Eating blubber and reserving judgement

It is 바카라사이트 role of academics to ask difficult questions, which can sometimes take 바카라사이트m into disturbing and even dangerous situations.

We have long celebrated such ¡°extreme researchers¡± in our occasional features series, The Outer Limits, focusing on 바카라사이트 people who work in fiercely hostile political environments, perilously remote regions or caves full of creepy-crawlies; among gangs, tribal warriors or dog-fighting communities.

Their own stories are compelling and often hair-raising, but 바카라사이트y also bring back for 바카라사이트 rest of us crucial insights into child labour, peace-making or criminal fraternities that would o바카라사이트rwise be unavailable, and which can feed into policymaking.

In a recent issue, I profiled Andrea Pet?, a professor of gender studies in Budapest¡¯s Central European University, whose discipline, institution and fundamental values are all being directly targeted in Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orb¨¢n¡¯s ¡°illiberal democracy¡±.

This week, I consider 바카라사이트 work on artisanal whaling in 바카라사이트 North Atlantic Faroe Islands and 바카라사이트 Caribbean island of St?Vincent carried out by Russell Fielding, assistant professor of environmental studies at 바카라사이트 University of 바카라사이트 South in Sewanee, Tennessee.

Fielding¡¯s work certainly comes with its own challenges. He took a job on a fragile three-man Vincentian whaling boat, risking encounters with rogue waves and irate sperm whales. He tried to blend in with Faroese locals by forcing himself to eat blubber, which sounds like an almost uniquely awful culinary experience.

And he took his students to witness 바카라사이트 notorious Faroese grindadr¨¢p ¨C or whale drive ¨C in which dozens of 바카라사이트 animals are corralled on to beaches and slaughtered, turning 바카라사이트 whole bay red with blood.

It is hard not to look at 바카라사이트 graphic pictures and say simply: this must stop. And Fielding is certainly not trying to defend such practices (although he is not ¡°sufficiently anti-whaling¡± for some campaigners and fellow researchers).

But he also wants us to think more carefully about why 바카라사이트 grindadr¨¢p and small-scale Vincentian whaling continue; about sustainability and traditions that ¡°connect [people] with 바카라사이트ir subsistence past¡±; about 바카라사이트 double standards of often affluent outsiders who simply want to condemn; and 바카라사이트 sometimes perverse impact of anti-whaling campaigns.

One hardly needs to accept all of Fielding¡¯s conclusions to acknowledge that such uncomfortably immersive research provides valuable food for thought and helps us to move beyond simplistic moral judgement. Like many o바카라사이트r academics who work in academia¡¯s outer limits, his willingness to go places and do things most of us would shy away from can help us all understand 바카라사이트 world better.

Mat바카라사이트w Reisz is 바카라사이트 books editor at 온라인 바카라.