{"id":23823,"date":"2018-02-20T23:50:30","date_gmt":"2018-02-20T23:50:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/writemyessayfree.com\/wal-mart-2"},"modified":"2017-08-03T16:09:33","modified_gmt":"2017-08-03T16:09:33","slug":"wal-mart-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wal-mart-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Wal-Mart"},"content":{"rendered":"
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This assignment asks you to complete a micro-ethnography. An ethnography is a research method that aims to gain a rich perspective on communities of users in the context of their everyday lives. Ethnographers observe communities and cultural practices by making careful observations called field notes; they later interpret and reflect on those notes in order to draw valuable conclusions about the observed community. This practice originated in the field of anthropology but is often used by sociologists, journalists, scholars in the various humanities, and even by professionals in the technological and business fields. (See the following blog post by software engineer Astrid Countee for a first-hand account of the valuable application of ethnographic skills within the tech world: HYPERLINK \u201chttp:\/\/ethnographymatters.net\/blog\/2016\/06\/22\/an-engineering-anthropologist-why-tech-companies-need-to-hire-software-developers-with-ethnographic-skills\/\u201d http:\/\/ethnographymatters.net\/blog\/2016\/06\/22\/an-engineering-anthropologist-why-tech-companies-need-to-hire-software-developers-with-ethnographic-skills\/). This assignment asks you to perform a micro-ethnography focused on a specific social space. You will pick a research site and perform a one-hour observation (or multiple, shorter observations) during which you consider how the space itself impacts the dynamic of the micro-community it houses. Note details such as colors, logos, signs, actions, motivations, participants\u2019 appearances and body language, physical qualities and uses of relevant artifacts, etc. After you demonstrate observation and transcription skills, you will next explore interpretative techniques, and then finally draw conclusions from the patterns you find. Why: Not only are ethnographic skills a valuable tool in many fields (see above), they also teach you primary research skills (YOU study the source directly and thereby become the originator of new knowledge). Such work fosters your ability to think critically, one of the most important goals both of this course and of your collegiate education in general. This project is directly aligned with the six course goals for this class. It teaches you: To engage in writing as a process, including various invention heuristics (brainstorming, for example), gathering evidence, considering audience, drafting, editing, and proofreading; To engage in the collaborative, social aspects of writing and use writing as a tool for learning; To use language to explore and analyze contemporary multicultural, global, and international questions; To gather, summarize, synthesize, and explain information from observation; To use grammatical, stylistic, and mechanical formats and conventions appropriate for a variety of audiences; To produce coherent, organized, readable prose for a variety of rhetorical situations. Step 1: Choose a research site and plan the dates\/times of your observations. You will undertake your ethnographic observation in a quotidian (everyday) space. Perhaps you will observe the train on your ride home or a common area in your dormitory or Classroom South or the Plaza. You pick the space. For this project, you will be an observer, not a participant observer, so you do not need to interact with anyone, unless it is a necessary aspect of being in that space (for example, if you observe a coffee shop, it would be poor manners to sit for an hour without purchasing something). Step 2: Conduct observation(s) while taking field notes in template. While you\u2019re observing the site, you should take notes in a double-entry format where the left column is a \u201cfactual\u201d recording of your observations and the right is your reflection on those events, either at the time or later. \u201cFactual,\u201d in this instance, refers to such information as a detailed site description, what participants are doing, the order in which activities happen, where the participants stand in regard to each other, how they interact, how many participants are present, how many are male\/female, etc. \u2014 descriptive\/quantitative data. The \u201creflections\u201d column (qualitative data), however, offers you a place to think through what you\u2019re seeing, ask some questions, jot down reactions, and engage in interpretive speculation. You will have two sets of data, one from each of your observational visits. Be sure to record the date, time, and place of observation as the header for your notes. *Write down everything that you see and experience, not just what you think might be important. You may find an interesting or unexpected pattern when you look back on your entries during step 4. *Remember to consider the ways in which the space itself affects the dynamic of the micro-community of the time and place you choose to observe. Guiding questions for the \u201cFactual\u201d column include (but are not limited to) the following: What does the space look, smell, sound, and feel like? How do the people in the space react to these sensory qualities? What logos or text are present in the space? How do the people in the space interact with them? What examples of ethos, logos, and\/or pathos are present in the space? How is the physical space arranged? How do people move through this space? Is there any unused\/unoccupied space? Who is occupying this space? How many? Males or females? How old are they? What are the people in the space doing? What are their appearances? What is their body language like? How do they appear to be feeling? What appears to be their reason(s) for being in the space? For how long do they stay? What artifacts (objects) exist within the space? How are people using these artifacts? Guiding questions for the \u201cReflections\u201d column include (but are not limited to) the following: What patterns do you observe? How would you characterize the overall atmosphere of the space? How would you characterize the community? How did the sensory qualities of the space impact the people within the space? How did the physical design of the space determine the ways in which people interacted? How did text or logos influence people\u2019s thoughts, emotions, and behaviors? How did it influence their interactions with others within the space? How did various rhetorical appeals present in the space (ethos, logos, pathos) influence people\u2019s thoughts, emotions, and behaviors? How did these influences influence their interactions with others within the space? What do the design elements of the space say about the community that inhabits it? What cultural norms\/expectations may have contributed to the space\u2019s design? What surprised me during the observations and why? What does this reveal about the nature of the community that inhabits this social space? What does it reveal about me as a researcher? Step 3: Reflect on your observations and experience as a researcher. Here are questions you should ask as you review your notes [taken from Sunstein and Chiseri-Strater\u2019s Fieldworking, 3rd ed.): Are the notes readable? Are the pages numbered and dated? What background material does someone need to understand the history and location of this place? Does the researcher include information about his\/her subjective feelings? What other details should the researcher include so that another person could see, hear, and become immersed in the daily routines of this place? What details are most interesting? What would you like to write more about? What other data do you need to confirm some of the initial observations about this place? What surprised me? Answering this question will help you target your preconceived notions and any prejudices you bring to the site. You can also note how your opinions change over the course of observing\/thinking about the site. What intrigued me? Addressing this question should help you define your position as a researcher. What is your connection to the site, your ethos as researcher? What disturbed me? Examining honestly your blind spots also helps you identify your relationship to material and perhaps other cultures. Step 4: Use your observations and reflections to write 3-5 page paper that answers the following prompt: How do the qualities of the physical space both reflect and influence the micro-community of people who inhabit it? In this paper, you want to think of connections you make among your notes and draw conclusions about how the physical space intersects with the people who inhabit it. How do the characteristics of the physical space reflect the qualities\/values\/interests of its community members? How do the qualities of the physical space influence the feelings\/choices\/behaviors\/interactions of its community members? *Your conclusions must be supported by details from your observations. Detailed descriptions must be included for your analysis to be convincing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This assignment asks you to complete a micro-ethnography. An ethnography is a research method that aims to gain a rich perspective on communities of users in the context of their everyday lives. Ethnographers observe communities and cultural practices by making Read More …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23823\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.benedictsol.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}