Ethnology. The Adaptability and Continuity of a Discipline

This article discusses the development throughtime and space of ethnology as a multifaceted disciplinaryfield. The objective of the article,however, is to challenge possible pre-assumptionsof ethnology as an incoherent i.e. variable and inconstant discipline, due to national limitations andtheoretical and methodological responsiveness, byproposing some core aspects regarding focalpoints,perspectives and methods that may beconsidered as prominent and unifying amongstethnologists both in Sweden and abroad. The articleargues for a general and continuing disciplinarianfocus on culture as a pluralistic, complexand individual-based phenomenon, as well as fundamentalinterest in the functions, social structures,constructions and experiences of cultures.Furthermore, the article describes how both earlierand later generations of ethnologists in generalhave chosen to study culture based on a selectionof recurring perspectives that comprise boththe intangible and tangible aspects of culture, aswell as the spatial and social contexts in whichcultures are formed and maintained. Finally, thearticle highlights how different types of ethnologicaldata are collected and analyzed via a combinationof constantly developed methods of culturalanalysis, though rooted in a disciplinarian tradition. In conclusion, despite a continuous progressionand adjustments within ethnology in regardto perspectives and methods over time and space,this has more often resulted in additions ratherthan replacements. For this reason, it seems relevantto define ethnology as a coherent discipline,designated by both adaptation and continuity.