ABSTRACT
Anthropologists in development know that collaborative research has become imperative on at least few levels. This chapter provides a window on the analytic capabilities of the former 'objects of research', capabilities which anthropologists have begun to appreciate. Then follows a critical sketch of certain Food Systems Under Stress (FSUS) workshop activities and discourses. The full FSUS programme aims to contribute to the development of social awareness in food-security planning by providing an avenue for collaboration between African researchers, policy-makers and food-insecure rural producers. The chapter also shows, first, that the people who attend participatory workshops (the villagers, the community workers, the policy-makers, the facilitators) are a highly diversified group, and secondly, that there is more at stake for participating anthropologists than a simple recording of the plurality of voices. When committed to participatory appraisal and research, anthropologists will become aware that someone must also reflect on the total context of the research process.
