Being Present: Emerging Ethnographic Perspectives and the Study of Laos

Forthcoming Jan 2026

Edited by Rosalie Stolz and Paul-David Lutz
With contributions from Charles P Zuckerman, Sumiya Bilegsaikhan Taij, Jessica DiCarlo, Phill Wilcox, Floramante Ponce, Elizabeth Elliott, Thippaphone Xayavong, Giulio Ongaro

Anthropology and related fields like human geography and development studies have seen significant changes in approach since the ‘critical turn’ of the 1970s–80s. With the turn, researchers were called upon to include themselves in the worlds they investigate. What does this call mean and imply today, nearly five decades later, and in a far more interconnected world? How are emerging ethnographers understanding and practicing their craft? Being Present addresses these questions through a showcase of ethnographic research on Laos, a rapidly transforming country at the heart of mainland Southeast Asia and a southern gateway to China.

The ethnographic study of Laos is booming. The small but vibrant cohort of established researchers on Laos is being boosted by a growing number of emerging scholars from various backgrounds and disciplines. Being Present highlights their novel contributions, methods and research directions. The volume’s ten contributors take the reader from Chinese trains to upland swidden fields to urban funeral wakes and beyond. They introduce new medicines, shamans, traders, fridges and imaginaries of the good life. The ethnographic portraits thus painted speak to the fields of linguistics, human geography, sociology, development studies as well as the anthropology of religion, health and affect. An engaging foreword and reflective afterword highlight the volume’s wider relevance for ongoing debates about ethnographic enquiry in the Global South today.

In its multifaceted offering, Being Present makes both substantive contributions to the study of Laos and Southeast Asia and a grounded, forward-looking case for reinvigorating reflective approaches in ethnographic research, writing and thinking.

“... a fascinating volume by the ‘new school’ of anthropologists working in Laos. Their original and innovative work uncovers new facets of Laos and makes for rewarding reading—not only for those interested in Laos, but also in the merits of the ethnographic method in general.” - Oliver Tappe, University of Cologne

Rosalie Stolz is a postdoctoral researcher at the Global South Studies Center, University of Cologne, Germany. She conducts research among Khmu-speaking uplanders of northwestern Laos - currently with a focus on the prevalent transformations of houses. She is the author of Living Kinship, Fearing Spirits published by NIAS Press.

Paul-David Lutz is an anthropologist and (former) rural development advisor with a longstanding focus on Laos. Currently, he is a postdoctoral researcher at the Laboratoire d'Anthropologie des Mondes Contemporains (LAMC), Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium. His ongoing research focuses on animism in the context of agrarian transition among ethnic Khmu.