I’ve never watched the show but from what i’ve seen it must’ve been a big upset…I just think the video is interesting because of how much adoration the girls in the video had for the finalist.
This is a good point. Their adoration seems so genuine. We can ask, though, what exactly is adoration and how do we measure this. Clearly there is a lot of performance here, maybe all performance. One thing that interests me about this . . .
Keeping a field journal is an important technique developed by ethnographers as part of their practice of long term participant observation. It is also useful in any other discipline, but especially those which trade in observation, participation and study of social practices. Refer back to Taussig’s (2003) article for more ideas about the place of the anthropologists diary in everyday research. While we are not doing ethnography in the way that cultural anthropologists do, this is still a useful method and paradigm for our own practices of observation and documentation and could become an important element in your own bag of methods that you take away from your tenure as a student at this university.
This project takes the field journal and reconfigures it as a scrapbook. By doing this we are trying to take the diary/ethnographer’s journal out of the exclusive realm of the textual. In doing this project, keep in mind that this is not a conventional scrapbook either; it is not a journal, it is not a diary, it is not an anthropologist’s field notebook… this scrapbook needs to be apprehended and turned into *your* own work-collection. While it is a highly personal document of your own research and study it is also necessary that I am able to understand what you are trying to say. A mixture of text and image is the safest approach. Sometimes extra commentary may be necessary to help me understand what you are trying to do. This doesn’t necessarily have to be written into the entry itself but could be on an extra piece of paper or even a stickey note.
Parameters:
max. 500 words
2 – 5 pages in a standard scrapbook (or equivalent)
Major passages of text should be typed, not hand written
Do not include highly valuable or original images that you would be sorry to lose. I’ll do my best to take care of your scrapbooks when you hand them in but I can’t guarantee anything.
Due dates:
Scrapbook 1: January 23
Scrapbook 2: February 9
Scrapbook 3: February 13
Evaluation of the Scrapbook entry assignments.
You are going to be evaluated on your ability to write coherently and intelligently. Your grade will depend also on the degree of creativity and reflexivity that you show.
The predominant idiom of contemporary scrapbooking in North America is concerned with documenting (and subsequently participating in the construction of) important life events: weddings, vacations, births, graduations, etc. Working within this idiom you are asked in this assignment to create a journal entry that considers your own subject position.
This is a minor work of autoethnography and it is a useful part of developing a reflexive framework for future theorizing about society and culture. Developing a reflexivity to your own subject position is sometimes easiest in terms of a question (eg. “Where do I stand on this issue”) but you can do it with just about anything. To get to that point, though, you need to be able to reflect on the important institutional/discursive frameworks that enable you to make meaning of the world. Following the lead of French theorist/philosopher Michel Foucault subject position should be understood as the way that multiple discourses position us as subjects within networks or webs of knowledge-power relations. This assignment allows you to explore one of more ways that your own subjectivity is constituted.
Follow instructions given in the detailed description of the scrapbook project. You can do further research on the concept of ‘subject position’ (see for instance the Blackwell guide to Sociology) and you should include references (as footnotes or endnotes) to any quotes and references you make. I am looking for a critical understanding of the terms of both subject position and of contemporary scrapbooking practices.
We looked at a little bit of an old soviet propaganda film the other day. Thinking about propaganda, persuasion and social manipulation links us to theories of (mass) media and ideology. One more current example of the intentional manipulation of thought/opinion can be seen in the internet phenomenon of ‘astroturfing‘. There is a recent article on the BBC website about how the Chinese government appears to be astroturfing the internets with positive impressions of life in China:
The Alberta government is also interested in public perception of the oilsands (having spent X$ on advertising last year). With recent studies showing that the ‘public’ thinks that the Tarsands industry is doing a poor job of curtailing environmental impacts, it is likely that we’ll see a lot more effort to represent the industry as a green industry (they’ve done a lot already, but they’ve admitted that they need to spend more money on public information/persuasion).
The critique of this is that the Alberta government and the petroleum industry have a lot more money to represent their interests than does ‘the public.’ Arguably the role of government of Alberta is to represent the public but do they really do so? If so which public?
Monday (Jan. 12) is our first scrapbooking day. Please bring in a scrapbook that you think that you might like to work with. Essentially it can be anything that will hold pictures, images, and text. The only parameters I have is that it isn’t too big (as you will need to hand it in to me for grading). I will explain more about the scrapbooking project on Monday.
Taussig, Michael. 2003. “The Diary as Witness: an Anthropologist Writes What He Must.” Chronicle of Higher Education 50, no. 17: B12-B13. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
Due Date: Monday, January 12
Notes: You can download this article from the UofA library. Search for “Chronicle of Higher Education” as a periodical. If you are having trouble finding the article, you can ask a librarian for help. Remember that if you’re off campus you’ll have to authenticate.
Jay, Martin (1991) The disenchantment of the eye: Surrealism and the crisis of occularcentrism. Visual Anthropology Review. Vol. 7, No. 1, p. 15-38.
Martin Jay’s article provides and important introduction to a number of key concepts that we’ll be considering in this course. You are required to locate, download, and read this article by January 14th. There will be an in-class quiz based on this article, Friday January 16th. The quiz will consist of some multiple-choice and short answer questions.
This is a minor work of autoethnography and it is a useful part of developing a reflexive framework for future theorizing about society and culture. Developing a reflexivity to your own subject position is sometimes easiest in terms of a question (eg. “Where do I stand on this issue”) but you can do it with just about anything. To get to that point, though, you need to be able to reflect on the important institutional/discursive frameworks that enable you to make meaning of the world. Following the lead of French theorist/philosopher Michel Foucault subject position should be understood as the way that multiple discourses position us as subjects within networks or webs of knowledge-power relations. This assignment allows you to explore one of more ways that your own subjectivity is constituted.
The Alberta government is also interested in public perception of the oilsands (having spent X$ on advertising last year). With recent studies showing that the ‘public’ thinks that the Tarsands industry is doing a poor job of curtailing environmental impacts, it is likely that we’ll see a lot more effort to represent the industry as a green industry (they’ve done a lot already, but they’ve admitted that they need to spend more money on public information/persuasion).
