Drawn from many months of ethnographic research with a classic European Circus in Switzerland, this narrative traces the author’s close contact and experience with one young circus woman over a 24-hour period. Through this brief portrait witnessing one particular individual’s story, larger themes — language, hierarchy, family, circus/town divides, belonging and exclusion, performance, gender roles, national identity, and more — all arise as key practices and performances for understanding the experience of European circus life. ‘Alessandra’ is a real person, a friend, and to those who know her in or out of the circus world, a compelling character. Not an explicit reflection on, nor analysis of, ethnographic experience, this ‘tale from the field’ is instead in-the-moment narration and commentary written to immerse the reader, engaging them in the ethnographic imagination, evoking lived experience, and inviting as many worthwhile questions as it may answer.

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As Jonathan Marion and Julia Offen note below, "more than just ways of thinking and being, cultures are also fields of sensation," and both cultural transmission and cultural understanding depend on experiential engagement. Recognizing this, many contemporary anthropologists seek to explore the variety of media through which multisensory experiences and knowledges can be communicated ethnographically by making use of emergent and established technologies. AN staff thank Jonathan Marion for his assistance in developing both In Focus series in this issue.

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