Native among the Natives

Abstract

The focus of the present article is the methodological aspects of conducting ethnography in a district level hospital in Bangladesh, the first of its kind in the country. Ethnographies in non-Western medical settings are rare. I describe the experience of gaining entry and negotiating my way through diverse gatekeepers, building rapport and trust with the doctors, the staff community, and the patients. I share the challenges of being native among the natives as my “nativity” was twofold: as a Bangladeshi doing fieldwork in the country, and as a medical doctor studying a hospital, the domain of doctors.