Positive and Negative Fields : The “Hand” of the Ethnologist and the Blow of Political Discourses (Research Note)
Continuing from a research project carried out in Corsica, which focuses on the relationship between the construction of political discourses and the reading of regional daily press, I am addressing the question of the nature of research, using the metaphor of the positive and negative hand in parietal paintings. The field is thus perceived as one of dualities which structure each level of the investigation : the boundary of the population, the identification of the dynamics at work in the production of these objects. In order to highlight these dualities, I carry out interviews and observations among people elected in the region, journalists of the regional daily press and readers, native of the same village. The aim of my study is to highlight the relationship between the « events » as they appear in the regional daily press, and the speeches of various actors who take part in these events. The dynamics at work in the production of these events and speeches can be understood as effects of the coexistence of contradictory consensuses that emerge in a socially networked society.