Tambo: Life in an Andean Village

Front Cover
University of Texas Press, Jul 5, 2010 - Social Science - 297 pages

Perhaps the best way to sharpen one's power's of observation is to be a stranger in a strange land. Julia Meyerson was one such stranger during a year in the village of 'Tambo, Peru, where her husband was conducting anthropological fieldwork. Though sometimes overwhelmed by the differences between Quechua and North American culture, she still sought eagerly to understand the lifeways of 'Tambo and to find her place in the village. Her vivid observations, recorded in this field journal, admirably follow Henry James's advice: "Try to be one of the people upon whom nothing is lost."

With an artist's eye, Meyerson records the daily life of 'Tambo—the cycles of planting and harvest, the round of religious and cultural festivals, her tentative beginnings of friendship and understanding with the Tambinos. The journal charts her progress from tolerated outsider to accepted friend as she and her husband learn and earn, the roles of daughter and son in their adopted family.

With its wealth of ethnographic detail, especially concerning the lives of Andean women, 'Tambo will have great value for students of Latin American anthropology. In addition, scholars preparing to do fieldwork anywhere will find it a realistic account of both the hardships and the rewards of such study.

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Contents

I
1
II
14
III
29
IV
41
V
59
VI
64
VII
70
VIII
79
XV
149
XVI
154
XVII
166
XVIII
173
XIX
180
XX
184
XXI
189
XXII
197

IX
88
X
105
XI
115
XII
121
XIII
135
XIV
143
XXIII
204
XXIV
212
XXV
221
XXVI
231
XXVII
236
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About the author (2010)

Julia Meyerson is an artist who lives in Earlville, New York.

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