Resumen

SCHNEIDER, Gretel. A metaphor for investigating in prison. Runa [online]. 2021, vol.42, n.2, pp.331-347.  Epub 27-Ago-2021. ISSN 1851-9628.  http://dx.doi.org/10.34096/runa.v42i2.8373.

The “Juan José O’Connor” Penal Unit No. 1 for boys in Paraná (Entre Ríos- Argentina), where Primary School No. 27 “Vicente Fidel López” operates, has been a familiar territory for me, for 10 years. Since the end of 2005, I have been part of a group of university extensionists that started with the detainees, various educational and cultural spaces, from the perspective of community communication.

I started participant observation at the school in 2015 and this forced me to make decisions about how to register and to find a metaphor to present ourselves in the field in which I was already related, since investigating is associated with police investigation or the search for evidence that prosecutors carry out in criminal complaints. However, that metaphor was not well chosen enough as a series of controversies were generated among the students, at the beginning and during the first months of my stay there. This allowed me to gauge what it means for those deprived of liberty to share fragments of what they think and feel with someone who does not belong entirely to that space, and the importance of knowing what to do with what they tell me.

We will also address the issue of moving like a fish in water in a territory as familiar as it is strange, allowing us to reflect on the possibilities and limits of “anthropology at home”.

Palabras clave : Ethnography; Prison; Reflexivity; Field work; Conflicts of meaning.

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