With our background in social anthropology, archaeology and heritage studies our aim is to study the gathering and construction of 'science', data and notions of 'nature' through an observation of (and interviews with) natural scientists in the field. We are interested in fieldwork practices, and relationships between scientists and landscape, animals and plants, and in long-term relationships with the field - repetitions, series and returns - making SEES particularly relevant. Anthropological fieldwork implies participation in normal activities, which, as in earlier fieldresearch in Ny-Ålesund, implies spending time with and assist a group of natural scientists. We are specifically curious about research on 'ruderal ecologies', that is new ecological relations and transitions triggered by prior human activity - such as, e.g. archaeological remains of hunting and whaling, traces of settlement, or lasting/abandoned scientific apparatus. The archaeological component of our project brings in the landscape perspective, focusing both on descriptive landscape surveys and on observing how scientists engage with 'nature' or landscape on a macro and micro scale. With reference to heritage studies we are interested in how certain conceptions of nature and nature-culture relations affect scientific endeavours carried out in these landscapes, and how the research conducted affects back on understandings of nature and natural heritage.
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