Mad Dogs, Englishmen, and the Errant Anthropologist Reflection In his book Mad Dogs, English, and the Errant Anthropologist, Raybeck discusses his observations as he immerses himself in Wakaf Bharu, a city in the state of Kelantan, Malaysia. Throughout the ethnography, he discusses the various differences that he observes with the Kelantanese culture and the American culture, while using his prior knowledge to explain the observations he takes note of. By using these observations, Raybeck proceeds to answer different Naturalistic Questions which explain how Raybeck gathers the information and in what ways his studies impact the culture.
Then, he elaborates on the economical aspect of the culture he studies, explaining how relationships and activities affect the economics of the culture. Finally, I will share my thoughts regarding the ethnography and what types of ethnocentrisms were shown throughout the ethnography and some which I felt. At first, the most important item for Raybeck was the location of the fieldwork as it had to fulfill the set requirements. Raybeck focused on the resources available: a close distance to the capital, a local building which kept all local demographic records, and a population which was not too large or too small.
Using these guidelines, he chose Wakaf Bharu as the site where he would conduct his fieldwork, using the villagers as the subjects of his studies. Next, was gaining entree, or entrance to the village (Omohundro 63), he was to find a modestly priced house in the village where he and his wife Karen could live in, which he was able to do with some help. The only thing that Raybeck had to do was fulfill the landowner’s obligation of doing guard duty which proved to be a good resource in collecting information and gaining contacts within the village.
After settling in, the culture shock starts to kick in for Raybeck which varied from different sources, ranging from the lack of privacy within his home to the straight forward discussion regarding bowel movements, which he and his wife found very inappropriate but important to the villagers. However Raybeck was not the only person who felt a culture shock; this shock was reciprocated by the villagers through Raybeck’s lack of knowledge with certain Kelantanese way of life, especially in regards to dressing and the act of bargaining.
His western style dressing in the beginning of the book, and tendency to not be able to bargain shocked the villagers to a point where Raybeck started to conform. To lessen his impact on the village, he and his wife adopt the traditional sarong called kain and also take lessons from a local merchant in regards to bargaining (Raybeck 43, 45). Moreoever, with his new acquaintances, he learns about the do’s and don’ts of the Kelantanese culture, immersing himself into the culture more. Using both the naturalistic and humanistic approaches, Raybeck is able to engage with and develop a greater understanding of Kelantanese culture.
The humanistic approach requires a great deal of immersion into the culture being studied and Raybeck does that very thing. Early on Raybeck learns the language in order to successfully study the culture. Using this skill, he spends hours talking to villagers about local affairs, learning about the culture as well as gaining rapport, or mutual understanding (Omohundro 64), from the village. His interviews were structured so that each question would not be in the form of a leading question, questions that led to specific answers, so the most honest response would be given (Raybeck 56).
As he interviews more locals and presents himself as a researcher studying the Kelantanese culture, he unofficially gets the role of being the village’s personal scribe, taking notes about the happenings of the society (Raybeck 51). With this role and the well respected image he garners, he notices a greater acceptance by the locals who show appreciation for the work that he does. And by using this acceptance from the locals, he is able to receive help not only from his wife Karen who accompanied him on this journey, but was also able to gain crucial friendships which aided his understanding of the Kelantanese culture.
Friends such as Yusof, Cik Din, and Encik Hussein aided him in giving a tour of the village, explaining certain customs that he was not aware of, giving him their life stories, allowing him to interview them as key informants, individuals who have a great rapport towards the fieldworker (Omohundro 64), and letting Raybeck accompany them to social events so that he could study the social behavior of the natives.
As time passes by, his increased participation in the Kelantanese culture results in a greater rapport within the village. Once incident that really shows this acquired rapport was when he was studying the lives of the prostitutes in the nearby capital, Kota Bharu. A villager who asks him for a ride to the barbershop but detours to the nearest whorehouse, only to be seen by Raybeck. When the villager realizes that Raybeck caught him in the act, he proceeds in lying, trying to establish a reason for this sudden detour.
Raybeck notes how this scene starts to show how his status changing from being an outsider through the act of lying, because He notices the change immediately as described from this section and it shows how a simple act of lying was able to show Raybeck’s increasing rapport vividly. The challenges the Raybeck faces are the ethical issues involving the reporting of certain information. Personal information that came from the villagers were usually out of bounds for Raybeck and he did not have access to many of the arguments and such, but when he did have access, he was not allowed to report on them.
Keeping this confidentiality was an ethical concern as the social status of the villagers was at stake. For example, during a quarrel between a man and a woman one evening, the villagers were not letting Raybeck gain knowledge of the event by denying its occurrence (Raybeck 63). And when Raybeck actually gained knowledge of this, he was to keep the names confidential due to the villagers wanting confidentiality. This is a weakness, he explains, about fieldwork.
The lack of openness to certain information and the status as an outsider really hinders sensitive information to come to you, information that is usually very crucial. However, to Raybeck, the strength of being able to experience the Kelantanese way of life first hand overweighed the weakness and still gave Raybeck crucial information that helped him document the Kelantanese culture. In regards to economics, the Kelantanese culture stresses an importance in interpersonal relationships between the seller and buyer which are crucial and affect how they transfer goods.
For example, because of the importance of interpersonal relationships when buying certain goods in the market, the Kelantanese culture has a bargaining system which Raybeck encounters when buying items from the market. The system was so important that when Raybeck was not able to bargain proficiently, the merchant told him to sit down as she explained every little detail about bargaining, even if some of her tricks of the trade were revealed to the consumer (Raybeck 47). By illustrating this example, the importance of bargaining was not only an economic benefit, but a key to creating a great relationship between the seller and the buyer.
On top of this, Raybeck notices how the individual who is able to bargain the best is looked up upon, gaining a level of respect within the village. During religious days such as Hari Raya Haji, it is customary to go to many different houses during these days so more food is made and eaten. Because of the high food consumption, there is a greater level of food production (Raybeck 49) so the economic activity of farming and producing food is greater during these religious days. Families of poor income will have children who help their families with farming, largely due to economic reasons (Raybeck 102).
Because of not being able to spare the help of the adolescent teenagers who would be able to bring a part of the income to the family, these families would farm together, showing that farming is a family ordeal, mostly related to the lower incomes. The higher income families would be able to send their children to secondary schools in order for them to go into medicine, business, teaching, army officers, and even government services (Raybeck 103). The difference of status would then show that farmers are lower class and producers, while the higher professions were upper class and the consumers.
As far as ethnocentricities go, I found myself uncovering my own ethnocentricities as I read through Raybeck’s ethnography. For example, when Raybeck discusses how the villagers would enter each other’s households unannounced took me with great surprise (Raybeck, 37). Growing up in the American culture which puts a great deal of emphasis on personal privacy, it was startling to see how another culture could just walk into a house that did not belong to them, bringing out my ethnocentrism regarding privacy. Another ethnocentrism that also affected me was the open talk about bowel movement between the villagers (Raybeck 40).
I felt a slight uneasiness when the villagers brought this topic up in such an open manner because of the explicit nature of the discussions. This behavior just seemed to be too much information for me because in the American culture, certain information would be deemed inappropriate to talk about in public. So naturally, I found it very disturbing when the villagers talked about the topic of bowel movement in public. Even Raybeck and his wife found the talk of bowel movements unsettling at first by considering these talks as irregular by the American standard.
Raybeck also notes the villagers’ interest in finding what the price was for a mattress he bought, which Raybeck viewed as impolite in American standards (Raybeck, 45). This again brought out ethnocentricity within Raybeck as he started to judge the villagers action based on the American culture. Finally, even the Villagers expressed certain ethnocentricities towards Raybeck and his wife after they move in. The villagers believed that since Raybeck and his wife were so involved in the culture, they would convert to Islam, a customary act which many individuals do as they settle into the village (Raybeck 50).
From this, the villagers expressed how their preconceptions of being accepted into their own culture required accepting the Islamic religion. By having this mindset, they brought out an ethnocentricity of their own, showing that Raybeck was not the only one with ethnocentrisms. I was very impressed by the fact that Raybeck was able to conduct this research using a Humanistic approach. The level of immersion he brings upon himself leads to honest information, hardly tampered by any bias.
One memorable instance which reflected this level of immersion was when Raybeck took the initiative to join the jaga, or the guard, only a couple of days into his arrival in the village (Raybeck 26). Without knowing anyone else in the village and possessing a basic understanding of the language, he bravely takes part in an important aspect of the village traditions exhibiting his level of dedication towards the research. However, one of the items that upset me the most was the fact that Raybeck kept his sample to the village of Wakaf Bharu and did not focus more on any of the other villages.
Even though this would have taken a greater amount of time and resources, I felt that limiting the majority of the responses from one village did not encompass the Kelantanese culture as well as getting the information from more than one sample. Moreover, by keeping the sample as that one village, Raybeck could have only experienced a certain area’s beliefs and customs which could lead to a bias. However, even with this drawback, I was impressed by the amount of depth that Raybeck puts into his research and found it not only informative but enjoyable as well.
