Date post: | 23-Apr-2018 |
Category: |
Documents |
Upload: | nguyenkhanh |
View: | 213 times |
Download: | 0 times |
Professor Glauco Sanga Ca' Foscari University
http://www.easaonline.org
6 September 2016
Re.: Ms. Roberta Chiroli
Dear Professor Sanga,
We, the Executive Committee of the European Association of Social Anthropologists, are addressing you out
of concern for a young graduate student in anthropology, Roberta Chiroli, who was sentenced, in June 2016
in Torino, to two months of prison on probation (con la condizionale) for her participation in a
demonstration. We are convinced that this sentence is the result of a misunderstanding.
Ms Chiroli’s fieldwork for an MA thesis at the University Ca’ Foscari of Venice focused on a social
movement opposing the construction of a high speed train between Turin and Lyon, the NO TAV movement.
The project had been approved by her supervisor, Valentina Bonifacio, and Roberta had a letter from her
supervisor explaining the scope and purpose of her fieldwork. She was not an activist of the movement.
During her fieldwork, Ms Chiroli was present at a demonstration at the seat of a private company
(Itinera) involved in the construction works. On that occasion, she was asked by police officers to present her
documents. During the demonstration, the activists (many of them minors) had entered the company’s
compound and wrote ‘NO TAV’ on a wall, and then blocked a company truck for a few minutes. Available
video footage shows that Ms Chiroli was there but kept on the side, never taking an active role. Nonetheless,
she was subsequently found guilty of ‘moral collusion’ (concorso morale) in the illegal occupation of a
private site and violence towards the truck driver (probably consisting in blocking his truck). A female PhD
student in sociology who had also been present during the demonstration, similarly had charges brought
against her, but unlike Ms Chiroli, she was acquitted.
Although the court has yet to publish its reasoning, the difference between the two cases apparently
concerned the use of a ‘participatory’ first person plural in the text of Ms Chiroli's thesis. According to her
defense lawyer, the use of the first person pronoun in the ethnographic description of the demonstration
seems to have been the evidence used by the court to condemn Ms Chiroli to two months of detention for
‘moral collusion’ in the events.
We believe the verdict to be a result of a misunderstanding of the nature of ethnographic research.
Unlike other social scientists, anthropologists strive to understand ‘the native's point of view’, describing and
analysing other people's social and cultural worlds from within, without taking a moral stance. This often
implies a strong identification with the informants during fieldwork (necessary to build trust) and writing (to
demonstrate ethnographic authority), and so the use of the first person plural is common, and this holds even
when the group under study is a marginal out-group. Thus, Roberta Chiroli's identification with the
demonstrators merely shows that she did a competent job as an ethnographer.
The European Association of Social Anthropologists expresses its solidarity with our colleague
Roberta Chiroli. We sincerely hope and believe that the court will realise that a mistake has been made owing
to a misunderstanding of the nature of ethnographic research, and – accordingly – will overturn the
conviction of Ms. Chiroli.
Yours sincerely,
Thomas Hylland Eriksen
President, EASA