The Rashomon Effect

The Rashomon effect was a very interesting article pertaining to different points of views and how easily something can be viewed one way or another and make sense.  This is very helpful when starting up in Anthropology because it gives some insight into the fact that not every ethnographer is going to see eye-to-eye, and that is crucial.  Using the classic Japanese film, "Rashomon", as a guiding light, it is easier to dissect this idea.  The film is about an event that is recalled four different ways by four different people, each being shown visually and each just as plausible as the next.  This is a reasonable enough analogy for ethnographers worldwide.  If an ethnographer from the United States and an ethnographer from one of the Koreas were to go to a neutral location to conduct fieldwork, each may observe the same things but interpret them in completely different ways.