Fieldwork

Knowledge

• Gain an excellent overview of the ethnographic region in which you will conduct fieldwork.
• In-depth knowledge of qualitative research methodology with a focus on participant observation and the interpretation and analysis of social interactions.
• Experience-based knowledge and a deeper understanding of the research process in Social Anthropology.

Skills

• Attain practical experience in managing your project and collecting qualitative data during fieldwork.
• Learn how to execute your own independent research project.
• Apply and reflect on key methodological and theoretical tools involved in the collection, production and analysis of different types of data.
• Convert fieldwork material into anthropological data, and will gradually learn how to move from data to analytical text in an ethically sound manner.

General competence

• Respect scientific values, such as openness, rationality and precision and will learn to distinguish between research-based knowledge, the importance of analytical model choices, practice-based knowledge and "perception".
• Gain ethical awareness concerning the various problems that may arise during research and the writing up of research results.
• Adhere to the principles of academic honesty, integrity, and responsibility when it comes to your research and to other professional work.

You must be enrolled in the master’s programme in Social Anthropology.

Students who are admitted to study programmes at UiO must each semester register which courses and exams they wish to sign up for in Studentweb.

If you are not already enrolled as a student at UiO, please see our information about admission requirements and procedures.

Compulsory activities:

• Project Proposal Update (pre-fieldwork). Before you start your fieldwork, you must have a mandatory meeting (ca. 30-60 minutes) with your supervisor, during which you present your project plans. This discussion should use the project proposal that was submitted at the end of ANTH4020 as a basis. The main task is to update your supervisor on further preparatory developments or changes made to the submitted proposal and clarify further ethics and safety challenges that may still need to be discussed. Your supervisor will assess this mandatory meeting as Approved/Not approved.
• MA Fieldwork Notification form (pre-fieldwork). You must fill in and submit the MA Fieldwork notification web form to notify the department about the details requested before starting your fieldwork. This will be assessed as Approved/Not approved.
• Sikt approval. All Master's projects must be pre-registered with the Norwegian Agency for Shared Services in Education and Research (Sikt). You are obliged to have the Sikt approval and inform the department of your Sikt reference before you start your fieldwork. This will be assessed as Approved/Not approved. Please read SAI’s data storage guide (in English and Norwegian).

All compulsory activities must be approved in order to take the ANTH4200 exam.

In the event of illness or other valid reasons, you can apply for a valid postponement of compulsory activity. Apply for valid absence from or need for postponement of compulsory activity

Exam:

• Fieldwork report (post-fieldwork).

The exam itself consists of a fieldwork report that must be submitted after fieldwork. The total word count of the fieldwork report should be around 3500 words (+/- 10 percent).

Previous exams and assessment guidelines

Guidelines for the fieldwork report

Fieldwork abroad:

All students who want to undertake fieldwork abroad must familiarize themselves with UiO’s "safety abroad" guidelines.

• Illness at exams / postponed exams
• Resitting an examination

It is possible to take the exam up to 3 times. If you withdraw from the exam after the deadline or during the exam, this will be counted as an examination attempt.

Grades are awarded on a pass/fail scale. Read more about the grading system.

Also see Grading guidelines in social anthropology