach.¹