Author Archives: Robin Irvine
The World of the Bulls: An Anthropologist’s Gold Mine
At the beginning of October, in a blog article about a bullfight in Corella, Navarra, taurine photographers and bloggers Gorka Azpilicueta and Arsenio Ramírez suggested that for an anthropologist like myself the world of the bulls represents a gold mine … Continue reading
A step in the right direction? From Madrid to Corella, Navarra.
“Happy, but not satisfied” sums up the feelings of the foreman of Partido de Resina after last Sunday’s corrida in Madrid. There’s more work to be done but the outcome was basically good. The critics – as always – gave … Continue reading
Return to Madrid
This coming Sunday, at six-thirty p.m. the notorious pabloromero bulls will return to Las Ventas in Madrid, which continues to be the most influential and important bullring in the taurine world. These beautiful but tricky bulls will be making their … Continue reading
Spectacular days
It’s April and things are really starting to kick off after a quiet winter in the Villamanrique de la Condesa area. If there’s is one word that covers everything that has happened in the last few weeks – from the … Continue reading
What counts as fieldwork for an anthropologist in Andalusia?
What does a social anthropologist even do when in the field? What is the stuff of fieldwork? What counts? What goes down in the notebook? Who counts? Who do we write about? When do we stop listening? Or jotting down … Continue reading
An homage to the older cow and horse hands out there
The other week, I took this photo of photo of three relatively young men heading out to tag newborn calves at Partido de Resina and some of the comments that were made about the photo on twitter said how good … Continue reading
Hot-branding revisited
Just a quick note to say that for those that are interested I read a piece about the hot-branding of fighting stock on yesterday’s BBC world service version of From Our Own Correspondent. It gives a slightly different angle on … Continue reading
Winter escapes
It feels wrong to say it is really cold here given that I come from Scotland, but it is REALLY cold. When I head out to assist the foreman of the breeding estate on the days he is alone I … Continue reading
Born this way: Born for the arena
Lets begin on a provocative note. Tongues out. I’m fully aware that what I’m blogging about (and will later write about more formally) is not to everybody’s taste. I hope this serves as an invitation to engage with the topic, … Continue reading
El Herradero – Handling, bumbling and branding
The last 10 days or so have been packed with different kinds of events on the estate, some of which are singular and some of which are ongoing. Today I want to focus on an event in the singular category: … Continue reading
Anthropology among the bulls 