The Ambiguity of Boundaries in the Fieldwork Experience: Establishing Rapport and Negotiating Insider/Outsider Status

This article contextualizes an emerging issue in critical ethnography, specifically, the problem of establishing rapport and negotiating boundaries for a partial insider in a non-Western setting. A description of the author’s experiences while conducting fieldwork among upper-middle-class Muslim families in Cairo, Egypt, highlights the fact that an ethnographer’s notions of self intersect with those of the people studied in multiple ways. In particular, the formulation of knowledge and its interpretation are affected. Further, it is illustrated that the constantly shifting, ambiguous boundaries between people become an important part of the research process.