Biographical knowledge and its implication to activism studies: A case study about the landless peoples movement in South Africa

The paper analyses the effects of a long-term ethnographic research with a landless activist in rural South Africa. Arguing that the relations we establish with the individuals change substantially along the research, I state that much we know about them, less capacity we have to classify or attach the individuals to one single social narrative (i.e. activism). Following the everyday transit of the LPM major leadership for six years, within and outside the movement, this work stresses the discontinuities among the various roles he plays and the social controversies he is involved due to that. Through this case I aim to discuss the implications of this kind of research for a sociological theory of action.