The Conceptual Metaphor as an Ethical Kaleidoscope in Field Research

Maria Flis; Karol Piotrowski

doi:10.18778/1733-8077.20.1.03

Authors

Maria Flis Jagiellonian University, Poland https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5586-2351
Karol Piotrowski Jagiellonian University, Poland

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/1733-8077.20.1.03

Keywords:

Metaphor, Ethical Kaleidoscope, Researcher Identity, Researcher Sensitivity, Ethical Code

Abstract

Attention to metaphor as a tool for cognition and action has already been called by the classic work by Georg Lakoff and Mark Johnson—Metaphors We Live By (1980). However, some four decades after this publication’s first edition, the role of metaphor as a useful instrument in empirical research seems to have been forgotten. Therefore, the first step taken in the text at hand is to highlight that codes of ethics neither resolve nor befit the dynamically shifting circumstances of research conducted in the field. Ethical codes are often insufficient. Hence, an objective here will be to critically assess the broad application of such codes in general. The second step will be to turn to metaphor as a tool in developing the sociological imagination as understood by C. Wright Mills. The metaphor can also assist in finding oneself when confronted with difficult, ambiguous circumstances that may arise during fieldwork. Metaphor as a tool, as an ethical kaleidoscope coherently links the field research experience precisely with the sociological imagination.

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Author Biographies

Maria Flis, Jagiellonian University, Poland

Maria Flis is a professor of sociology and Head of the Section of Social Anthropology at the Jagiellonian University, Cracow. Her areas of research interest encompass philosophy, the sociology of culture, social anthropology, the history of ideas, cognitive science, and the cultural mechanisms by which knowledge is developed. Her most significant books (in Polish) include Leszek Kołakowski—A Theoretician of European Culture (Leszek Kołakowski – Teoretyk kultury europejskiej, 1994) and The Social Anthropology of Radcliffe-Brown (Antropologia społeczna Radcliffe’a-Browna, 2001). She also edited and contributed to a collaborative volume, The Ethical Dimension of Cultural Identity (Etyczny wymiar tożsamości kulturowej, 2004). Among her other chapters and articles are “Patriotism in Light of Ethics Discourse: Is a Patriotic Education Possible?” [“Patriotyzm w świetle etyki dyskursu: czy możliwe jest patriotyczne wychowanie?”] (in Ethics and Patriotism [Etyka a patriotyzm], 2019); “Kołakowski’s Discourse on Man” [“Kołakowskiego dyskurs o człowieku”] (Kwartalnik Filozoficzny, 2010); “Utopian Thinking: A Discourse on the Culture of Leszek Kołakowski and Zygmunt Bauman” (Orbis Idearum, 2/2019); and “The Identity of Human Nature and the Dominant Identity Strategy in European Culture” [“Tożsamość natury ludzkiej i dominująca w kulturze europejskiej strategia tożsamościowa”] (Kultura i Społeczeństwo, 2/2020).

Karol Piotrowski, Jagiellonian University, Poland

Karol Piotrowski is a Ph.D. candidate in the Doctoral School of Social Sciences at the Jagiellonian University in Cracow. He holds a master’s degree in sociology from the Institute of Sociology, Jagiellonian University. He is preparing his doctoral dissertation on equality marches and parades with a particular focus on the social practice of corporeality and “bodilyness” manifested during these events. His research interests are situated on the borderline between anthropology and sociology, especially focusing on the anthropology of the body, identity, sexuality, visual analysis, and symbol theory.

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