Frédérique Jankowski (Centre Norbert Elias, Lyon)
Detachment As a Way of Being Engaged: Human Observer-Primate Relationships in the Field
The history of field methods in ethology reveals the difficulty of treating animals as neutral objects of inquiry. Since the 70s, detachment is considered the only acceptable scientific posture allowing the objectification of observed behavior. In order to guarantee a certain distance with the object of study, various tools are used: methodological ones (predefined observation grids, quantification), but also paradigmatic ones (cognitivism) which relegate the observer in a stance of exteriority and neutralize the interactivity of observation situations.
However, one might suspect that this theoretical frame meant to guarantee scientific objectification has certain consequences on behavior’s definition and interpretation. What does remoteness imposes and allows or not to describe ? This talk questions data collected in Ivory Coast, Guinea and South Africa, during groups of baboons habituation process to the presence of a scientific observer. Analysis of simian behaviors and human practices from a relational point of view is essential to account for these processes’complexity. The use of new tools is necessary to reconsider, without subjectivity, their interactive nature. This perspective allows to treat "detachment" and "engagement" not as two antagonistic phenomena, but as elements defining singular relational forms between a man and various individuals of a group.
