Fieldwork is one of the most important features of modern anthropology. It refers to the systematic study of people and cultures through direct, first-hand observation and participation in the everyday life of a community. The emergence of fieldwork transformed anthropology from a discipline largely dependent on second-hand information into a science based on intensive and direct cultural investigation. During the nineteenth century, early anthropologists generally did not conduct fieldwork themselves. They depended on reports provided by missionaries, travellers, colonial administrators, explorers and other observers. Anthropologists such as Edward B. Tylor and James G. Frazer collected information from books, questionnaires and published accounts. This period is often described as the “armchair anthropology” phase because scholars analysed cultural information without personally visiting the communities they studied. Although these works contributed to the development of anthropological theory, the information was often incomplete, biased and influenced by the observers' own cultural assumptions. The limitations of second-hand information gradually created a need for direct observation. Anthropologists realised that cultural practices could not be properly understood merely through written reports. Language, social relationships, rituals, economic activities, kinship systems and religious beliefs had to be studied within