Ethnographic Observation 1: Encountering Diversity

In this assignment, you are to go out and find diversity, as you define it, observe cultural diversity in action, write about it, and analyze it.

In Outside Lies Magic (1999), John Stilgoe tells us to Get out now. Not just outside, but beyond the trap of the programmed electronic age so gently closing around so many [of us]…. Flex the mind, a little a first, then a lot…. Get out and look around, see accurately, notice, make connections.

• For this assignment, I would like you to do just that. Get out [off campus/out of your dorm/out of your residence], take a look around, and make connections… in a way that relates back to some of our course discussions about diversity in the US.Observation and Description. Visit an off-campus cultural site where you are confident that you will encounter cultural diversity as weve begun to think about it. Preferably you will observe social interactions between people you consider different from yourself. Briefly introduce and describe the site and describe the people you are observing. If youre in a situation where you are participating and interacting, take mental notes of what is going on and how people are interacting with one another and with you. If you are observing, it may be appropriate to take notes, which will help you to write up a more coherent description or narrative of what you see and hear. If a particular interaction or two are particularly interesting or revealing, you may decide to focus on these. [Youll find that in a short paper, you cannot usually be exhaustive.]
• Analysis/Interpretation. In the second part of your paper, I would like you to analyze, ponder, interpret, comparenot necessarily judgmentally, that relates your observations to class (canvas) discussions and specific readingsfor example, on culture, diversity, gender, race, ethnicity, borders, contested belonging, etc. Can you make any connections to course reading? How might one of our authors read this encounter? Can you use any of the course concepts that have been introduced? What does your observation suggest about cultural diversity in the US?
• Rationale/Reflection. In a final paragraph or two I would like you to justify your choice of a site or interaction. Why did you choose this place? (Not just because it was easy or convenient for this assignment.) Why is this place or the people and interactions you observed culturally interesting? Why is it worthy of cultural exploration? What does it suggest to you about cultural diversity (or unity) in the US? How did you feel while you were there? What insights does this experience provide into you and your own understandings of diversity? In what ways did you come up against your own cultural limits of insight and understanding? What might it take for you to interact effectively with people in this milieu?