summarizes very complex topic extremely well. It would be a lie to pretend
that everything I know about Bali was a direct result of thick description
or archival research. But what I am not lying about is the fact that I have
actually been there and have actually spoken with real life people about the
generalizations I have tried to put forward. Nevertheless, I am painfully
aware that without complete fluency in all levels of the Balinese language,
and without many years of painstaking observation, I only also see Bali
only somewhat superficially. I may know a bit more than the average tour-
ist, especially the tourist who is mainly there simply for the beach and the
beer, but I am still in the kindergarden (Kindergarten) stage of real appre-
ciation for many aspects of Balinese life. What helps is that I am under few
illusions. I do not pretend to begin to reach the level of expertise of those
nineteenth century specialistsGeertz (1980)cites, nor to have done the
extensive fieldwork of a Jane Belo. But I have been able to bring my back-
ground in sociology into the field. I have learned some things that are not
immediately apparent to all but a handful of true experts. Just as I have
learned how not to lie with statistics or rhetorical obfuscation, I have
learned how not to lie with ethnography and thick description.
HOW NOT TO LIE WITH ETHNOGRAPHY
Duneier (2011) wrote an interesting essay on “How Not to Lie with
Ethnography” which focuses specifically on Geertz’s “Deep Play” essay. I
will try to briefly summarize some of his remarks, but his essay should be
read as a whole. He mentions that the sample chosen by Geertz may well
have been very biased. Duneier discusses the well-known idea of a “conve-
nience sample” in qualitative research and suggests that a good rule would
be to always ask what an “inconvenience sample” for a specific topic would
be like. For example, it was “inconvenient” for Geertz to live with a lower
caste family while doing his research in Bali. Similarly, it would have been
inconvenient in their study of kinship for the two Geertz’s to stress the
third gender (wasia) and sex between men (or between women). Geertz
does not emphasize the prevalence of prostitution in Bali, even though it is
so widely practiced he must have been aware of it. By “systematically iden-
tifying aspects of the situation under study that have been excluded from
the analysis” we can put any ethnographic report or monograph “under
trial.” That is, we can gain a better sense of why certain aspects of the story
have been left out and other aspects have been emphasized. The narrative
is never complete. It is always one-sided and somewhat incomplete. That is
100 J. I. (HANS) BAKKER