ABSTRACT
Sociocultural anthropology is unique in requiring graduate students to conduct lengthy, qualitative research or ‘fieldwork’ in another culture.1 Fieldwork is the prescribed rite of passage that must be successfully negotiated before the doctoral student is recognized as fully professional; fieldwork transforms the neophyte into a ‘real’ anthropologist (Johnson 1984; Tedlock 1991:67-70). Because of its central place in the identity of the discipline, it is not surprising that the impact of fieldwork upon the identity of the fieldworker, and vice versa, is the subject of intense scrutiny at a time when anthropology is questioning its definition as a discipline. Nor, considering the secrecy which customarily surrounds all rites of passage, is it remarkable that it has taken anthropologists so long to examine their own identifying experiences critically and publicly (DeVita 1990; Tedlock 1991).
