Slow Fieldwork, less a methodology than a momentary intervention, is the performative dimension of slow ethnography and involves staged embodiments of slowness in the field through performative movements, exercises, or self-imposed rules. Slow fieldwork can be collaborative or individual, public or personal. For example, one might try to continually recalibrate their spatial awareness by stopping and performing Jakob von Uexkull’s exercises for finding one’s personal coordinate system (1934, 15-16) in each new place they go. Or, they might choose strategically to do a “slow walk” – attempting to walk as slow as one possibly can – at particular sites or moments of the day. A less conspicuous example might be deciding to play a game from one’s childhood with one’s interlocutors. Slow fieldwork draws inspiration and tactics from performance art.
The Water Moves Too Quickly
By Garrett Lockhart
"We can see all the water now, it is too lively"
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You and Us Silent Beings
By Ségolène Guinard
"They told me about the time before the great fires. Before everything became ashes..."