Assess your experience doing ethnography. How did the Coronavirus pandemic affect your research. Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of online ethnography from your own experience.
Conducting an ethnography is challenging by nature. Informants are usually hesitant to share much information and so building a good rapport comes in handy. In the case of this specific, it offered me some positive opportunities and some negative obstacles along the way. When it comes to the positives, due to the COVID-19 pandemic I was able to interview a long-time friend of mine who happens to be a doctor working as a first responder in ER rooms and a part of COVID teams. Not only that, he caught the virus himself and recovered thankfully, which makes for an interesting story to develop and read. However, it was not easy to conduct the interview due to the fact that my informant refused to start any video call of some sort. I perhaps would have been able to convince him to agree to a video call if I pressed on the matter but I suspected that it might compromise my ability to milk some information so I let it go. I had to emphasize on the voice and tone of my informant since that the body language and the facial expressions were missing. As far as locating the informant I did not find any trouble with that, assigning the time and date for the interview was not an issue as well due to the fact that my informant was in quarantine. So, I naturally asked my informant to assign the time and day himself. One of the major difficulties I went through while conducting the interview is when my informant spoke in pure medical terms. I tried to inform myself with all the medical vocabulary related to COVID-19, yet I still had to stumble upon some words that my informant spoke that I was forced to ask him to explain them to me in laymen terms. Some terms I had to write down and search them later because I felt like asking too many times will disturb the rhythm and flow of the interview. Subsequently, refraining from asking perhaps made me not able to ask to follow up on some questions as I did not fully comprehend the nature of some answers at that moment. When I usually conduct an ethnography, I like to ask my informant if this specific event I am interviewing them about relates to anything they have experienced before. However, this time I felt like this question is almost useless due to the unique nature of this pandemic, so I preferred to keep the focus of my attention on the pandemic and my informant’s personal life. I also felt as if the personal questions regarding the pandemic were sort of difficult to carry out giving the situation of my informant wife’s pregnancy. However difficult those question where I had to ask them to preserve the integrity and authenticity of my ethnography. It was relatively an easygoing process. As much as I would like to talk about the difficulties that I have faced in regard to conducting the interview during the pandemic. I can not force my self to ignore the fact the in the grand scheme of things it made things more easy than difficult for me personally. Where I was able to conduct the interview from the comfort of my house, I did not have to wait anywhere outside or drive in traffic to secure an interview. All I had to do is text Dr. Alawadhi get his approval, set a time and date and it was pretty much set. The only difficulties were in terms of focusing on the tone of voice and not being able to read the facial expressions and body language. I was however limited in terms of the paradigm of things that I am able to explore in the context of this ethnography. That did enable me to focus on a specific set of investigation to conduct on the other hand.
Haya Z - S00033978 PART 1 Conducting ethnographic research during the Corona virus pandemic was not as bad as I thought it would be. Initially, I began by considering the different ways that I would be able to conduct research, and how online platforms would make that possible for me. Virtual communication through email, social media, WhatsApp, telephone calls, ZOOM, and WebEx are all mediums I used for this approach. In today’s world, social media platforms such as Instagram, have become a good way to assess online groups and day to day interaction. From small business, public figures, and daily news, I have noticed that social media has its own realm of context, and is expansive enough to be observed, and analyzed for those interested in online culture. When humans are deprived of their daily social interactions, with colleagues, classmates, the everyday coffee barista, and more, they retrieve to the one other form of social interaction; virtual. Since my research was mainly about the art world in Kuwait, I began to observe social networks online, and how quickly they’ve adapted and jumped into the concept of social distancing. It may just be that art began to peak much more on social media since the pandemic; artists post their work more, talking about their experiences and levels of productivity and creation during quarantine. Museums began opening online exhibitions, featuring artists online. Social media accounts begin taking in relevant artwork, and a whole new wave of art is being made about corona virus. Whether its satire related, a painting, a series, poetry, or photography, it was being created inclusively, and adapted more than ever. For the purpose of this class, I did not have much trouble addressing how I would go about my research. For the participant observation, I simply took the time to look inwards, and observe the happenings, within my home, which I never thought would be important. Through the process of observing my inner world from an objective lens, I saw its significance. How does one avoid bias and write a well-rounded paper from within the confinements of their home? Personally, I usually take up most of my writing at the library, or usually sitting outdoors, or a coffee shop; outside of home. In that case, I had to change these habits, and learn to see my informants from a different perspective.
Haya Z - S00033978 PART 2 Since data collection in ethnographic research is meant to take place within a specific field, usually in the outside world, interacting with real people, I had to reconsider how I would interview my informants online. I approached most of my informants through email, by writing down a list of open-ended questions that would allow me to extract information without having to physically meet up with or “see” my informants. All informants I chose were artists, as I tried to approach many that would be beneficial not only for the purpose of this class, but to further extend my capstone research. As a side note: all artists I contacted, I also happen to follow on Instagram. (emphasis on its importance in navigating, and for contact purposes) Completing my capstone at this time has been quite interesting as well, but not too bad either. I found that most artists’ responses I got, were very honest, thoughtful, and detailed answers. I would assume that, in this day and age, people are comfortable in reaching out to others virtually, whereas a real-life approach may come off as more intimidating. I began to consider the whole concept of “social distancing” and how it would change people’s habits, and what being “social” really meant. However, I did receive many fruitful responses, which I was glad for, because they really help enrich my paper. Also, after trying out a different interview format, which took place on ZOOM, I noticed that the conversation went a bit more “naturally” making out to be more of a discussion, rather than an interview style approach. Of course, the process of extracting information took much longer, and It took up one important aspect of my day; time. All in all, I would say some weaknesses of online ethnography would be the important aspect of capturing the “aura” or “essence” of the field location, and field informants is minimized, where some important information would get lost in translation. Although virtual communication has become very efficient in today’s world, it may be difficult to grasp the “wholeness” and “sensibility” of any given situation. Especially when trying to configurate a type of reality, where the idea of “space” is diminished, and the context of the space is virtual rather than “real”.
My experience of conducting fieldwork during the Coronavirus pandemic was enjoyable but also challenging. Since I had already chosen an ethnography topic at the beginning of the semester, it was difficult letting go of the hard work I put into my observational data and discarding the relationship/rapport I developed with the manager of the place (at the Al-Mayadeen Shooting Range). I had already planned what I was going to do for the next assignment, but when the virus reached Kuwait at the end of February, I knew that it would be dangerous to expose myself and others to the virus in the Shooting Range. Not only did I panic about this class’s ethnography, I also began to panic and lose hope about conducting a “good enough” capstone ethnography next year. I had great ideas in mind for my capstone and it’s sad to think that I won’t be able to follow through with them (unless the number of victims gradually decreases by the end of this year). After attending a couple of our SBSA 200 eLearning classes, I slowly began gaining motivation to work on a new ethnographic topic that focused on the pandemic’s effect on household conversations and activities. The motivation was generated from Dr. Pellegrino’s advice and lectures on how to modify our fieldwork methods to adapt to online fieldwork, and from other classmates’ ideas on new ethnographic topics. I wanted to take advantage of this pandemic, practice my ethnographic skills, and develop new data to hopefully use in a future ethnography about the pandemic. The first assignment that was due during eLearning was our participant observation, in which I participated in a household family gathering. My parents, my grandmother, and I were watching an interview and Islamic program on Kuwait TV1 while enjoying some tea and coffee, and having a conversation. As I assumed before I started the fieldwork, our conversation was about Kuwait and how they were handling the coronavirus, but it also included topics about our family members, expat workers, and more. I felt very comfortable participating and observing my family members since we are used to being in each other’s presence, but I wasn’t able to experience the challenges or the awkwardness in participant observation with a population I need to develop a relationship with. Therefore, I didn’t need to start my fieldwork by searching for informants, convincing them of my interest to study their population, or engage in a conversation about my project. The weakness of my fieldwork during quarantine was that my informants might have agreed to allow me to observe and participant in their gathering as merely a college assignment. They might have taken pity on me and wanted to help me, as their daughter/granddaughter, complete this assignment. I asked my grandmother and parents if I observe their gathering for my methods class, and they agreed without asking questions about the assignment (I explained to them why I was doing the assignment, regardless). On the other hand, I believe that conducting my participant-observation at home made me aware of my presence in the informant’s space and how it affected their behavior (not so much speech). This is because I wasn’t worried about things I would worry about when participating in an activity with people I don’t know as well. If I were doing this assignment in the shooting range, I would worry about introducing myself to people engaging in the same activity, receiving awkward stares from people, making sure I’m being safe with and around the fire arms, and trying to talk to my informants with the noise cancelling headphones on. By doing my participant observation at home, I was able to relax and focus on observing my setting and the non-verbal and verbal communications, as well as my focus on asking adequate questions to understand the conversations. I believe that my skills as an observer and a student of ethnographic fieldwork were heightened/developed during this activity and I was self-reflexive while analyzing the data.
Part 2 The interview I conducted with a friend of mine from university was also enjoyable and coherent. Developing my open-ended questions for the interview was a bit challenging since I didn’t know if they were good enough or if I was on the right track. After coming up with my questions, I acted out the interview to see if I could answer the questions with open-ended answers, as the informant, so the assignment (being an online interview) forced me to use my knowledge of ethnographic interviews to move on with the assignment. If not for quarantine, I would not have interviewed a person I have already developed a rapport with because I wanted to go through developing rapport from scratch, on the basis of my project. However, I’m glad I did interview a friend because he gave me information I don’t think I would get from someone who didn’t know me very well, especially since we discussed personal and household activities during quarantine. The interview was also easy to plan and meet for since I only had to send my informant a link to a Zoom meeting. It was also very easy to record, since Zoom has a “record” option during the call. I did encounter a disconnection during the interview, but fortunately, it only happened once. I did miss some aspects of an ethnographic interview like the informant’s body language (since I could only see his face and upper body), the mapping of our interview setting, how our shared setting/environment affected the interview or informant’s attitudes, and the challenges ethnographers experience to find a place and time to meet with the informant. The Zoom meeting created a casual and informal mood for the interview and I could infer by the informant’s tone and answer, that he was comfortable during the meeting as well. I think quarantine’s effect on my ethnography and fieldwork enabled me to expand my observational, communication, analyzing, and interviewing skills before beginning my capstone project next year. I have now practiced conducting ethnographies face to face and through the internet. I also learned to use available resources, like my household members and my friends, to make use of collecting data during this restrictive time. Although it was a challenge, I believe I have learned things that I couldn’t have learned if the pandemic hadn’t appeared this semester. It is a difficult time for many academics who have already started their projects or have wanted to start a project but couldn’t. Indeed the pandemic has challenged many of our goals, but we must continue working towards them using a different route, whatever that may be. In conducting ethnographies online, we can form relationships and develop rapport with people all around the world who have access to the Internet. This allows us to become sensitive to their stress and understand what they are going through during this tough time because as ethnographers, we are the source that can give our informants a voice to be heard worldwide. -s0043659
My research initially was targeting the beauty industry, specifically observing Sephora customers and employees, looking at how age, gender, and social class plays a role into the industry, but after the pandemic I knew I had to change my topic as a full lockdown was enforced. Prior to the lockdown, I was able to conduct two observational assignments at Sephora where I was able to collect interesting data on both customers and employees, and I would have loved to continue another observational assignment as well do my interview assignment with the employee’s and multiple customers. Unfortunately, the coronavirus interrupted my research and made it difficult for me to focus on Sephora, so I had my topic changed to a broader subject such as self care and make up. I wanted to stay in the same theme, as Sephora does include several skin care, hair care, nail care, and make-up lines, without looking at the store as it became impossible due to the virus. I joined this class with the intention of choosing a topic for my capstone and gathering the research needed, and at first I thought the adjustments I had to make would be a waste of time and research, but I feel like it was a good way to prepare and train me for future observational, participant observation, and interview assignments. Plus, the research that I gathered was not a waste of time, as I was able to get knowledgeable information from my informant and I do feel like all experiences are valid and useful to my research. For my participant observation, I had joined my mother and sister doing their hair mask weekly routine, and for the interview I had interviewed my mom. I chose to do these assignments with family because a.) they have genuine interest to my topic b.) my mom is interesting and c.) I don’t really know anyone else. Of course I tried my best to professional with them and again, it was a good way to practice or prepare myself, as I’ve never done an interview like this. The questions I created for the interview is something I’m actually really proud of, and will be using again when I continue with this research for my capstone. Personally, I feel like I did a good job staying in the same theme as my original research topic, and I think that the questions I created for my informant were good and useful questions. I do want to include nail care, and make-up related questions, as I feel like it is part of self care. It might run the interview longer, but I would feel satisfied discussing all aspects of self-care rather than just part of it. Make up is pretty important in todays society and I would love to see how it affects different people’s lives. A problem faced when conducting the interview was asking my informant to elaborate her answers, in the moment I thought I was giving her too much space and time to answer the questions, but when re listening to the voice recording I realized that she mentioned a few things I seemed to ignore at the time? Maybe I was too focused on getting the answers of the questions when I should have been more present during the interview, I may have been thinking head as I am an anxious person in general. From my experience, online ethnography was only difficult for me because I had to kind of change my topic and idea. I really wanted to interview Sephora employee’s as well as customers they get. I’m happy with the choice of my informant, as she has experience with self care and make up, but it would have been more interesting if she was a regular Sephora customer, or if I found her at Sephora. Also if family members were not allowed to be interviewed, I may have struggled choosing an informant as I do not know much people. A pro to online ethnography is being able to stay home, and that’s about it. I think online ethnography completely ruins ethnographic research. It takes out the fun of being to able to go somewhere new and do things out of your comfort zone, like staying and observing people in a store for an hour, or talking to employee’s and customers.
Throughout this course, I was discouraged and somewhat held back when it came to starting an ethnographic study due to the limited data and information available in Kuwait databases. In and of itself, ethnography has proven to be quite difficult as far as finding respondents from which data can be gathered. This issue is prevalent in Kuwait, especially, since there are widespread holes of information that have yet to be filled and studied but societal, religious, and cultural pressures trump ethnographic studies. These pressures limit studies in the sense that they restrict individuals’ responses should they have an opinion that does not align with the norm. Initially, my ethnographic study was going to focus on the world of female sports in Kuwait—hockey to be more specific. The coronavirus (covid-19) epidemic occurred around the same time I started my study, which prompted me to shift my focus to frontline workers and the impact the virus has had on their lives. I also decided to observe how my own family has adjusted to this change. On the first few classes of e-learning I did not know what to expect. I have based two of my papers on family gatherings and how family members interacted with each other post- Covid-19. A lot of things have managed to change from the first assignment from being at a family gathering with covid scares and uncertainty of where things would go; after all we were only given two extra weeks to stay at home until it was extended to two months and counting the dramatic change of not going out due to curfew,to extended family members only being reachable through phone calls and Skype calls have given me a new perspective on my research. My strengths with conducting online ethnography has been to start of with locating a new informant for my semi structure interview and that was a family member that works frontline with corona patients at a busy hospital. Although he had a busy schedule it was easy to agree on a time to have a WhatsApp video call while we were both in different places, he was very comfortable and not in a hurry I was also able to see most of his facial and body language as well as get a lot of information from him as I can. The difficulties faced while conducting ethnography online is that although it was a strength conducting interviews online and it was very convenient for time it still lacks authenticity and was still not as genuine as it could have been if it was a face to face interview. Getting more information and getting to the source of it, as well as getting opinions of other people to broaden my research was close to impossible because of the curfew. Nevertheless theres a future in ethnographic study being held online especially for those who are unable to attend physically a place of (war, travel restrictions areas) and so on. For myself I would have rather had the opportunity to continue my field work and to have had more time with informants as well as visiting certain area that would have helped with my research. -S00038919
Conducting Ethnographic research is very challenging and that’s the main reason I was looking forward to taking this class. As an introvert, I was very excited to go out there and finally step out of my comfort zone and expose myself to the reality of other people’s lives and finally experience what it's like to observe and participate in other aspects of life that are different from my own but unfortunately, my excitement came to a halt when the Corona virus reached Kuwait in February. My first topic was the social behavior of skilled workers in the workplace and how Race, ethnicity and religion affect the work environment. I got the idea when I started working with my sister during winter break as a “Site Observer” for one of her projects in Sabah Al Salem; I witnessed a lot of casual racism and browbeating between the workers, which had a major impact on the quality and the duration of the work. My first assignment was very easy because I didn’t have to talk to anyone and so I didn't really have to worry about the language barrier with some of the workers or the unnerving feeling that I get when I have to talk to people that I don't know. But I thoroughly enjoyed it because I was so focused on observing everything that I noticed a lot of things that I otherwise wouldn’t, mainly because I was always either on my phone or taking pictures of the place to send them to my sister because I don't really know anything about the field. Unfortunately, I couldn't go back there to do my second assignment because the virus had just reached Kuwait at the time and my sister immediately decided to put all of her projects on hold. Now doing ethnography during quarantine was not as easy as I thought it would be, in fact it was very challenging, and It was also rather hard giving up on that topic because I really wanted it to be my capstone project. But to be honest the only reason I thought it was challenging was because I felt very constrained and limited to one topic and I don't really know a lot of people so finding new informants and having the ability to explore different topics wasn't really an option for me. My family was my only option, so for the participant observation, I decided to participate in my family’s special “playtime” with our new puppies; the descriptive observation, I observed my sister, who’s an interior design instructor, give one of her online classes. I also interviewed her for our last assignment, the semi structured interview, about the impact of culture and globalization on the design industry here in Kuwait. As a whole, the online ethnography experience was very interesting to me, but I wish I could've gone out there, because I feel like it could’ve helped become more familiar with the nature of anthropology and conducting ethnographic research as well as expand my horizons and broaden my perspective. Unfortunately, That is something that I feel like online ethnography doesn't offer. In my opinion. I think it has a lot of limitations and although it may offer a glimpse of the person’s reality or life, the ethnographer doesn't really get to experience it first-hand, which is very important to conducting thorough research. However, I’m not exactly a social butterfly and I feel like it (online ethnography) would be beneficial to me, in the sense that I would be more comfortable conducting interviews and doing research in the comfort of my own home than anywhere else.
Besides the overwhelming factors of this pandemic, ethnographic research methods became limited in my approach, nothing was certain, and it was hectic. We began our e-Ethnographic research with our participant-observation assignment, that meant that my initial research topic was no longer effective to pursuit, due to the social distancing regulations announced by Kuwait’s government. We were obligated to conduct our participant-observation assignment in the comfort of our homes. I began to take initiative and said to my household members that I need to take a picture that reflects our pandemic quarantine status, thinking that it will be a breeze, when apparently, I caused some discomfort to my family members. That’s when I realized that I am an expert at speaking with strangers, and I missed it. So I decided to continue elsewhere, yet everywhere was closed or busy doing their business, no time for a student roaming around to do her homework anywhere, the pandemic gave us a handful of options to seek out as our research topic, and a handful is not bad at all. As for our second assignment; semi-structured interview, I was aiming for the volunteers at the cooperative society markets. So, it was hectic, because I thought I could just go and interview the youth of Kuwait at the frontlines, of course I was putting myself at risk, yes, I am Dr. Watson I confess. But the reason why I say it was hectic, is that there was no certainty regarding my interviewee, and it took me couple of days back and forth in order to assign one for sure. The reason adhere ethnographic research is because of the adventures it comes with it, and an adventure is all about random events and random people. After conducting the interview, I realize now that I have more information about my interview topic and that my informant was comfortable in her home and talking to me without restrains. Perhaps that was the only good thing in my experience, It is worthy to note that I was comfortable too, so I wrote many information that I don’t think I could have jot down if we were to conduct the interview in her workplace. For me to assess the overall experience I would just state that I cannot wait for it to end. Although I prefer e-Learning, I really do not prefer the virtual platform to conduct an ethnography, I believe that living with my informants in the same time and space, even for moments is still worthwhile.
Part 1 : During the course of ethnographic and qualitative research methods, I learned new techniques and methods that enhance my understanding. And develop my observations skill. and know more about the formal format to document these narratives or events. where I have to assess the space and know its importance ( mapping exercises ), observe the whether and the general atmosphere, the number and the gender of people who are involved in that event or place. Also, I got instructed by how to choose interesting question topic that I will be able to find its answer through the ethnography I would conduct. How I would choose the right informant that would answer my questions and provide me with more details. And I start to value every single detail of everything whether it’s a materialistic or emotional details. And because I’m an expert in relationships I chose to relate to subtheme that under the theme of relationship especially the matchmaker roles in the process of finding the right partner and soul mates. My first observation experience under this theme was a general observation where I didn’t participate in any thing just focusing in observing as much details as possible . Then I moved to another experience where I attended an engagement celebration and observed the advantages of having access to these events for a matchmaker or for a lady who wants to get married in a traditional way, or the mother of a young man , whose son asked her to find a suitable partner. I noticed the difference when I attended the party with an intention to observe these patterns my perspective and the outcomes were totally different than the normal time. 45954
Part 2: After the second experience, the learning process changed to E-learning due to Corona virus pandemic. The whole world faced a new and strange situation where no one was prepared or has the knowledge about it . Its speared was insanely fast. The rate of infected cases jumped sky high as well as death rate. This pandemic is really scary. So, the ethnographic research methods were changed from On-site field to virtual and online field. Before it happened I was afraid of reaching the interview part because I don’t like to ask anything from anyone. and I was afraid that face to face was little harsh for me if I didn’t get accepted. But I thought that it would be opportunity to face my fears and develop my skills and the way I deal with such situations. So the shift from on-site to online field work gave me more time to manage this issue and deal with it successfully. Moreover, the online field work gave me access to do my field work without the time conflict between me and the informant and I found it much easier concerning time, and energy saving. whereas during the normal days alot of time was lost in traffic, searching for parking, time conflict ,and energy consption , finding at the end very limited time for the real interview.
On the other hand, some of the limitations of online field work were the lack of body language and facial expressions connection and even if it was virtual the delay of it might lose a lot of important details and observations. Also, I didn’t see the embodiment of the explanation of the activity that the informant was talking about. In addition, sometimes the internet connection became weak due to the load of participants and this would cause misunderstanding in some cases, or even the PC or laptop lag the technology errors also caused limitations . However, the psychological status of most of people at these times where they were struggling in depression, anxiety, and the fear of uncertainty caused a big obstacle where I faced when I called one of my friend to talk about the situation and know her point of view about it, as a friendly talk not a formal talk. She felt desperate and told me that the situation is scary and the pressure of social isolation could lead her to a very serious mental disorder and she hanged up the phone and text me that she doesn’t want to talk to anyone. I found it common like her case but she was severely affected. 45954
I am able to identify the vertical relationship ( e.g the relation between professor and student) and the horizontal relationship (the relation between 2 students) and used the proper skill for each relation. Also Iam able to identify the participants perspective, feeling , action regarding a certain event or topic that affect the society in general and each individual in the community. More over I tend to understand the emic approach better than before and know its advantages. And take into consideration the ethical part of the online ethnography conducting where I have to put myself in the shoes of people I’m interacting with and be a sensitive towards their emotions and psychological status, and make sure that I show respect and appreciation what they are say. 45954 Completed. My comment includes 3 parts
Before the pandemic affect, my original ethnography research topic was about Souq Al-Mubarakiya. Due to the recent pandemic issues and the changes in quarantine regulations in the whole country, we had to adjust and were to choose a new topic related to the COVID-19. So, my new topic is about an insider’s view of the process of returning to Kuwait and coping with self-isolation. I chose this topic because I want to see and learn from a person with their experience of coming back to Kuwait since I’m seeing lots of news showing people getting off of an airplane and seeing lots of police and medical staffs in the airport. Being the first time for me to do my ethnographic research while in quarantine, there were some advantages and disadvantages of doing such ethnographic topic in a limited location. The advantages were that I was able to do some ethnography while I’m in quarantine like, participant observation and interview. Doing a participant observation at my home was easy and fun to do. I had to write about an event or activity that we do now that we don’t normally do before quarantine. And it was a walking exercise in our living room because this is our only room in our house that is spacious. I also had to document a photo that I took, which was a picture of my father walking in a living room. As for my interview, I had to find an informant who had an experience with returning back to Kuwait. So, I interviewed my brother who had came back from the USA. In the interview, I had to social distance from my brother since he came from outside, but I got lots of information and learned a lot of him. As for the disadvantages of doing ethnography while in quarantine, thankfully I didn’t encounter any difficulties of doing my ethnography while I’m at home. However, doing this type ethnography didn’t feel like a real ethnography or fieldwork. Because a proper fieldwork is to go outside and observe the place or location, mapping the place, doing participant observation and interviewing people. Therefore, I didn’t get a chance to experience what a real ethnography or fieldwork is. Overall, doing an ethnography while I’m in quarantine was a new experience for me which I have learned a lot from. And I learned that I can get a lot of information just from staying at home.
Susanna 46003 PART 1 In this class we had the task of conducting our own ethnography. As exciting and nerve wrecking as it was at the start, we were interrupted very early on in the process with the emergence of the corona virus and having to continue via online class. This drastic change had its advantages as well as a lot of downsides. My strategy of collecting data changed but also how I felt about the whole project changed too. Overall a significant amount of the data collected was not done in person. As we only did two non-participant observations. Because I had to just watch and take notes, everything I collected was based on my own interpretation of the activities, which is an important thing to note as part of the research but since I did not get the chance to do a participant observation with those same people, it didn’t give me more of an insider’s perspective on the activities. This demotivated me a little bit because I felt a sense of disconnection with our original topic of research and I felt a shift in topic which gave me a sense of uncertainty and made it more difficult to continue. As for the data I collected I do acknowledge the fact that it is not as authentic as I would have liked it to be. This is because I did not spend enough time with the people I was studying to build enough rapport for them to get used to me and be as natural as possible around me. I wanted them to almost forget that I was there but I realize that is near impossible since I didn’t get the opportunity to spend enough time with them and get to know them. Later on when locating informants for my first semi-structured interview, I didn’t have much trouble choosing my informant as I picked the person I had most rapport with and that I felt would represent the group that I was studying as a whole. It served as a great advantage later on being that I had some rapport with him. The interview itself was a bit awkward as it was strange to do it through video as the body language and interpretation of how the interviewee was feeling was very challenging. From what I saw I believe he looked comfortable and was speaking openly. I also have to question his validity to a certain extent as I know that people tend to polish up their image when being interviewed in such a formal way even though my interview was not being recorded, the formality definitely was a barrier that I could not avoid because I didn’t have enough time to build more rapport with this person. My interviewee offered me a lot of useful and detailed information in which I experienced difficulty noting. It would have been much easier if I had recorded the interview and I would have been more relaxed during it instead of trying to cram in every detail in my notes. Given the fact that I couldn’t prolong the interview time a lot I didn’t want to dwell too much on certain questions so I may have missed a few details due to normal human error.
Susanna 46003 PART 2 Another issue was that I would have liked to do a second interview with the actual workers other than the chef that managed them as it could have given me an entirely different perspective that I believe my project needed. Unfortunately I was not able to do that because of our time restrictions for the course. There were many positives of conducting the remainder of the course online that I have tried to keep in mind in order to feel better about this huge change in routine. Although we couldn’t do a participant observation that relates to our original topic, we got to do it in our homes. It is obvious that the comfort of our own home and its familiarity would serve as an advantage to make the collection of data more enjoyable and easy. I do believe during this pandemic since we are all forced to stay at home, this makes the home a very important environment that is interesting to study at this time. Since home-life became a huge part of our year it was necessary to include in our research as a part of the drastic changes of the corona virus, and drastic changes can happen many times during the ethnographic process not everything is predictable. Conducting my research from home also made me less stressed and made me feel less awkward and more comfortable especially during the interview. I would say doing it through video really allowed me to ask the questions that I did as I feel like I wouldn’t have asked some of the questions if I had to do it in person. Overall I focused more on collecting the data during the interview instead of stressing over other things which I could have. Another advantage is that during the lockdown my informant had more free time so it was easier to get him to do an interview with me because on regular days he would be really busy. I also had more time to spare to really think about my interview question and to assess my data and organize it before writing it up. I also had a good amount of time to reflect on this whole experience. Furthermore I believe being able to still do this ethnography during this time is an advantage in itself. As this is a weird and uncertain time of our lives that will be marked in history I believe it’s great that we had the opportunity to document some of people’s experiences as well as our own during this pandemic. This will serve as very interesting research that we can benefit from now and later on when we look back at this time. Overall this experience taught me a lot of things but mostly it taught me to adapt to unexpected changes and to make the most out of whatever situation I’m in. Although this ethnography would have been better if it was conducted in person, I still feel like conducting it this way is a new experience although not traditional, we benefitted from it in a different way.
In conducting this ethnographic project I had intended my research to explore friendship narratives in Kuwait. Due to the nature of the first two assignments being general and structured observations, I altered the initial goal of my fieldwork to observing social settings where friends gather. I was worried this would not allow me to aptly document friendships as the nature of the topic was intimate and personal, while my observations would have to be distant. While I was aware of the obvious merits of observing people from afar, I had been nervous. These worries lessened when I began the actual fieldwork.
Cafés were my first choice and felt like the obvious place to begin with when exploring friendship in Kuwait. I hoped to gather information about the behaviour of cross and same gender friends from the ages of 18 to 27. The immediate issue that arose was my lack of access to their conversations and interactions, thus I was limited to distant observation – this made me question how useful the data I gathered would be, considering how much information I would miss. Cafés were not an activity or event that I could observe from afar, thus most of my fieldwork in that site was speculative. Nonetheless I felt like I gained information about the general nature and goal of café gatherings which in turn revealed information about the nature of friendships, the social spaces it occupies, and the background of the people that occupy such spaces in Kuwait. For my second fieldwork assignment I decided to document an activity, the bowling alley. Being centered around a physical activity I believed it would provide comparative information. The primary concern for my fieldwork was how accurate the information I gathered was, I worried about how much of it was accurate and how much was inferred. Especially considering that I fall into the same social circles of people I was observing, these were places I would visit and people that I could easily have been friends with. All were in my approximate age group, social circles and had similar ethnic backgrounds to me, and I worried I made too many assumptions based on my own experiences. Due to the ongoing situation with COVID-19 and the country going into quarantine the ethnographic research I conducted had to be transferred into the online sphere, luckily enough this was a place where friendship already exists, so the transfer was easy enough. Due to my previous work being limited to social spaces without any contact being made I had no informants to turn to, leaving only people I already knew being accessible. I decided to expand and reorient my topic to personal relationships – both family and friends – and how the pandemic has affected them, but in turn I noticed my informants reoriented it specifically to family relations. This was the relationship that flourished during quarantine and it was the one I documented. For the participant observation that was obvious as I was documenting a family setting, but it was also the theme that emerged with my interview, my informant stating that she had not been in close contact with friends during this period.
As I conducted the participant observation at my home with people that were comfortable with me, I did not face any obstacles. Additionally the activity I observed was a board game and consequently not intrusive. I collected some data concerning the pandemic’s effect on people’s relationships and how they coped with the situation. Additionally, the interview went smoothly as well, the nature of my questions and the topic were easy enough to answer, and the atmosphere was relaxed. In fact I think that by doing the interview online where the person isn’t hyper aware of being recorded it made them feel more relaxed and less formal, like a skype session between friends simply catching up. However it did have some issues, with only the face and some of the upper body being in shot it was difficult to pick up on physical signals, the only body language I could observe was when she raised her hands to appear on screen. Additionally looking down ever so often to take notes hindered my ability to catch any physical tells.
For this part of my ethnography I have been able to adapt but due to my lack of informants the situation has certainly caused anxiety about any future capstone plans that I’ve been unable to address so far. Moving forward I could focus on friendships that exist on social media such as Twitter or Instagram, which I would have to find an informant for first – I had noticed some people playing online board games with friends, which was interesting as that was a common occurrence in cafés as well, it seems that the activities people enjoy with friends have shifted into an online format but have remained the same. I could additionally focus on representations of friendship in media, though I wonder how relevant that would be to Kuwait.
The Coronavirus pandemic has put the whole world in quite a strange/tough state currently. In the beginning of the semester when I first started my research project, I was excited yet a little bit nervous when it came to interviewing people as I can be slightly timid or shy when it came with approaching strangers. However I noticed that even after only the first initial interaction – I decided to gain confidence in speaking to people and building rapport. Then the Coronavirus pandemic started and I had to rethink my topic and change it, which was a little stressful for me as for a little while I was unsure of which direction I was going to take this, since I could not visit the original place I was researching which was the agricultural market in the midst of the Abdali farms as it was closed obviously due to it usually being a place that was crowded with people in a small space. Now that I had to scratch my initial project and start something else, I liked the idea of relating the project to the current pandemic as even though this is a very stressful times for most of us, it is not something many of us expected to experience during our lifetime so documenting a portion of what some people are going through sounded like a very interesting idea. The negative aspects of how the Coronavirus pandemic my ethnography was obviously the stress of changing my topic quickly, as well as the research methods. Since the nature of an ethnography is going out and visiting the sites and meeting people personally, it felt a slightly limiting that now I could not necessarily go out and meet people personally and my research methods were limited to phone calls and video calls etc., basically anything online. This is not a very bad thing per se, however I personally feel like when talking to a person face to face, one can experience a different feel to the interview and also get to talk more in depth about certain things – as in my opinion talking to someone face to face is more personal than through a video call. Therefore I felt that the research I gained was slightly limited. On a more positive note, the change of dynamic from personal to online did make me much more comfortable in talking and asking questions, I feel as this may be because of my shy nature and an video call in a way made me feel much more comfortable to come forward and speak. As well as this, because the topic I chose to research was the effect of the Coronavirus pandemic on the elderly in Kuwait, my interviewees that I interviewed where my grandparents, whom I have already built rapport with obviously and I am very close with – so I was comfortable to an extent with asking many questions and I already had knowledge of what my limits where. I have known them for my whole life so I knew what was acceptable and what would offend them if I asked so it made me more confident and comfortable, whereas if it was a stranger that I was still in the process of building rapport with, I would have been very careful and nervous as I have yet to know what topic discussions are off limits or what their reactions would be. The interview went by very smoothly and I got to hear what my grandparent’s thoughts are on the whole pandemic as it is interesting to see their point of view at their age, however I did realize that we went off track many times since we would run off into different unrelated topics which I am guilty of indulging in, although I do not necessarily think that is a huge issue, it just made the interview time a tad bit longer but otherwise not really a problem. Ultimately, this was an interesting experience to go through as this gave me a chance to apply this current pandemic to the classwork and the fact that it all happened so suddenly and I had to work around changing the research topic gave me a little experience in working under pressure - but all in all I like to look at this as a positive experience and making the most out of a not so positive situation.
Nadeen Jallad 44247 part 1 The Corona virus has invaded the whole world and spread terror and fear in the hearts of many people. With the increasing number of infections and death cases, everyone is wondering? What does a corona patient go through? Is it painful? Is it true that children do not get infected? This has raised the motivation inside of me to find the right answers, and as Ethnography is a research tool central to studying a group of people from the standpoint of its social relations. My topic before the Corona crisis it was basically about gossiping, but the Corona Virus forced me to change it and changed my plan to the capstone, I was able to conduct and get numerous of information because gossiping can be found everywhere especially among girls and women, and observe how gossiping varies from woman to woman, but in the first two observational assignments I did a great work and I gathered many information based on gossiping topic. I tried as much as I can to connect my topic to the Corona virus, like observe my mom and my sister when they are talking to the phone, or observe my cousins when we talk video call during the quarantine, but it was impossible because I didn’t hear and there was no gossip. Due to the Corona situation that pervaded all over the world, and most countries imposed their residents to stay at home and they are under quarantine, the ethnographic research that I conducted had altered into online. After participating in some SBSA 200 online classes, I started to adapt and started to work on new ethnographic theme which was about how’s this epidemic effected Kuwait and your family. The first assignment was participant observation at my home, and observing the life in Kuwait based on social media platforms and life under quarantine at my house hold, and I didn’t face any impediments, but the only thing, that I didn’t get the opportunity to do the participant observation and connected to my gossip topic, but it was enjoyable and easy going to observe and write about my family members and I how we are spending our time during quarantine. The activity that I chose it was playing cards with my mom because she was never playing with us but during quarantine she did.
Nadeen Jallad 44247 part 2 The experience of ethnography during Covid-19 was a great experience full of knowledge and gaining various skills that helped me in gathering the right information and seeing the matter from another perspective especially in the interview assignment. My aim was to live the experience to the fullest, however, due to the current circumstances I was not able to be among the patients and listen to their experience, but I was lucky to find and locate an informant who is a doctor and working in the first lines in facing the COVID-19. I chose Dr. Nasser to be the informant, and at the same time he’s my sister’s fiancé and close to my family, this was the main strength in conducting the interview which makes the interview more interesting to read. I got more time to regulate my questions before interviewing my informants, and it never occurred to me to ask him about his experience during Covid-19, but the interview helped me to gain and gather more information and learn more about the virus. Honestly I was very curious to know some answers of the questions that I asked him for example, why many doctors and nurses are being infected despite they took the full precautions. The interview that I conducted with Dr. Nasser made me feel relieved, and less worried, especially doing the interview at home it was comfortable to me therefore, and this was one of the strengths. Despite, in the beginning he was afraid, but he was speaking openly and comfortable, and gave full and correct answers based on my open-ended questions, which will make us all feel less stressed, and focus on taking the right precautions and concentrate on our healthy lifestyle rather than just sitting doing nothing but feeling worried about the virus. Also, I didn’t go back to listen to the record because the notes were enough for me to write my assignment as I said above he gave me full answers. The strengths were not only centered in feelings, and making people feel less anxious, but also were in setting the base of correct information and spreading the knowledge about COVID-19. Also, I was able to understand most of the medical terms during the interview because my mom is a nurse and I always listen to her when she talks with doctors and her department officers.
Nadeen Jallad 44247 part 3 My experience is like any other experience, I encountered some difficulties. In order to conduct a good ethnography study, you need to be among the group of people that you’re studying their behavior, and as I mentioned earlier, due to the current circumstances I could only conduct an interview with the doctor through a WhatsApp video call, designate date, and time to interview him was an issue for me, which he refused at the beginning because the information that I got are very confidential and I had to convince and promise him that I’ll not reveal any confidential information for anyone only for my professor, and I told him I’ll use pseudonym .The video call interview made it hard to observe all the face expressions and body language as it differs from being in front of the informant and having a proper dialogue with him because face to face interview conversation will be longer and more enthusiastic, which was the second difficulty that I have faced. Nevertheless, the time factor played a major role as due to the limited time I couldn’t ask all the questions which I wanted to ask. Last but not least, Dr. Nasser didn’t answer the other four questions because of confidentiality, and the limitation that he had to stick to. Overall, this experience during this crisis changed and taught me several of things. A one should always be ready and expected for any crisis or problem happened to him/ her or to the world, so this doesn’t mean that a person stops his work, studies, and his future because naturally we will face many obstacles in our live. For example, I was strong enough and I was able to do ethnography through this crisis, and I was glad to get the chance to conduct research because ethnography needs a well-trained researcher, but I did a good job, and I believe it was a great experience that I tried to attain what I want.
Before the corona pandemic started, we had around a month to actually experience being ethnographers in public. My first assignment was an observation of a social scene, and I had decided to observe the people that hang out at Marina Courts. I enjoyed observing them and writing notes because it was a new experience that I had never done before. After looking at the future assignments then I thought it would be an interesting and fun semester, until the corona pandemic began.
Due to the pandemic happening we were stuck with using the people in our lives like our family and friends for our assignments. I wasn’t capable in using people I didn’t know because my parents wouldn’t allow me to leave the house at all. The reason I didn’t enjoy observing my family is because they didn’t want to or liked to be observed. Also, my family are not the best people to observe and participate with because they are very silent and hard to read. So, it was hard for me to write my field notes about my observations because there was rarely anything to observe or participate on.
The Coronavirus Pandemic affected my research negatively because I wasn’t able to show and reach my maximum potential in ethnography. After I compared the fieldnote I did before the pandemic and a fieldnote I did during the pandemic I realized that my best work doing ethnography was before the pandemic. Back then I had a lot to write about and most of my notes were interesting.
In my opinion I believe that there are a lot more weaknesses to online ethnography than there are strengths. Since this was my first-time doing ethnography and really experiencing it, I think if I got the opportunity to do it freely in public rather than online, my work would be significantly better. In my experience If you had to do ethnographic work that didn’t need to be online like a online interview than you should try and do all your work outside in public. I think online ethnography should just been an option for if you absolutely can't do your ethnographic work outside like this pandemic or unless you are conducting an interview online.
Having to experience ethnography at home was really difficult.
At the start of this course, I was a bundle of nerves, to say the least. I was only 17 surrounded by students who are at least 19, and that was intimidating to me. That was with, no doubt, the main reason why I initially intended to base my research on high school students, more specifically graduating students from the British Educational systems, who would be sitting their examinations by the end of the school year and by fall would be starting university. Besides the fact that it is something I’ve experienced, I was familiar with the environment and so it was easy to locate informants since I knew several people there and it didn’t cause a hassle when it came to transportation as there was a school not too far away from the university. That being said, when the COVID-19 outbreak started to worsen in Kuwait, regulations were put into place closing down schools, bringing the academic year to a halt until August. This meant I wasn’t able to go to any school in Kuwait and I couldn’t carry out the research on-site. Nevertheless, this opened opportunities to research broader topics, not necessarily in the same field but related, for example how students spend their time besides studying and school work which I did a participant observation on; my younger brother spent his time playing video games and taught me how to use a gaming controller. When it comes to the struggles I faced during online ethnography, I would say that I personally had two main issues that interfered with my ability to transcribe the research I was able to do. First being that I faced a number of technical difficulties. During this time, my laptop malfunctioned and I didn’t have a way to type up my research. To face this, I wrote up my notes in as much detail as possible so that I don’t lose any data I collected. The second struggle I faced was the lack of motivation that began as more and more regulations were placed due to numbers of COVID-19 cases rose. This is perhaps the hardest part for me. I had to prioritize other aspects relating to my home and family and found myself with no will to write or produce any sort of research. By talking to one of my peers in class, I was able to gain some motivation to start at least writing down data. In addition, Dr. Luciano’s advised that we keep a type of journal, documenting our struggles and thoughts about research and whatnot during the pandemic which was a key factor in how I gained the motivation to get to work. Even so, We cannot deny that online ethnography has advantages as well. I found it much more convenient to contact informants this way. At one point, I was interviewing an informant I had from the school I visited earlier this year about how the pandemic has affected her education and her thoughts on the whole matter. Using Zoom, a video conferencing app, I could effortlessly have an e-meeting and ask her all the questions I wanted to ask. Yes, elements such as body language couldn’t be recorded as it normally would if this interview were done out in the field, but still, I could collect data based on the questions I asked. With that, I was able to learn a great deal about the extent to which students have been affected and this brought a different insight on the matter than what I had previously. To add, I feel that the situation we are in now has opened my eyes to the fact that the household has many opportunities in which we can investigate and participate in. Ethnography is a chance in which we can go out to explore, investigate, educate ourselves on matters that we may not really understand or matters we think we understand. It is a chance in which we can understand further and deeper, probing ourselves into issues and questions we may have. And so, I believe Online Ethnography will not be the same and will not have the same effect as having to experience everything in the field. The fun of having a challenge and experiencing first hand is lost with online ethnography. Overall, this was a new and challenging experience, but I wouldn’t really want to do it another time.
Part 1 Learning to do ethnography during spring 2020 has proven to be an intriguing and unique experience. This is because our class got to do one or two assignments before the pandemic made the news, getting a taste of how one normally embarks on this endeavor in the public sphere. But of course, things changed rather quickly. Kuwait initially implemented partial curfews, then went on to make it a full lock-down for the month of May. We can only hope that the situation with COVID-19 begins improving soon, not only for ethnography of course, but for the wellbeing of people here and around the world. The limitations of the pandemic have resulted in many of us in class, and ethnographers more generally, to redirect our focus to observe the impacts of this novel virus. For our class specifically, we had to observe our own homes for at least one assignment, and conduct mediated interviews with our informants instead of doing them in person. Personally, I had two out of four field note entries recounting observations of my family, which is unrelated to my primary interest- vegan life in Kuwait. Those assignments, though from experience I can say they do not compare to ethnographic work in the public sphere, still provided an opportunity to learn the difficulties faced when making observations, as well as learning to work around them. To begin with, both observation sessions taught me how little detail I could note down in the midst of either high or low amounts of activity taking place around me. These experiences also had me navigate to some extent the question of how much detail I should submit for feedback- for example my sister is a hijabi, and so I felt it unnecessary to include many (or any) physical descriptions of her, though I could still note that she wore matching clothing with my niece, which alone provides some indication of the nature of their relationship to one another. However, the two entries focusing on my initial topic were still highly informative, one of which was my observation of a renowned vegan café (before curfew), the other a video call interview with my primary informant, both of which were greatly insightful and have grounded my expectations closer to the reality of vegan life here, which is fortunate as I intend to make this topic my primary project. As I mentioned previously, observations in public are not the same as those at home. This is for a few reasons: first, at home I did not have to deal with the awkwardness or anxiety of interacting with or being among strangers. I was initially very anxious when I did my café observation, especially as the room I set out to observe was much smaller than I had anticipated. Though I felt better when I buried my head in note-taking, this sense of conspicuity probably blunted my observation of details more than I can guess it did. Working from home from that point made it so I had yet to attain the experience necessary for me to overcome this issue.
Part 2 The mediated interview I conducted with my primary informant was a greatly rewarding experience, not only because I got to enjoy time with a newer friend before and after the official interview, but also for the interview experience itself. I had never conducted an interview before, and so it was interesting to learn how to attain the details one is hoping to ascertain while maintaining a loose structure that allows for the informant to speak tangentially and lead the ethnographer through their personal experiences. Having the interview through a Zoom conference call comes with its set of benefits and costs. To start simply, it allowed my informant to work with me from the comfort of their home, not having to navigate Kuwait’s traffic nor their typically busy schedule. Another advantage which I can note in hindsight is that I could see myself. This made it so I can note my appearance and expressions as the interview went on, changing them if I felt they were too off-putting. This may also be a cost, as I was probably more self-aware than I would be otherwise. As it regards the weaknesses of a mediated interview, an important one that comes to mind is that the informant can curate their image and presentation, especially since they are also more self-aware in the same way I was. My informant did not dress any differently than they would have otherwise, though they did take notes, the purpose of which I’m not exactly sure; this may have not been the case if we met in person. As it regards image, I could only see the waist up, and could not observe their entry into the interview space, which I could have had we done it in person; the aforementioned limits how many physical descriptions and non-verbal cues I could note. Perhaps this is not a strength of online ethnography, but overall it allowed for convenience on my end, as well as my informant’s. But convenient means certainly come with their weaknesses, the biggest of which you can see throughout this assessment is that detail was lost. The other big weakness is that I am still learning the ethnographic process, and starting off online certainly sets me back in this endeavor. Another example of this (than that previously mentioned) is that I don’t have enough practice describing novel settings, as I only did one observation outside my home. Another big setback is that I only have one informant currently, and being introduced to others in Kuwait’s vegan social circles will be more challenging as I won’t have my informant with me to facilitate these introductions, as it would likely be if I was working with people in person. Another thing worth noting here is that I am not interacting with my informant during normal times, which means the data I collect will be less representative than I would like. This is especially the case when considering the mental or emotional burden curfews and lockdowns can have. However, there is a silver lining to this, as it provides data I can contrast with those collected when people are out and about again.
Part 3 Some of the challenges I faced are perhaps generally the case when conducting ethnographic, not specific to the limitations of working from home. For example, a prospective informant declined to work with me for the mediated interview, and perhaps is no longer a person I can work with for the project I hope to continue with. As I mentioned previously, this means I have one informant at the moment. There have been a few attempts at building connections with others through my informant, though the problem there has been two-fold: communications through messaging apps result in the informant’s personal interpretation of what I’m trying to study as opposed to being able to talk through what I’m trying to work on with my informant, and that people are less emotionally/mentally and temporally available to participate in field research, meaning that I face rejections more frequently than I imagine would be the case in non-pandemic times. I mention this here because these issues, while arising in this specific scenario, are also one’s that can and have occurred before the COVID-19 pandemic took place. I have had limited access to vegan social circles from before this class and my idea to study vegan life in Kuwait, especially since I had left one of the major messaging groups twice and felt it a bad idea to try entering that group again for ethnography, especially since I have a “turbulent” (take this term lightly) history with one of the moderators of the group, let alone that they are the same person who declined to work with me for the interview. In summation, learning to do ethnography has overall been a rewarding experience, and doing it in this unique setting has presented its own set of challenges and benefits. However, the challenges of ethnographic work that are faced in normal times have not gone away, and I have had to learn to navigate those as well (and continue to do so), making me a better ethnographer than I was before. To be frank, I didn’t consider myself an ethnographer nor interested in this work before embarking on it, but having had the opportunity to do so has made excited to continue with the project I have in mind.
Before the corona pandemic started, we had around a month to actually experience being ethnographers in public. My first assignment was an observation of a social scene, and I had decided to observe the people that hang out at Marina Courts. I enjoyed observing them and writing notes because it was a new experience that I had never done before. After looking at the future assignments then I thought it would be an interesting and fun semester, until the corona pandemic began.
Due to the pandemic happening we were stuck with using the people in our lives like our family and friends for our assignments. I wasn’t capable in using people I didn’t know because my parents wouldn’t allow me to leave the house at all. The reason I didn’t enjoy observing my family is because they didn’t want to or liked to be observed. Also, my family are not the best people to observe and participate with because they are very silent and hard to read. So, it was hard for me to write my field notes about my observations because there was rarely anything to observe or participate on.
The Coronavirus Pandemic affected my research negatively because I wasn’t able to show and reach my maximum potential in ethnography. After I compared the fieldnote I did before the pandemic and a fieldnote I did during the pandemic I realized that my best work doing ethnography was before the pandemic. Back then I had a lot to write about and most of my notes were interesting.
In my opinion I believe that there are a lot more weaknesses to online ethnography than there are strengths. Since this was my first-time doing ethnography and really experiencing it, I think if I got the opportunity to do it freely in public rather than online, my work would be significantly better. In my experience If you had to do ethnographic work that didn’t need to be online like a online interview than you should try and do all your work outside in public. I think online ethnography should just been an option for if you absolutely can't do your ethnographic work outside like this pandemic or unless you are conducting an interview online.
Having to experience ethnography at home was really difficult. S00050678
Rafah Al-Shohaty 46285: It was strange looking at people walking aimlessly around the streets through my window; but it was more peculiar being a part of them. The Coronavirus pandemic has significantly changed various aspects of our lives we once sought as a norm—like walking down the street (although that activity in particular is strange in a country like Kuwait because people do not normally go for a stroll). The lockdown and the fear of the virus has caused majority of the population to adopt new daily routines. Such activities can be seen from neighboring households, but mainly through social media. Being an ethnographer in such circumstances is incredibly convenient because of the new material one could obtain. As a student of ethnography, however, the situation was not as rewarding, due to various factors. Personally, I wish that I had devoted most of my time in writing a full developed ethnography on the changes Coronavirus lockdown has impacted our society. However, since I was caught up in different errands and obligations, my time was limited. Moreover, my anxiety has been the major obstacle in conducting such research. In the beginning of the pandemic, long before Kuwait restricted outings, I limited my own space and surrounding; I rarely left my home and expressed my worries to my family members who did. Nevertheless, what pushed me to leave was the first assignment regarding this pandemic: our second observation. In conducting such assignment, I have found that my clouded mind prevented me from gathering rich detail of the environment around me. I tried to stay in a place that did not contain as much people for my observation. In retrospective, I can see that my distressed mind did not retain significant and detailed information that would have impacted this ethnography. Moreover, the place that I chose, which was Shaheed Park, was not ideal for gathering information; there was a limited number of people and the place did not fit the concept of Coronavirus. (It would have been best if I observed a supermarket or even by the seaside.)
Nonetheless, as time went on, the anxiety from the pandemic and lockdown began to settle down and I had found myself curious of the change rather than worried. Another obstacle that came by, however, was stress on maintaining my studies as well as completing house chores (especially during Ramadan). Balancing the two have taken up most of my time, which limited me in forming detailed observations on my surroundings. Nevertheless, I would observe out my window, or balcony, the people (or lack of) passing by and going on walks/runs as much as I could. I recall in my journal the first day the curfew was set. I opened my window just to experience the “thrilling tranquility” of the city. It was strangely quiet—never has a city been that quiet before—but the stillness had an uneasy edge to it. After days, the curfew sank into our routine and we adapted to it. Following those days, the streets became emptier. A month later, however, a day before the full lockdown, I woke up and noticed out in the streets so many cars passing by on the Gulf road and on the neighboring streets. For a moment, I had forgotten how that used to be a norm; the number of passing cars and people walking reminded me of a time that was long gone. The full lockdown brought more curiosities to the way people adapted. In those two hours permitted for people to leave, I would see a number gathering around in parking lots and streets doing activities that I normally don’t observe them doing. In all my years of living in Kuwait, I have never seen such life in the outside world. I noted down some of my observations on May 15, what I had seen: a family of four kicking a soccer ball to one another (they seemed Western); an Arab family on the side of the parking lot, the father helping his son on the bicycle; a man pouring bird food across the parking lot for the pigeons; at least 5 people jogging/running down the sidewalks (sometimes on the street). Every day I would observe the people during those two hours from my window, they looked like zombies walking around aimlessly, yet it felt surreal seeing so many people and so much activity. I decided to go out for a walk a few times, one of those was merely for observation. It was strange seeing so many people scattered throughout the streets aimlessly walking. I wish I would have developed my ethnography research solely on that, but due to the time constraints I was unable.
Coronavirus did not significantly affect my research, for I was able to interview an expert regarding theatre. Without the pandemic, however, I would have been able to experience and become a part of Kuwaiti theatre and learn its differences. Nevertheless, I took my initial topic and built it on how the scope might’ve got affected by this pandemic: how theatre is taught or practiced under lockdown. I learned so much and could potentially learn more from my informant. I greatly enjoyed my interview, as I have noted in my analysis section; however, I wish that it could have been done in person. Again, the obstacle I faced was my anxiety in this assignment; however, it was caused by an insecurity: poor Arabic language. I believe that if I were better in communicating and expressing myself in Arabic, I would have been able to develop my interview. In general, there exists strengths and weaknesses in doing ethnography online. The pros in this case is the wide range of informants and mediums. It is easier to connect and speak to various people, rather than meeting them in person. In contrast, the main cons is not being able to meet them in person. In developing ethnography, in my opinion, it is best to build a connection with the informants. That way, the data an ethnographer will gather would be rich in detail and better represented. I have mentioned the main weakness I experienced in my online ethnography; it was generally caused by the concern of the pandemic. Other weaknesses were lack of focus in the ethnography as a whole and the lack of time. My ethnography had a general scope: life under lockdown. Other than that factor, my field notes collectively do not seem to have a theme. The strengths, on the other hand, were the mobility of choosing informants, I was able to interview/observe a wide range of people; and, ironically, the pandemic that we experienced. A pandemic rarely occurs, and in this time and age especially, it was intriguing to note how people globally were affected by it. This world has become globalized to the extent that we are all affected by the same virus and are able to express it collectively.
Shana Bijumon S00049829 Ethnography by its nature is a platform to understand individuals, culture, and also what is happening around us. It has been of great interest to me to conduct and collect a series of data about people. But being an Indian immigrant in Kuwait I had no access to explore through the ethnicity and culture of this place. Therefore, I decided to focus and shortlist a number of ideas on groups and people which I would get access to. After, a few days of spinning wheels on different ideas I confirmed to conduct an ethnography on house nurses. My aim was to identify and collect information on the cultural differences and impact it had on house working nurses. My first participant observation was held in the nurse’s dorm, it was quite uncomfortable for me to avoid any interaction as some of the nurses would come up to me for a talk, mostly because of the vibe of being from the same country. I tried to avoid any possible interaction for as long as I could though I kept having recurring thoughts on how disrespectful it was to avoid them being in their dorm. I should say my experience being in the dorm helped me give an insight into the routines of home care nurses and also understand my weaknesses as an observant. Shortly after a while, Kuwait was hit with coronavirus which made it impossible for me to reach the dorm for a second observation due to safety reasons. I had to change my second observation and relocate to a place that was safe enough. It was easy as it was conducted within my family. Over the span of two months, the virus had increased, and the country set curfew which made me pause the fieldwork and work on a topic not very different from the initial topic. I started working on collecting contacts of general nurses who are working frontlines during Covid-19, I was able to contact a government nurse who is a former colleague and a friend of my mother. Prior to the interview, I kept in touch with my informant through calls and texts trying to build a comfort zone later on for both of us. While the pandemic was getting even worse in Kuwait there were also reception issues in my area which made most of my classes and works get delayed. I would not say this pandemic affected the whole of my research but not being able to access a proper connection was my main disadvantage. Knowing that forming a rapport with my informant would help me develop a better interview I tried to maintain the contact. I had constant feelings of incapability to conduct an interview without any fieldwork experience. Nevertheless, I managed to move forward with my idea and questions because an ethnographer should utilize the available opportunity. I found online ethnography both useful and weak at the same time, what was of advantage was the cost of travel and time. An onsite interview would have consumed time and energy with traveling back and forth. Meanwhile, it would have given me the opportunity to explore and gain resources that did not work out well in case of the online ethnography. One other weak point is the connection between an ethnographer and the interviewee, which would have been better with a non-virtual interaction. It helps us enhance trust and demonstrate the importance to the other person. During the online interview, it was hard to understand certain cues due to the clarity and troubles with the connection, I had to reconnect the call about 5 to 6 times and continue the interview. The strength while carrying out the interview was the comfort both of us got being in our homes. There were mistakes I assume while conducting the interview because it was my first experience and I will look for more opportunities to correct my mistake and make room for learning new things. Finally, all of this would not have been possible without the co-operation of my informant and her willingness to accept the interview.
Doing ethnographic research means you would have to step out and gather data for what you are researching. You would have to be on the field experiencing what you are researching firsthand where you are welcome to passively watch or interact with the environment. When unusual or unexpected things happen, for example, you are there to witness it rather than listen to people sharing their opinions that you cannot safely confirm if true. Research is not necessarily limited. You have the freedom to go and take in what you need from the field as you desire. Of course, this all changed once a pandemic spread across the globe. People are encouraged to stay and, in some places, including Kuwait, it is the law. You would not be the only one staying home but so does everyone else, meaning that even if there are times where you can leave legally, the area you are researching in is likely closed and abandoned. Doing ethnographic research now is a different experience. Collecting data remains to be the goal, however, it is all done from home. Data can no longer be gathered at times where the areas are active. Getting to speak to people is an entire process on its own. You would have to set up a time to meet online together or in person which is more difficult. People are not often too comfortable with interviews as it is that they will likely go for an online meeting and when they do, they choose to turn off their camera which leads to a basic phone call. Interviews over phone calls are risky in terms of how much data is sufficient. It is not easy to tell if the person on the line is being genuine while remaining serious and professional with them. My personal experience was not too bad. For the interviews, I only had to do it once and I did it with a close friend so understanding his tone was not a problem. For the introverted people such as myself, working in solitude and away from human interaction is preferable and much more comfortable. The Pandemic has altered my approach in a way that I am reluctant about since I can work in my comfort zone. On the other hand, I will admit that this is the only thing I enjoy about virtual ethnography. Being out there on the field where the events are happening in front of me, as uncomfortable as it is for me, truly is the simplest and effective method of researching -S00034954
The Coronavirus has definitely affected my ethnography research because of the current lockdown that halted down everything. The lack of not going out and observing different interactions and engagements of people with one another, has caused the ethnography process to suffer. However, it was not all bad honestly, when I stayed home and did participant observation from my home on April 25, 2020, where me and my sister decided to cook together, to me this was the first genuinely interacting with someone from my family. We had a great time and I managed to observe things and details that where not observable before. Therefore, the strength about ethnography. Right before the lockdown, we were given observation assignments. I remember when I visited a coffee shop on a busy weekend to conduct an observation as an ethnographer in public, it was great seeing people engaging and interacting with one another. I was able to clearly capture the facial expressions, gestures, and attitudes. All these elements where crucial for my field notes. However, when the lockdown took place and I was stuck at home. It was hard to be a professional ethnographer because I was unable to capture the true expressions, genuine feelings, and people's reactions like I did before the lockdown. During the lockdown, I started observing my family members and I started taking notes on each and every one of them. This was a new experience and to be honest, it was refreshing. The idea that I could observe the people in my house has never occurred to me, but this was a great experience. However, as I was observing my family members, it was very hard to observe them all at once, because every member was seated in different place inside the house. This is one of the downside of doing internal ethnography during the lockdown because I was unable to take notes of the group interactions that my family could have done. On the other side, it was great to take field notes about the personality of each of my family. When I reviewed the notes I have taken about the family members, I realized that everyone is different than the other and that for instance my sister likes to compliment my father she enjoys how reacts to her compliments. Even though there are more weaknesses about online ethnography, I believe it also has some great strengths related to it. For instance, it allows you to closely observe the people you live with in more details than regular ethnography. In addition, doing online ethnography also allows me to have a better and genuine interaction with myself because I was doing it from the comfort zone of my home. However, online ethnography is not the same as traditional ethnography because the later offers more dynamic, social interactions, visual expressions, gestures and other things that could tell me significant thing about a group or individual interactions. In addition, doing traditional ethnography requires an open space and through that space, I will be able to have better field notes taken in a professional manner. Doing ethnography at home might sound simple and easy, but its complex and tricky because there is not a lot to observe especially when the people are your family members, but one thing for sure is that I was able to greatly understand and observe how each of my family members interact, engage, and behave in a closed setting.
My experience doing ethnography was great. Although I am more interested in doing crime/addiction ethnography but for the sake of safety I did about small businesses. My first experience in ethnography was observation, I went to Mubarkya which is a famous and cultural place, and at tha day there was a festival due to Kuwait National Day, there was a place that had all the small business lined up. I remember having to sit in a certain area, that made me view the whole place. Comparing it with my first online ethnography which was during the Covid 19 pandemic, which was at my families gathering. Actually I felt weird in both situations, but the one on site felt different due that there was a lot of odd things happening and the background was different. I wasn’t in my comfort zone as much as I was in the gathering. Furthermore, I did an online interview with a teacher, assessing the teaching during the pandemic, efcourse that’s after having my informant of my main research cancelling at the last moment. Although I knew the person I was interviewing, the interview was so formal. Having it online didn’t change the formality, or maybe because that it was a video call it changed the whole experience. I never experienced an interview on site before so I can't say if it would be different, but maybe it would be less formal. I think the pandemic wasn’t a bad thing to the research, although it changed the research slightly, I think I had the chance to do an ethnography during the pandemic, I actually wish I do a whole research about the people on the first line, people with the sickness, people in general and how they live with in the pandemic. I covered the feelings of teaching online, and covered the feeling of people in gatherings during the pandemic, but I feel that with more research in the pandemic, would give a beautiful final result. The difficult challenges I encountered online differed from on site, while I did my first observation which was before the pandemic, I felt released, more free, but, during the pandemic which was online, I felt I had to go with in a certain thing, my options wasn’t open, as it was before. I actually wanted to continue my research on small business because I heard they got effected horribly during this pandemic, but sadly my interviewee cancelled at the last moment. It was a challenge to find a substitute to that, and at the same time I feel its easier to do the work online.
hallenge to find a substitute to that, and at the same time I feel its easier to do the work online. Why easier? Because you dnt have to move from place to place, its just one click and the task is on. I believe that one of my best strength is that I have patience and enjoy looking at things in a different perspective, In other words, I like to put myself In places that I can experience other views. A weakness I may have, is that my looks can be viewed a bit dangerous to others, because I realize that people try to avoid me, so this can affect me having to talk with people during the ethnography. Moreover, I did a participation assignment with my family members, it was fun, we did it the whole pandemic, but we stopped at Ramadan, during the pandemic things have changed slightly, responsibilities as well. I am the eldest in my home & I’m the man, so I always had responsibilities, during the pandemic I had to stay home a lot. Doing the ethnography at home wasn’t as bad as I thought. Maybe it lacked the real ethnography experience, but I don’t doubt it if the ethnography changed to be online in future. I believe seeing things with your own eyes has a different taste, you can view the person in front of view, and see their body language. While doing it via video call, you can see the face, and I believe gestures such as the hand and other areas on the body is important. The work had to be done, and I did it. I scheduled a meeting online with my informant, and I did it via zoom, I recorded the interview with my phone, the recording helped a lot, to gain back on the interview. I believe whats missing in the online ethnography is the sight, when you view things with your own eyes, you realize things that isnt realized with a video call, also, I believe that online ethnography has its pros. Its easier to communicate and do the work online. To be honest, although the online ethnography lacks the real experience, it can still do the work if you the informants are available. On the other hand, it is hard to participate during online and I mentioned before, viewing the body language of the person infront view changes the whole perspective.
This was one of the most challenging things to do, being used to do the work in the actual field, with meeting people in person & then have to switch off and try to do it at home or in an online interview, was way harder. Trying to be an outsider in an observation at your own home is not the best thing to do. Specially trying to keep up with writing notes and asking questions without allowing your emotions to come over with your own judgement to take over the observation was a whole battle to fight in your mind while working. Also, moving out of the main idea and filed that you were planning to work on since the beginning of semester wasn’t really good thing to happen. The thing that you need to keep updating yourself about the whole new topics in everytime can be confusing, but still it give you more experience and new points of view to observe. Including or questioning your thoughts about the whole lock down & reaching to the same realization with your informants, helps in deepening your data and observation throughout your informants, which was really interesting. As for the interview taking notes during the online interview is never easy plus having the informant already requested to not be recorded, made things much harder to keep up with. In addition of not being able to stay focus because of things out of your control like someone just came in during the interview or the place you are in suddenly decided that it would be good to have music in the background, also the internet connection that keeps getting bad in the most important parts. However, having online interviews is less stressful & time saving. In the end, the situation was manageable but an opinion that I would not made with my free well to have it in this way, as I prefer working in the actual filed and people face to face. The good thing was; more new point of views, easy access to number of informants easily online & time saving. The disadvantage of it; hard to keep up with the informants and taking notes process with showing them your full attention.
Fatma Al-Mutawa 45792 We were asked to pick a research topic in the begging of the semester. The topic had to have an objective, ask unanswered question about a group, a place, or an event, have a fixed place where I have access, and make sure the topic is not a sensitive one. In order for me to pick a topic I had to stop and observe my surrounding and ask myself who am I? and where do I belong? I still do not know, but I made a list and come up with some ideas. Based on my list I wanted to do research about Alshaya since I have a relative that does Heseeneyat every Friday, but decided not since it is a sensitive topic, so I went with diabetic patients. My theme was living with diabetes. I wanted to know more about other people’s experiences, and knowledge. Are we the same? I did not think so everyone has their own experience. like how did they know they had diabetes? How was their family’s reaction or their own? What were their feeling, thoughts about their illness? How does religion shape their way of thinking about it? How did they choose to deal with it? And did sellers ever tried to fool them into thinking they have the cure? I had access to Dasman Diabetic Center, so I was able to go through with it. For my first observation assignment, I had to stay sit in a specific area in Dasman Center. I had to take notes of everything around me including the time, weather, description of the place, ambiance, people, how they look, estimate their age, I had to assume their mood based on their facial expectations, and body language for 50 minutes. I did the observation on Thursday, in the pharmacy waiting area on 6 Feb 2020, 10:19 -11:03. There were many people coming and going mostly, elderly people who from the way they dress seem from either the upper or middle class. Some of them had trouble walking. A pharmacist who is about 40 years old, was the most active pharmacist. The line would move quickly but it was not a guarantee that the patient would get their medicine right away. In my first observation, I was very conscious of people being conscious of me. I had to write my notes quickly, so it was hard for me to pretend like I was not observing them, not that I had to keep it a secret but wanted to avoid being called out. I had trouble looking at their faces. It was in the earliest stages of Corona virus when neither people nor the government took it seriously. I was one of the few ones who were wearing masks. In my second observation, I wanted to attend an event in Dasman Center, but it got cancelled because of the pandemic, so the only place where I was sure a lot of people would be there was the pharmacy. At that time, the university stopped operating because of the pandemic and we were told to wait for further notice. I went on Tuesday, but I found out the pharmacy opens only on specific days. So, I went on Wednesday 4 Mars 2020, 5:46 pm- 7:01 pm. Daman Center prepared the place for the patients by putting a nurse next to the elevators to check their temperature, ask them when is the last time they travelled, and their ID number while noting it down on a chart. They also placed posters about Corona on walls and tables. Even though the government was taking extra measures to deal with the virus, not everyone was wearing a mask, and were taking it less seriously. However, the number of people wearing masks was still much higher than in the first observation. The workers were taking it more seriously, they were wearing masks, glovers, some were wearing a plastic coat. The place was much calmer at night. The people around sounded more comfortable and sociable than in my first observation. They were asking and talking to each other more. Most of the people were elderly, but I had seen few youngsters. I felt a lot more comfortable doing this observation, either people the atmosphere allowed me to be, or because the people probably know that I was a diabetic patient since I placed my medicine plastic bag next to me so they... part one
...did not have to worry about me. Since more people were wearing masks, I could not note down everyone’s facial experience. The active pharmacist was the only pharmacist present. At a certain time, he was not, the people were waiting, and some were wondering, and some of them suggested that he was taking a break to pray. I noticed that the pharmacist was a very polite persons and knows how to respond to people. For my participant observation had to shift our focus from our research topics because of the pandemic. Even though at that time the government had cancelled the curfew, the Dasman Center was closed. Patients were not able to book appointments with their doctors. Instead doctors would give them a call. If the patients wanted to get some medicine, they had to book an appointment. Then go to Dasman Center, the gate guard will check the time of their appointment and ask them to wait in front of the front gate for the pharmacist to come and give them their medicine. I know this because I went there. Because of this obstacle, I had to do my participate observation with my mother, Ombraim a single mother in her 40s recently retried, while visiting the Al-Jaafariya Cemetery in Al-Sulaibikat, Monday August 31, 2020, 9:46 - 10:43. Later I had an Interview with my mother from 3:30 to 4:00. Some of the obstacles were the very hot weather, my mother wanting to take picture for my assignment and writing notes while trying keep up with my mother pass. I found out that Al- sheeya dedicate a lot of their time, money, and effort for their deceased as it is an important thing in our society because it shows that the deceased has good relatives and is still connected to them. some of the things they do are clean their graves, leave Quran next to it, read Surat Al-fatehah upon them, distributing water, food, sweets, and money to people in need, visitors, and the graveyard workers and give the recompense to their deceased. It was interesting to look at the modern graves’ decoration and design. The graveyard was a pit empty because people tend to visit it on Fridays. I started to think maybe I want to change my research topic, to do research on cemeteries. However, I’m still not sure, since it might be a sensitive topic, and I need to have access which I don’t. Though I still want to explore the cemetery more and ask the workers some questions relating to their work. For my semi instructed interview assignment, I wanted to interview a doctor from Dasman Center since it related to my research topic, but they did not answer. Therefore, I did an interview with a mid-student, Yousef from Sudan in his final year, currently living in Kuwait, and volunteered to help in the Aemerre hospital during the pandemic. I interviewed him on Friday, September 11, 2020, 3:44 - 4:19. Mid students had to assent doctors, by doing paperwork, but not help them deal with infected patients. Their schedules, and the type of work tended to shift, and they had to interview some patients. To him it was exhausting experiences both physically and mentally since he had to be in quarantine several times. They did not get reworded. Some families got infected because one family member did not quarantine themselves. Some doctors had been infected and some students were in danger because they were in contact them. I thought his family would be more careful and conscious of the disease since their son is a mid-student. However, they were like any other family, they quarantine themselves, sanitize everything that comes from the outside, and were masks when heading out and nothing more. My informant was very smiley, friendly, cooperative person, and had a lot regarding my questions. Part two
...For my second semi instructed interview I interviewed my sister Sharifa 25 university student in her fourth-year majoring in Health information and informatic management on Monday September 14, 2020, 10:12 pm to 10:23 pm, break, 11:03 pm to 10:20 pm. My other candidates were busy with their exams and assignments. I choose her because she is diabetic and wanted to know more about her perspective of the Corona virus pandemic. Unlike what I expected she was not worried about the virus because she did some research and found out only 2% had died from it. Still she thinks that people should be careful even if it was not that dangerous. Similar to the mid student she would wear masks and use hand sanitizers when she when out. She did not need to contact her doctors, and if she needed any medicine, she would contact Dasman through WhatsApp. As a student she preferred online classes because it saves time. As a Muslim, she was able to worship her god more in Ramadan during the lock down by reading more Quran. Though she thinks gaining weight was one of the negative effects since a lot of sweet dishes were cooked in Ramadan. As a human, the lock down did not bring her closer to her family because they were practicing social distancing but brought her closer to her cats. One of the side effects was her cats gaining weight because she kept feeding them. In her opinion not having gathering was a pleasing because she knew people will not follow the guidelines and because they made her feel sick. One of the things that happened to her during the pandemic was that her grandmother died a natural death. It was fun to do an interview with her. However, one of the problems I faced were not having enough questions, some of my questions were short ended, she gave me short answers, and she was vocal when it comes to her opinion. In both interviews I had trouble writing my informants facial expressions and writing the time because I was taking handwriting notes. Usually I write on my phones note, because I find it easier, cares less weight, and a can see the time. Writing hand notes was not bad either, but I just keep forgetting to wear a watch. I learned to prepare as many questions as possible, let my informants speak, and ask them to elaborate as much as proposal. Doing ethnography will my family was fun and helpful but some time they tend to disrupt the work, not understanding that there is a way if doing things and a reason for it to be done that way. However, it is indeed fascinating hearing other people's stories like Lila Abu-Lughod wrote in her book Writing Women's Worlds it is better capture the qualities of "life as lived" in this community."(2) Part three
Conducting an ethnography is challenging by nature. Informants are usually hesitant to share much information and so building a good rapport comes in handy. In the case of this specific, it offered me some positive opportunities and some negative obstacles along the way. When it comes to the positives, due to the COVID-19 pandemic I was able to interview a long-time friend of mine who happens to be a doctor working as a first responder in ER rooms and a part of COVID teams. Not only that, he caught the virus himself and recovered thankfully, which makes for an interesting story to develop and read. However, it was not easy to conduct the interview due to the fact that my informant refused to start any video call of some sort. I perhaps would have been able to convince him to agree to a video call if I pressed on the matter but I suspected that it might compromise my ability to milk some information so I let it go. I had to emphasize on the voice and tone of my informant since that the body language and the facial expressions were missing.
ReplyDeleteAs far as locating the informant I did not find any trouble with that, assigning the time and date for the interview was not an issue as well due to the fact that my informant was in quarantine. So, I naturally asked my informant to assign the time and day himself. One of the major difficulties I went through while conducting the interview is when my informant spoke in pure medical terms. I tried to inform myself with all the medical vocabulary related to COVID-19, yet I still had to stumble upon some words that my informant spoke that I was forced to ask him to explain them to me in laymen terms. Some terms I had to write down and search them later because I felt like asking too many times will disturb the rhythm and flow of the interview. Subsequently, refraining from asking perhaps made me not able to ask to follow up on some questions as I did not fully comprehend the nature of some answers at that moment.
When I usually conduct an ethnography, I like to ask my informant if this specific event I am interviewing them about relates to anything they have experienced before. However, this time I felt like this question is almost useless due to the unique nature of this pandemic, so I preferred to keep the focus of my attention on the pandemic and my informant’s personal life. I also felt as if the personal questions regarding the pandemic were sort of difficult to carry out giving the situation of my informant wife’s pregnancy. However difficult those question where I had to ask them to preserve the integrity and authenticity of my ethnography.
It was relatively an easygoing process. As much as I would like to talk about the difficulties that I have faced in regard to conducting the interview during the pandemic. I can not force my self to ignore the fact the in the grand scheme of things it made things more easy than difficult for me personally. Where I was able to conduct the interview from the comfort of my house, I did not have to wait anywhere outside or drive in traffic to secure an interview. All I had to do is text Dr. Alawadhi get his approval, set a time and date and it was pretty much set. The only difficulties were in terms of focusing on the tone of voice and not being able to read the facial expressions and body language.
I was however limited in terms of the paradigm of things that I am able to explore in the context of this ethnography. That did enable me to focus on a specific set of investigation to conduct on the other hand.
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ReplyDeleteHaya Z - S00033978
ReplyDeletePART 1
Conducting ethnographic research during the Corona virus pandemic was not as bad as I thought it would be. Initially, I began by considering the different ways that I would be able to conduct research, and how online platforms would make that possible for me. Virtual communication through email, social media, WhatsApp, telephone calls, ZOOM, and WebEx are all mediums I used for this approach. In today’s world, social media platforms such as Instagram, have become a good way to assess online groups and day to day interaction. From small business, public figures, and daily news, I have noticed that social media has its own realm of context, and is expansive enough to be observed, and analyzed for those interested in online culture. When humans are deprived of their daily social interactions, with colleagues, classmates, the everyday coffee barista, and more, they retrieve to the one other form of social interaction; virtual. Since my research was mainly about the art world in Kuwait, I began to observe social networks online, and how quickly they’ve adapted and jumped into the concept of social distancing. It may just be that art began to peak much more on social media since the pandemic; artists post their work more, talking about their experiences and levels of productivity and creation during quarantine. Museums began opening online exhibitions, featuring artists online. Social media accounts begin taking in relevant artwork, and a whole new wave of art is being made about corona virus. Whether its satire related, a painting, a series, poetry, or photography, it was being created inclusively, and adapted more than ever.
For the purpose of this class, I did not have much trouble addressing how I would go about my research. For the participant observation, I simply took the time to look inwards, and observe the happenings, within my home, which I never thought would be important. Through the process of observing my inner world from an objective lens, I saw its significance. How does one avoid bias and write a well-rounded paper from within the confinements of their home? Personally, I usually take up most of my writing at the library, or usually sitting outdoors, or a coffee shop; outside of home. In that case, I had to change these habits, and learn to see my informants from a different perspective.
Haya Z - S00033978
ReplyDeletePART 2
Since data collection in ethnographic research is meant to take place within a specific field, usually in the outside world, interacting with real people, I had to reconsider how I would interview my informants online. I approached most of my informants through email, by writing down a list of open-ended questions that would allow me to extract information without having to physically meet up with or “see” my informants. All informants I chose were artists, as I tried to approach many that would be beneficial not only for the purpose of this class, but to further extend my capstone research. As a side note: all artists I contacted, I also happen to follow on Instagram. (emphasis on its importance in navigating, and for contact purposes) Completing my capstone at this time has been quite interesting as well, but not too bad either. I found that most artists’ responses I got, were very honest, thoughtful, and detailed answers. I would assume that, in this day and age, people are comfortable in reaching out to others virtually, whereas a real-life approach may come off as more intimidating. I began to consider the whole concept of “social distancing” and how it would change people’s habits, and what being “social” really meant. However, I did receive many fruitful responses, which I was glad for, because they really help enrich my paper. Also, after trying out a different interview format, which took place on ZOOM, I noticed that the conversation went a bit more “naturally” making out to be more of a discussion, rather than an interview style approach. Of course, the process of extracting information took much longer, and It took up one important aspect of my day; time.
All in all, I would say some weaknesses of online ethnography would be the important aspect of capturing the “aura” or “essence” of the field location, and field informants is minimized, where some important information would get lost in translation. Although virtual communication has become very efficient in today’s world, it may be difficult to grasp the “wholeness” and “sensibility” of any given situation. Especially when trying to configurate a type of reality, where the idea of “space” is diminished, and the context of the space is virtual rather than “real”.
My experience of conducting fieldwork during the Coronavirus pandemic was enjoyable but also challenging. Since I had already chosen an ethnography topic at the beginning of the semester, it was difficult letting go of the hard work I put into my observational data and discarding the relationship/rapport I developed with the manager of the place (at the Al-Mayadeen Shooting Range). I had already planned what I was going to do for the next assignment, but when the virus reached Kuwait at the end of February, I knew that it would be dangerous to expose myself and others to the virus in the Shooting Range. Not only did I panic about this class’s ethnography, I also began to panic and lose hope about conducting a “good enough” capstone ethnography next year. I had great ideas in mind for my capstone and it’s sad to think that I won’t be able to follow through with them (unless the number of victims gradually decreases by the end of this year). After attending a couple of our SBSA 200 eLearning classes, I slowly began gaining motivation to work on a new ethnographic topic that focused on the pandemic’s effect on household conversations and activities. The motivation was generated from Dr. Pellegrino’s advice and lectures on how to modify our fieldwork methods to adapt to online fieldwork, and from other classmates’ ideas on new ethnographic topics. I wanted to take advantage of this pandemic, practice my ethnographic skills, and develop new data to hopefully use in a future ethnography about the pandemic.
ReplyDeleteThe first assignment that was due during eLearning was our participant observation, in which I participated in a household family gathering. My parents, my grandmother, and I were watching an interview and Islamic program on Kuwait TV1 while enjoying some tea and coffee, and having a conversation. As I assumed before I started the fieldwork, our conversation was about Kuwait and how they were handling the coronavirus, but it also included topics about our family members, expat workers, and more. I felt very comfortable participating and observing my family members since we are used to being in each other’s presence, but I wasn’t able to experience the challenges or the awkwardness in participant observation with a population I need to develop a relationship with. Therefore, I didn’t need to start my fieldwork by searching for informants, convincing them of my interest to study their population, or engage in a conversation about my project. The weakness of my fieldwork during quarantine was that my informants might have agreed to allow me to observe and participant in their gathering as merely a college assignment. They might have taken pity on me and wanted to help me, as their daughter/granddaughter, complete this assignment. I asked my grandmother and parents if I observe their gathering for my methods class, and they agreed without asking questions about the assignment (I explained to them why I was doing the assignment, regardless). On the other hand, I believe that conducting my participant-observation at home made me aware of my presence in the informant’s space and how it affected their behavior (not so much speech). This is because I wasn’t worried about things I would worry about when participating in an activity with people I don’t know as well. If I were doing this assignment in the shooting range, I would worry about introducing myself to people engaging in the same activity, receiving awkward stares from people, making sure I’m being safe with and around the fire arms, and trying to talk to my informants with the noise cancelling headphones on. By doing my participant observation at home, I was able to relax and focus on observing my setting and the non-verbal and verbal communications, as well as my focus on asking adequate questions to understand the conversations. I believe that my skills as an observer and a student of ethnographic fieldwork were heightened/developed during this activity and I was self-reflexive while analyzing the data.
Part 2
ReplyDeleteThe interview I conducted with a friend of mine from university was also enjoyable and coherent. Developing my open-ended questions for the interview was a bit challenging since I didn’t know if they were good enough or if I was on the right track. After coming up with my questions, I acted out the interview to see if I could answer the questions with open-ended answers, as the informant, so the assignment (being an online interview) forced me to use my knowledge of ethnographic interviews to move on with the assignment. If not for quarantine, I would not have interviewed a person I have already developed a rapport with because I wanted to go through developing rapport from scratch, on the basis of my project. However, I’m glad I did interview a friend because he gave me information I don’t think I would get from someone who didn’t know me very well, especially since we discussed personal and household activities during quarantine. The interview was also easy to plan and meet for since I only had to send my informant a link to a Zoom meeting. It was also very easy to record, since Zoom has a “record” option during the call. I did encounter a disconnection during the interview, but fortunately, it only happened once. I did miss some aspects of an ethnographic interview like the informant’s body language (since I could only see his face and upper body), the mapping of our interview setting, how our shared setting/environment affected the interview or informant’s attitudes, and the challenges ethnographers experience to find a place and time to meet with the informant. The Zoom meeting created a casual and informal mood for the interview and I could infer by the informant’s tone and answer, that he was comfortable during the meeting as well.
I think quarantine’s effect on my ethnography and fieldwork enabled me to expand my observational, communication, analyzing, and interviewing skills before beginning my capstone project next year. I have now practiced conducting ethnographies face to face and through the internet. I also learned to use available resources, like my household members and my friends, to make use of collecting data during this restrictive time. Although it was a challenge, I believe I have learned things that I couldn’t have learned if the pandemic hadn’t appeared this semester. It is a difficult time for many academics who have already started their projects or have wanted to start a project but couldn’t. Indeed the pandemic has challenged many of our goals, but we must continue working towards them using a different route, whatever that may be. In conducting ethnographies online, we can form relationships and develop rapport with people all around the world who have access to the Internet. This allows us to become sensitive to their stress and understand what they are going through during this tough time because as ethnographers, we are the source that can give our informants a voice to be heard worldwide.
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My research initially was targeting the beauty industry, specifically observing Sephora customers and employees, looking at how age, gender, and social class plays a role into the industry, but after the pandemic I knew I had to change my topic as a full lockdown was enforced. Prior to the lockdown, I was able to conduct two observational assignments at Sephora where I was able to collect interesting data on both customers and employees, and I would have loved to continue another observational assignment as well do my interview assignment with the employee’s and multiple customers. Unfortunately, the coronavirus interrupted my research and made it difficult for me to focus on Sephora, so I had my topic changed to a broader subject such as self care and make up. I wanted to stay in the same theme, as Sephora does include several skin care, hair care, nail care, and make-up lines, without looking at the store as it became impossible due to the virus. I joined this class with the intention of choosing a topic for my capstone and gathering the research needed, and at first I thought the adjustments I had to make would be a waste of time and research, but I feel like it was a good way to prepare and train me for future observational, participant observation, and interview assignments. Plus, the research that I gathered was not a waste of time, as I was able to get knowledgeable information from my informant and I do feel like all experiences are valid and useful to my research. For my participant observation, I had joined my mother and sister doing their hair mask weekly routine, and for the interview I had interviewed my mom. I chose to do these assignments with family because a.) they have genuine interest to my topic b.) my mom is interesting and c.) I don’t really know anyone else. Of course I tried my best to professional with them and again, it was a good way to practice or prepare myself, as I’ve never done an interview like this. The questions I created for the interview is something I’m actually really proud of, and will be using again when I continue with this research for my capstone.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I feel like I did a good job staying in the same theme as my original research topic, and I think that the questions I created for my informant were good and useful questions. I do want to include nail care, and make-up related questions, as I feel like it is part of self care. It might run the interview longer, but I would feel satisfied discussing all aspects of self-care rather than just part of it. Make up is pretty important in todays society and I would love to see how it affects different people’s lives. A problem faced when conducting the interview was asking my informant to elaborate her answers, in the moment I thought I was giving her too much space and time to answer the questions, but when re listening to the voice recording I realized that she mentioned a few things I seemed to ignore at the time? Maybe I was too focused on getting the answers of the questions when I should have been more present during the interview, I may have been thinking head as I am an anxious person in general.
From my experience, online ethnography was only difficult for me because I had to kind of change my topic and idea. I really wanted to interview Sephora employee’s as well as customers they get. I’m happy with the choice of my informant, as she has experience with self care and make up, but it would have been more interesting if she was a regular Sephora customer, or if I found her at Sephora. Also if family members were not allowed to be interviewed, I may have struggled choosing an informant as I do not know much people. A pro to online ethnography is being able to stay home, and that’s about it. I think online ethnography completely ruins ethnographic research. It takes out the fun of being to able to go somewhere new and do things out of your comfort zone, like staying and observing people in a store for an hour, or talking to employee’s and customers.
Throughout this course, I was discouraged and somewhat held back when it came to starting an ethnographic study due to the limited data and information available in Kuwait databases. In and of itself, ethnography has proven to be quite difficult as far as finding respondents from which data can be gathered. This issue is prevalent in Kuwait, especially, since there are widespread holes of information that have yet to be filled and studied but societal, religious, and cultural pressures trump ethnographic studies. These pressures limit studies in the sense that they restrict individuals’ responses should they have an opinion that does not align with the norm. Initially, my ethnographic study was going to focus on the world of female sports in Kuwait—hockey to be more specific. The coronavirus (covid-19) epidemic occurred around the same time I started my study, which prompted me to shift my focus to frontline workers and the impact the virus has had on their lives. I also decided to observe how my own family has adjusted to this change. On the first few classes of e-learning I did not know what to expect. I have based two of my papers on family gatherings and how family members interacted with each other post- Covid-19. A lot of things have managed to change from the first assignment from being at a family gathering with covid scares and uncertainty of where things would go; after all we were only given two extra weeks to stay at home until it was extended to two months and counting the dramatic change of not going out due to curfew,to extended family members only being reachable through phone calls and Skype calls have given me a new perspective on my research. My strengths with conducting online ethnography has been to start of with locating a new informant for my semi structure interview and that was a family member that works frontline with corona patients at a busy hospital. Although he had a busy schedule it was easy to agree on a time to have a WhatsApp video call while we were both in different places, he was very comfortable and not in a hurry I was also able to see most of his facial and body language as well as get a lot of information from him as I can. The difficulties faced while conducting ethnography online is that although it was a strength conducting interviews online and it was very convenient for time it still lacks authenticity and was still not as genuine as it could have been if it was a face to face interview. Getting more information and getting to the source of it, as well as getting opinions of other people to broaden my research was close to impossible because of the curfew. Nevertheless theres a future in ethnographic study being held online especially for those who are unable to attend physically a place of (war, travel restrictions areas) and so on. For myself I would have rather had the opportunity to continue my field work and to have had more time with informants as well as visiting certain area that would have helped with my research.
ReplyDelete-S00038919
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ReplyDeleteConducting Ethnographic research is very challenging and that’s the main reason I was looking forward to taking this class. As an introvert, I was very excited to go out there and finally step out of my comfort zone and expose myself to the reality of other people’s lives and finally experience what it's like to observe and participate in other aspects of life that are different from my own but unfortunately, my excitement came to a halt when the Corona virus reached Kuwait in February. My first topic was the social behavior of skilled workers in the workplace and how
ReplyDeleteRace, ethnicity and religion affect the work environment. I got the idea when I started working with my sister during winter break as a “Site Observer” for one of her projects in Sabah Al Salem; I witnessed a lot of casual racism and browbeating between the workers, which had a major impact on the quality and the duration of the work. My first assignment was very easy because I didn’t have to talk to anyone and so I didn't really have to worry about the language barrier with some of the workers or the unnerving feeling that I get when I have to talk to people that I don't know. But I thoroughly enjoyed it because I was so focused on observing everything that I noticed a lot of things that I otherwise wouldn’t, mainly because I was always either on my phone or taking pictures of the place to send them to my sister because I don't really know anything about the field. Unfortunately, I couldn't go back there to do my second assignment because the virus had just reached Kuwait at the time and my sister immediately decided to put all of her projects on hold.
Now doing ethnography during quarantine was not as easy as I thought it would be, in fact it was very challenging, and It was also rather hard giving up on that topic because I really wanted it to be my capstone project. But to be honest the only reason I thought it was challenging was because I felt very constrained and limited to one topic and I don't really know a lot of people so finding new informants and having the ability to explore different topics wasn't really an option for me. My family was my only option, so for the participant observation, I decided to participate in my family’s special “playtime” with our new puppies; the descriptive observation, I observed my sister, who’s an interior design instructor, give one of her online classes. I also interviewed her for our last assignment, the semi structured interview, about the impact of culture and globalization on the design industry here in Kuwait.
As a whole, the online ethnography experience was very interesting to me, but I wish I could've gone out there, because I feel like it could’ve helped become more familiar with the nature of anthropology and conducting ethnographic research as well as expand my horizons and broaden my perspective. Unfortunately, That is something that I feel like online ethnography doesn't offer. In my opinion. I think it has a lot of limitations and although it may offer a glimpse of the person’s reality or life, the ethnographer doesn't really get to experience it first-hand, which is very important to conducting thorough research. However, I’m not exactly a social butterfly and I feel like it (online ethnography) would be beneficial to me, in the sense that I would be more comfortable conducting interviews and doing research in the comfort of my own home than anywhere else.
Besides the overwhelming factors of this pandemic, ethnographic research methods became limited in my approach, nothing was certain, and it was hectic.
ReplyDeleteWe began our e-Ethnographic research with our participant-observation assignment, that meant that my initial research topic was no longer effective to pursuit, due to the social distancing regulations announced by Kuwait’s government. We were obligated to conduct our participant-observation assignment in the comfort of our homes. I began to take initiative and said to my household members that I need to take a picture that reflects our pandemic quarantine status, thinking that it will be a breeze, when apparently, I caused some discomfort to my family members. That’s when I realized that I am an expert at speaking with strangers, and I missed it. So I decided to continue elsewhere, yet everywhere was closed or busy doing their business, no time for a student roaming around to do her homework anywhere, the pandemic gave us a handful of options to seek out as our research topic, and a handful is not bad at all. As for our second assignment; semi-structured interview, I was aiming for the volunteers at the cooperative society markets. So, it was hectic, because I thought I could just go and interview the youth of Kuwait at the frontlines, of course I was putting myself at risk, yes, I am Dr. Watson I confess. But the reason why I say it was hectic, is that there was no certainty regarding my interviewee, and it took me couple of days back and forth in order to assign one for sure. The reason adhere ethnographic research is because of the adventures it comes with it, and an adventure is all about random events and random people. After conducting the interview, I realize now that I have more information about my interview topic and that my informant was comfortable in her home and talking to me without restrains. Perhaps that was the only good thing in my experience, It is worthy to note that I was comfortable too, so I wrote many information that I don’t think I could have jot down if we were to conduct the interview in her workplace.
For me to assess the overall experience I would just state that I cannot wait for it to end. Although I prefer e-Learning, I really do not prefer the virtual platform to conduct an ethnography, I believe that living with my informants in the same time and space, even for moments is still worthwhile.
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ReplyDeletePart 1 :
ReplyDeleteDuring the course of ethnographic and qualitative research methods, I learned new techniques and methods that enhance my understanding. And develop my observations skill. and know more about the formal format to document these narratives or events. where I have to assess the space and know its importance ( mapping exercises ), observe the whether and the general atmosphere, the number and the gender of people who are involved in that event or place. Also, I got instructed by how to choose interesting question topic that I will be able to find its answer through the ethnography I would conduct. How I would choose the right informant that would answer my questions and provide me with more details. And I start to value every single detail of everything whether it’s a materialistic or emotional details.
And because I’m an expert in relationships I chose to relate to subtheme that under the theme of relationship especially the matchmaker roles in the process of finding the right partner and soul mates. My first observation experience under this theme was a general observation where I didn’t participate in any thing just focusing in observing as much details as possible . Then I moved to another experience where I attended an engagement celebration and observed the advantages of having access to these events for a matchmaker or for a lady who wants to get married in a traditional way, or the mother of a young man , whose son asked her to find a suitable partner. I noticed the difference when I attended the party with an intention to observe these patterns my perspective and the outcomes were totally different than the normal time.
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Part 2:
ReplyDeleteAfter the second experience, the learning process changed to E-learning due to Corona virus pandemic. The whole world faced a new and strange situation where no one was prepared or has the knowledge about it . Its speared was insanely fast. The rate of infected cases jumped sky high as well as death rate. This pandemic is really scary. So, the ethnographic research methods were changed from On-site field to virtual and online field. Before it happened I was afraid of reaching the interview part because I don’t like to ask anything from anyone. and I was afraid that face to face was little harsh for me if I didn’t get accepted. But I thought that it would be opportunity to face my fears and develop my skills and the way I deal with such situations. So the shift from on-site to online field work gave me more time to manage this issue and deal with it successfully. Moreover, the online field work gave me access to do my field work without the time conflict between me and the informant and I found it much easier concerning time, and energy saving. whereas during the normal days alot of time was lost in traffic, searching for parking, time conflict ,and energy consption , finding at the end very limited time for the real interview.
On the other hand, some of the limitations of online field work were the lack of body language and facial expressions connection and even if it was virtual the delay of it might lose a lot of important details and observations. Also, I didn’t see the embodiment of the explanation of the activity that the informant was talking about. In addition, sometimes the internet connection became weak due to the load of participants and this would cause misunderstanding in some cases, or even the PC or laptop lag the technology errors also caused limitations . However, the psychological status of most of people at these times where they were struggling in depression, anxiety, and the fear of uncertainty caused a big obstacle where I faced when I called one of my friend to talk about the situation and know her point of view about it, as a friendly talk not a formal talk. She felt desperate and told me that the situation is scary and the pressure of social isolation could lead her to a very serious mental disorder and she hanged up the phone and text me that she doesn’t want to talk to anyone. I found it common like her case but she was severely affected.
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Part 3:
ReplyDelete(more of course outcomes)
I am able to identify the vertical relationship ( e.g the relation between professor and student) and the horizontal relationship (the relation between 2 students) and used the proper skill for each relation. Also Iam able to identify the participants perspective, feeling , action regarding a certain event or topic that affect the society in general and each individual in the community. More over I tend to understand the emic approach better than before and know its advantages. And take into consideration the ethical part of the online ethnography conducting where I have to put myself in the shoes of people I’m interacting with and be a sensitive towards their emotions and psychological status, and make sure that I show respect and appreciation what they are say.
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Completed. My comment includes 3 parts
Before the pandemic affect, my original ethnography research topic was about Souq Al-Mubarakiya. Due to the recent pandemic issues and the changes in quarantine regulations in the whole country, we had to adjust and were to choose a new topic related to the COVID-19. So, my new topic is about an insider’s view of the process of returning to Kuwait and coping with self-isolation. I chose this topic because I want to see and learn from a person with their experience of coming back to Kuwait since I’m seeing lots of news showing people getting off of an airplane and seeing lots of police and medical staffs in the airport. Being the first time for me to do my ethnographic research while in quarantine, there were some advantages and disadvantages of doing such ethnographic topic in a limited location.
ReplyDeleteThe advantages were that I was able to do some ethnography while I’m in quarantine like, participant observation and interview. Doing a participant observation at my home was easy and fun to do. I had to write about an event or activity that we do now that we don’t normally do before quarantine. And it was a walking exercise in our living room because this is our only room in our house that is spacious. I also had to document a photo that I took, which was a picture of my father walking in a living room. As for my interview, I had to find an informant who had an experience with returning back to Kuwait. So, I interviewed my brother who had came back from the USA. In the interview, I had to social distance from my brother since he came from outside, but I got lots of information and learned a lot of him.
As for the disadvantages of doing ethnography while in quarantine, thankfully I didn’t encounter any difficulties of doing my ethnography while I’m at home. However, doing this type ethnography didn’t feel like a real ethnography or fieldwork. Because a proper fieldwork is to go outside and observe the place or location, mapping the place, doing participant observation and interviewing people. Therefore, I didn’t get a chance to experience what a real ethnography or fieldwork is.
Overall, doing an ethnography while I’m in quarantine was a new experience for me which I have learned a lot from. And I learned that I can get a lot of information just from staying at home.
Susanna 46003
ReplyDeletePART 1
In this class we had the task of conducting our own ethnography. As exciting and nerve wrecking as it was at the start, we were interrupted very early on in the process with the emergence of the corona virus and having to continue via online class. This drastic change had its advantages as well as a lot of downsides. My strategy of collecting data changed but also how I felt about the whole project changed too.
Overall a significant amount of the data collected was not done in person. As we only did two non-participant observations. Because I had to just watch and take notes, everything I collected was based on my own interpretation of the activities, which is an important thing to note as part of the research but since I did not get the chance to do a participant observation with those same people, it didn’t give me more of an insider’s perspective on the activities. This demotivated me a little bit because I felt a sense of disconnection with our original topic of research and I felt a shift in topic which gave me a sense of uncertainty and made it more difficult to continue.
As for the data I collected I do acknowledge the fact that it is not as authentic as I would have liked it to be. This is because I did not spend enough time with the people I was studying to build enough rapport for them to get used to me and be as natural as possible around me. I wanted them to almost forget that I was there but I realize that is near impossible since I didn’t get the opportunity to spend enough time with them and get to know them. Later on when locating informants for my first semi-structured interview, I didn’t have much trouble choosing my informant as I picked the person I had most rapport with and that I felt would represent the group that I was studying as a whole. It served as a great advantage later on being that I had some rapport with him.
The interview itself was a bit awkward as it was strange to do it through video as the body language and interpretation of how the interviewee was feeling was very challenging. From what I saw I believe he looked comfortable and was speaking openly. I also have to question his validity to a certain extent as I know that people tend to polish up their image when being interviewed in such a formal way even though my interview was not being recorded, the formality definitely was a barrier that I could not avoid because I didn’t have enough time to build more rapport with this person. My interviewee offered me a lot of useful and detailed information in which I experienced difficulty noting. It would have been much easier if I had recorded the interview and I would have been more relaxed during it instead of trying to cram in every detail in my notes. Given the fact that I couldn’t prolong the interview time a lot I didn’t want to dwell too much on certain questions so I may have missed a few details due to normal human error.
Susanna 46003
ReplyDeletePART 2
Another issue was that I would have liked to do a second interview with the actual workers other than the chef that managed them as it could have given me an entirely different perspective that I believe my project needed. Unfortunately I was not able to do that because of our time restrictions for the course.
There were many positives of conducting the remainder of the course online that I have tried to keep in mind in order to feel better about this huge change in routine. Although we couldn’t do a participant observation that relates to our original topic, we got to do it in our homes. It is obvious that the comfort of our own home and its familiarity would serve as an advantage to make the collection of data more enjoyable and easy. I do believe during this pandemic since we are all forced to stay at home, this makes the home a very important environment that is interesting to study at this time. Since home-life became a huge part of our year it was necessary to include in our research as a part of the drastic changes of the corona virus, and drastic changes can happen many times during the ethnographic process not everything is predictable.
Conducting my research from home also made me less stressed and made me feel less awkward and more comfortable especially during the interview. I would say doing it through video really allowed me to ask the questions that I did as I feel like I wouldn’t have asked some of the questions if I had to do it in person. Overall I focused more on collecting the data during the interview instead of stressing over other things which I could have. Another advantage is that during the lockdown my informant had more free time so it was easier to get him to do an interview with me because on regular days he would be really busy. I also had more time to spare to really think about my interview question and to assess my data and organize it before writing it up. I also had a good amount of time to reflect on this whole experience.
Furthermore I believe being able to still do this ethnography during this time is an advantage in itself. As this is a weird and uncertain time of our lives that will be marked in history I believe it’s great that we had the opportunity to document some of people’s experiences as well as our own during this pandemic. This will serve as very interesting research that we can benefit from now and later on when we look back at this time. Overall this experience taught me a lot of things but mostly it taught me to adapt to unexpected changes and to make the most out of whatever situation I’m in. Although this ethnography would have been better if it was conducted in person, I still feel like conducting it this way is a new experience although not traditional, we benefitted from it in a different way.
S00046211 - Part One
ReplyDeleteIn conducting this ethnographic project I had intended my research to explore friendship narratives in Kuwait. Due to the nature of the first two assignments being general and structured observations, I altered the initial goal of my fieldwork to observing social settings where friends gather. I was worried this would not allow me to aptly document friendships as the nature of the topic was intimate and personal, while my observations would have to be distant. While I was aware of the obvious merits of observing people from afar, I had been nervous. These worries lessened when I began the actual fieldwork.
Cafés were my first choice and felt like the obvious place to begin with when exploring friendship in Kuwait. I hoped to gather information about the behaviour of cross and same gender friends from the ages of 18 to 27. The immediate issue that arose was my lack of access to their conversations and interactions, thus I was limited to distant observation – this made me question how useful the data I gathered would be, considering how much information I would miss. Cafés were not an activity or event that I could observe from afar, thus most of my fieldwork in that site was speculative. Nonetheless I felt like I gained information about the general nature and goal of café gatherings which in turn revealed information about the nature of friendships, the social spaces it occupies, and the background of the people that occupy such spaces in Kuwait. For my second fieldwork assignment I decided to document an activity, the bowling alley. Being centered around a physical activity I believed it would provide comparative information. The primary concern for my fieldwork was how accurate the information I gathered was, I worried about how much of it was accurate and how much was inferred. Especially considering that I fall into the same social circles of people I was observing, these were places I would visit and people that I could easily have been friends with. All were in my approximate age group, social circles and had similar ethnic backgrounds to me, and I worried I made too many assumptions based on my own experiences.
Due to the ongoing situation with COVID-19 and the country going into quarantine the ethnographic research I conducted had to be transferred into the online sphere, luckily enough this was a place where friendship already exists, so the transfer was easy enough. Due to my previous work being limited to social spaces without any contact being made I had no informants to turn to, leaving only people I already knew being accessible. I decided to expand and reorient my topic to personal relationships – both family and friends – and how the pandemic has affected them, but in turn I noticed my informants reoriented it specifically to family relations. This was the relationship that flourished during quarantine and it was the one I documented. For the participant observation that was obvious as I was documenting a family setting, but it was also the theme that emerged with my interview, my informant stating that she had not been in close contact with friends during this period.
S00046211 - Part Two
DeleteAs I conducted the participant observation at my home with people that were comfortable with me, I did not face any obstacles. Additionally the activity I observed was a board game and consequently not intrusive. I collected some data concerning the pandemic’s effect on people’s relationships and how they coped with the situation. Additionally, the interview went smoothly as well, the nature of my questions and the topic were easy enough to answer, and the atmosphere was relaxed. In fact I think that by doing the interview online where the person isn’t hyper aware of being recorded it made them feel more relaxed and less formal, like a skype session between friends simply catching up. However it did have some issues, with only the face and some of the upper body being in shot it was difficult to pick up on physical signals, the only body language I could observe was when she raised her hands to appear on screen. Additionally looking down ever so often to take notes hindered my ability to catch any physical tells.
For this part of my ethnography I have been able to adapt but due to my lack of informants the situation has certainly caused anxiety about any future capstone plans that I’ve been unable to address so far. Moving forward I could focus on friendships that exist on social media such as Twitter or Instagram, which I would have to find an informant for first – I had noticed some people playing online board games with friends, which was interesting as that was a common occurrence in cafés as well, it seems that the activities people enjoy with friends have shifted into an online format but have remained the same. I could additionally focus on representations of friendship in media, though I wonder how relevant that would be to Kuwait.
Rawan 45875
ReplyDeleteThe Coronavirus pandemic has put the whole world in quite a strange/tough state currently. In the beginning of the semester when I first started my research project, I was excited yet a little bit nervous when it came to interviewing people as I can be slightly timid or shy when it came with approaching strangers. However I noticed that even after only the first initial interaction – I decided to gain confidence in speaking to people and building rapport. Then the Coronavirus pandemic started and I had to rethink my topic and change it, which was a little stressful for me as for a little while I was unsure of which direction I was going to take this, since I could not visit the original place I was researching which was the agricultural market in the midst of the Abdali farms as it was closed obviously due to it usually being a place that was crowded with people in a small space.
Now that I had to scratch my initial project and start something else, I liked the idea of relating the project to the current pandemic as even though this is a very stressful times for most of us, it is not something many of us expected to experience during our lifetime so documenting a portion of what some people are going through sounded like a very interesting idea.
The negative aspects of how the Coronavirus pandemic my ethnography was obviously the stress of changing my topic quickly, as well as the research methods. Since the nature of an ethnography is going out and visiting the sites and meeting people personally, it felt a slightly limiting that now I could not necessarily go out and meet people personally and my research methods were limited to phone calls and video calls etc., basically anything online. This is not a very bad thing per se, however I personally feel like when talking to a person face to face, one can experience a different feel to the interview and also get to talk more in depth about certain things – as in my opinion talking to someone face to face is more personal than through a video call. Therefore I felt that the research I gained was slightly limited.
On a more positive note, the change of dynamic from personal to online did make me much more comfortable in talking and asking questions, I feel as this may be because of my shy nature and an video call in a way made me feel much more comfortable to come forward and speak. As well as this, because the topic I chose to research was the effect of the Coronavirus pandemic on the elderly in Kuwait, my interviewees that I interviewed where my grandparents, whom I have already built rapport with obviously and I am very close with – so I was comfortable to an extent with asking many questions and I already had knowledge of what my limits where. I have known them for my whole life so I knew what was acceptable and what would offend them if I asked so it made me more confident and comfortable, whereas if it was a stranger that I was still in the process of building rapport with, I would have been very careful and nervous as I have yet to know what topic discussions are off limits or what their reactions would be. The interview went by very smoothly and I got to hear what my grandparent’s thoughts are on the whole pandemic as it is interesting to see their point of view at their age, however I did realize that we went off track many times since we would run off into different unrelated topics which I am guilty of indulging in, although I do not necessarily think that is a huge issue, it just made the interview time a tad bit longer but otherwise not really a problem. Ultimately, this was an interesting experience to go through as this gave me a chance to apply this current pandemic to the classwork and the fact that it all happened so suddenly and I had to work around changing the research topic gave me a little experience in working under pressure - but all in all I like to look at this as a positive experience and making the most out of a not so positive situation.
Nadeen Jallad 44247 part 1
ReplyDeleteThe Corona virus has invaded the whole world and spread terror and fear in the hearts of many people. With the increasing number of infections and death cases, everyone is wondering? What does a corona patient go through? Is it painful? Is it true that children do not get infected? This has raised the motivation inside of me to find the right answers, and as Ethnography is a research tool central to studying a group of people from the standpoint of its social relations. My topic before the Corona crisis it was basically about gossiping, but the Corona Virus forced me to change it and changed my plan to the capstone, I was able to conduct and get numerous of information because gossiping can be found everywhere especially among girls and women, and observe how gossiping varies from woman to woman, but in the first two observational assignments I did a great work and I gathered many information based on gossiping topic. I tried as much as I can to connect my topic to the Corona virus, like observe my mom and my sister when they are talking to the phone, or observe my cousins when we talk video call during the quarantine, but it was impossible because I didn’t hear and there was no gossip.
Due to the Corona situation that pervaded all over the world, and most countries imposed their residents to stay at home and they are under quarantine, the ethnographic research that I conducted had altered into online. After participating in some SBSA 200 online classes, I started to adapt and started to work on new ethnographic theme which was about how’s this epidemic effected Kuwait and your family. The first assignment was participant observation at my home, and observing the life in Kuwait based on social media platforms and life under quarantine at my house hold, and I didn’t face any impediments, but the only thing, that I didn’t get the opportunity to do the participant observation and connected to my gossip topic, but it was enjoyable and easy going to observe and write about my family members and I how we are spending our time during quarantine. The activity that I chose it was playing cards with my mom because she was never playing with us but during quarantine she did.
Nadeen Jallad 44247 part 2
ReplyDeleteThe experience of ethnography during Covid-19 was a great experience full of knowledge and gaining various skills that helped me in gathering the right information and seeing the matter from another perspective especially in the interview assignment. My aim was to live the experience to the fullest, however, due to the current circumstances I was not able to be among the patients and listen to their experience, but I was lucky to find and locate an informant who is a doctor and working in the first lines in facing the COVID-19. I chose Dr. Nasser to be the informant, and at the same time he’s my sister’s fiancé and close to my family, this was the main strength in conducting the interview which makes the interview more interesting to read. I got more time to regulate my questions before interviewing my informants, and it never occurred to me to ask him about his experience during Covid-19, but the interview helped me to gain and gather more information and learn more about the virus. Honestly I was very curious to know some answers of the questions that I asked him for example, why many doctors and nurses are being infected despite they took the full precautions. The interview that I conducted with Dr. Nasser made me feel relieved, and less worried, especially doing the interview at home it was comfortable to me therefore, and this was one of the strengths. Despite, in the beginning he was afraid, but he was speaking openly and comfortable, and gave full and correct answers based on my open-ended questions, which will make us all feel less stressed, and focus on taking the right precautions and concentrate on our healthy lifestyle rather than just sitting doing nothing but feeling worried about the virus. Also, I didn’t go back to listen to the record because the notes were enough for me to write my assignment as I said above he gave me full answers. The strengths were not only centered in feelings, and making people feel less anxious, but also were in setting the base of correct information and spreading the knowledge about COVID-19. Also, I was able to understand most of the medical terms during the interview because my mom is a nurse and I always listen to her when she talks with doctors and her department officers.
Nadeen Jallad 44247 part 3
ReplyDeleteMy experience is like any other experience, I encountered some difficulties. In order to conduct a good ethnography study, you need to be among the group of people that you’re studying their behavior, and as I mentioned earlier, due to the current circumstances I could only conduct an interview with the doctor through a WhatsApp video call, designate date, and time to interview him was an issue for me, which he refused at the beginning because the information that I got are very confidential and I had to convince and promise him that I’ll not reveal any confidential information for anyone only for my professor, and I told him I’ll use pseudonym .The video call interview made it hard to observe all the face expressions and body language as it differs from being in front of the informant and having a proper dialogue with him because face to face interview conversation will be longer and more enthusiastic, which was the second difficulty that I have faced. Nevertheless, the time factor played a major role as due to the limited time I couldn’t ask all the questions which I wanted to ask. Last but not least, Dr. Nasser didn’t answer the other four questions because of confidentiality, and the limitation that he had to stick to.
Overall, this experience during this crisis changed and taught me several of things. A one should always be ready and expected for any crisis or problem happened to him/ her or to the world, so this doesn’t mean that a person stops his work, studies, and his future because naturally we will face many obstacles in our live. For example, I was strong enough and I was able to do ethnography through this crisis, and I was glad to get the chance to conduct research because ethnography needs a well-trained researcher, but I did a good job, and I believe it was a great experience that I tried to attain what I want.
Before the corona pandemic started, we had around a month to actually experience being ethnographers in public. My first assignment was an observation of a social scene, and I had decided to observe the people that hang out at Marina Courts. I enjoyed observing them and writing notes because it was a new experience that I had never done before. After looking at the future assignments then I thought it would be an interesting and fun semester, until the corona pandemic began.
ReplyDeleteDue to the pandemic happening we were stuck with using the people in our lives like our family and friends for our assignments. I wasn’t capable in using people I didn’t know because my parents wouldn’t allow me to leave the house at all. The reason I didn’t enjoy observing my family is because they didn’t want to or liked to be observed. Also, my family are not the best people to observe and participate with because they are very silent and hard to read. So, it was hard for me to write my field notes about my observations because there was rarely anything to observe or participate on.
The Coronavirus Pandemic affected my research negatively because I wasn’t able to show and reach my maximum potential in ethnography. After I compared the fieldnote I did before the pandemic and a fieldnote I did during the pandemic I realized that my best work doing ethnography was before the pandemic. Back then I had a lot to write about and most of my notes were interesting.
In my opinion I believe that there are a lot more weaknesses to online ethnography than there are strengths. Since this was my first-time doing ethnography and really experiencing it, I think if I got the opportunity to do it freely in public rather than online, my work would be significantly better. In my experience If you had to do ethnographic work that didn’t need to be online like a online interview than you should try and do all your work outside in public. I think online ethnography should just been an option for if you absolutely can't do your ethnographic work outside like this pandemic or unless you are conducting an interview online.
Having to experience ethnography at home was really difficult.
At the start of this course, I was a bundle of nerves, to say the least. I was only 17 surrounded by students who are at least 19, and that was intimidating to me. That was with, no doubt, the main reason why I initially intended to base my research on high school students, more specifically graduating students from the British Educational systems, who would be sitting their examinations by the end of the school year and by fall would be starting university. Besides the fact that it is something I’ve experienced, I was familiar with the environment and so it was easy to locate informants since I knew several people there and it didn’t cause a hassle when it came to transportation as there was a school not too far away from the university. That being said, when the COVID-19 outbreak started to worsen in Kuwait, regulations were put into place closing down schools, bringing the academic year to a halt until August. This meant I wasn’t able to go to any school in Kuwait and I couldn’t carry out the research on-site.
ReplyDeleteNevertheless, this opened opportunities to research broader topics, not necessarily in the same field but related, for example how students spend their time besides studying and school work which I did a participant observation on; my younger brother spent his time playing video games and taught me how to use a gaming controller.
When it comes to the struggles I faced during online ethnography, I would say that I personally had two main issues that interfered with my ability to transcribe the research I was able to do. First being that I faced a number of technical difficulties. During this time, my laptop malfunctioned and I didn’t have a way to type up my research. To face this, I wrote up my notes in as much detail as possible so that I don’t lose any data I collected. The second struggle I faced was the lack of motivation that began as more and more regulations were placed due to numbers of COVID-19 cases rose. This is perhaps the hardest part for me. I had to prioritize other aspects relating to my home and family and found myself with no will to write or produce any sort of research. By talking to one of my peers in class, I was able to gain some motivation to start at least writing down data. In addition, Dr. Luciano’s advised that we keep a type of journal, documenting our struggles and thoughts about research and whatnot during the pandemic which was a key factor in how I gained the motivation to get to work.
Even so, We cannot deny that online ethnography has advantages as well. I found it much more convenient to contact informants this way. At one point, I was interviewing an informant I had from the school I visited earlier this year about how the pandemic has affected her education and her thoughts on the whole matter. Using Zoom, a video conferencing app, I could effortlessly have an e-meeting and ask her all the questions I wanted to ask. Yes, elements such as body language couldn’t be recorded as it normally would if this interview were done out in the field, but still, I could collect data based on the questions I asked. With that, I was able to learn a great deal about the extent to which students have been affected and this brought a different insight on the matter than what I had previously. To add, I feel that the situation we are in now has opened my eyes to the fact that the household has many opportunities in which we can investigate and participate in.
Ethnography is a chance in which we can go out to explore, investigate, educate ourselves on matters that we may not really understand or matters we think we understand. It is a chance in which we can understand further and deeper, probing ourselves into issues and questions we may have. And so, I believe Online Ethnography will not be the same and will not have the same effect as having to experience everything in the field. The fun of having a challenge and experiencing first hand is lost with online ethnography. Overall, this was a new and challenging experience, but I wouldn’t really want to do it another time.
Joanna ElChanti S00051334
DeletePart 1
ReplyDeleteLearning to do ethnography during spring 2020 has proven to be an intriguing and unique experience. This is because our class got to do one or two assignments before the pandemic made the news, getting a taste of how one normally embarks on this endeavor in the public sphere. But of course, things changed rather quickly. Kuwait initially implemented partial curfews, then went on to make it a full lock-down for the month of May. We can only hope that the situation with COVID-19 begins improving soon, not only for ethnography of course, but for the wellbeing of people here and around the world. The limitations of the pandemic have resulted in many of us in class, and ethnographers more generally, to redirect our focus to observe the impacts of this novel virus. For our class specifically, we had to observe our own homes for at least one assignment, and conduct mediated interviews with our informants instead of doing them in person.
Personally, I had two out of four field note entries recounting observations of my family, which is unrelated to my primary interest- vegan life in Kuwait. Those assignments, though from experience I can say they do not compare to ethnographic work in the public sphere, still provided an opportunity to learn the difficulties faced when making observations, as well as learning to work around them. To begin with, both observation sessions taught me how little detail I could note down in the midst of either high or low amounts of activity taking place around me. These experiences also had me navigate to some extent the question of how much detail I should submit for feedback- for example my sister is a hijabi, and so I felt it unnecessary to include many (or any) physical descriptions of her, though I could still note that she wore matching clothing with my niece, which alone provides some indication of the nature of their relationship to one another.
However, the two entries focusing on my initial topic were still highly informative, one of which was my observation of a renowned vegan café (before curfew), the other a video call interview with my primary informant, both of which were greatly insightful and have grounded my expectations closer to the reality of vegan life here, which is fortunate as I intend to make this topic my primary project. As I mentioned previously, observations in public are not the same as those at home. This is for a few reasons: first, at home I did not have to deal with the awkwardness or anxiety of interacting with or being among strangers. I was initially very anxious when I did my café observation, especially as the room I set out to observe was much smaller than I had anticipated. Though I felt better when I buried my head in note-taking, this sense of conspicuity probably blunted my observation of details more than I can guess it did. Working from home from that point made it so I had yet to attain the experience necessary for me to overcome this issue.
Part 2
ReplyDeleteThe mediated interview I conducted with my primary informant was a greatly rewarding experience, not only because I got to enjoy time with a newer friend before and after the official interview, but also for the interview experience itself. I had never conducted an interview before, and so it was interesting to learn how to attain the details one is hoping to ascertain while maintaining a loose structure that allows for the informant to speak tangentially and lead the ethnographer through their personal experiences. Having the interview through a Zoom conference call comes with its set of benefits and costs. To start simply, it allowed my informant to work with me from the comfort of their home, not having to navigate Kuwait’s traffic nor their typically busy schedule. Another advantage which I can note in hindsight is that I could see myself. This made it so I can note my appearance and expressions as the interview went on, changing them if I felt they were too off-putting. This may also be a cost, as I was probably more self-aware than I would be otherwise. As it regards the weaknesses of a mediated interview, an important one that comes to mind is that the informant can curate their image and presentation, especially since they are also more self-aware in the same way I was. My informant did not dress any differently than they would have otherwise, though they did take notes, the purpose of which I’m not exactly sure; this may have not been the case if we met in person. As it regards image, I could only see the waist up, and could not observe their entry into the interview space, which I could have had we done it in person; the aforementioned limits how many physical descriptions and non-verbal cues I could note.
Perhaps this is not a strength of online ethnography, but overall it allowed for convenience on my end, as well as my informant’s. But convenient means certainly come with their weaknesses, the biggest of which you can see throughout this assessment is that detail was lost. The other big weakness is that I am still learning the ethnographic process, and starting off online certainly sets me back in this endeavor. Another example of this (than that previously mentioned) is that I don’t have enough practice describing novel settings, as I only did one observation outside my home. Another big setback is that I only have one informant currently, and being introduced to others in Kuwait’s vegan social circles will be more challenging as I won’t have my informant with me to facilitate these introductions, as it would likely be if I was working with people in person. Another thing worth noting here is that I am not interacting with my informant during normal times, which means the data I collect will be less representative than I would like. This is especially the case when considering the mental or emotional burden curfews and lockdowns can have. However, there is a silver lining to this, as it provides data I can contrast with those collected when people are out and about again.
Part 3
ReplyDeleteSome of the challenges I faced are perhaps generally the case when conducting ethnographic, not specific to the limitations of working from home. For example, a prospective informant declined to work with me for the mediated interview, and perhaps is no longer a person I can work with for the project I hope to continue with. As I mentioned previously, this means I have one informant at the moment. There have been a few attempts at building connections with others through my informant, though the problem there has been two-fold: communications through messaging apps result in the informant’s personal interpretation of what I’m trying to study as opposed to being able to talk through what I’m trying to work on with my informant, and that people are less emotionally/mentally and temporally available to participate in field research, meaning that I face rejections more frequently than I imagine would be the case in non-pandemic times. I mention this here because these issues, while arising in this specific scenario, are also one’s that can and have occurred before the COVID-19 pandemic took place. I have had limited access to vegan social circles from before this class and my idea to study vegan life in Kuwait, especially since I had left one of the major messaging groups twice and felt it a bad idea to try entering that group again for ethnography, especially since I have a “turbulent” (take this term lightly) history with one of the moderators of the group, let alone that they are the same person who declined to work with me for the interview.
In summation, learning to do ethnography has overall been a rewarding experience, and doing it in this unique setting has presented its own set of challenges and benefits. However, the challenges of ethnographic work that are faced in normal times have not gone away, and I have had to learn to navigate those as well (and continue to do so), making me a better ethnographer than I was before. To be frank, I didn’t consider myself an ethnographer nor interested in this work before embarking on it, but having had the opportunity to do so has made excited to continue with the project I have in mind.
Before the corona pandemic started, we had around a month to actually experience being ethnographers in public. My first assignment was an observation of a social scene, and I had decided to observe the people that hang out at Marina Courts. I enjoyed observing them and writing notes because it was a new experience that I had never done before. After looking at the future assignments then I thought it would be an interesting and fun semester, until the corona pandemic began.
ReplyDeleteDue to the pandemic happening we were stuck with using the people in our lives like our family and friends for our assignments. I wasn’t capable in using people I didn’t know because my parents wouldn’t allow me to leave the house at all. The reason I didn’t enjoy observing my family is because they didn’t want to or liked to be observed. Also, my family are not the best people to observe and participate with because they are very silent and hard to read. So, it was hard for me to write my field notes about my observations because there was rarely anything to observe or participate on.
The Coronavirus Pandemic affected my research negatively because I wasn’t able to show and reach my maximum potential in ethnography. After I compared the fieldnote I did before the pandemic and a fieldnote I did during the pandemic I realized that my best work doing ethnography was before the pandemic. Back then I had a lot to write about and most of my notes were interesting.
In my opinion I believe that there are a lot more weaknesses to online ethnography than there are strengths. Since this was my first-time doing ethnography and really experiencing it, I think if I got the opportunity to do it freely in public rather than online, my work would be significantly better. In my experience If you had to do ethnographic work that didn’t need to be online like a online interview than you should try and do all your work outside in public. I think online ethnography should just been an option for if you absolutely can't do your ethnographic work outside like this pandemic or unless you are conducting an interview online.
Having to experience ethnography at home was really difficult.
S00050678
Rafah Al-Shohaty 46285:
ReplyDeleteIt was strange looking at people walking aimlessly around the streets through my window; but it was more peculiar being a part of them. The Coronavirus pandemic has significantly changed various aspects of our lives we once sought as a norm—like walking down the street (although that activity in particular is strange in a country like Kuwait because people do not normally go for a stroll). The lockdown and the fear of the virus has caused majority of the population to adopt new daily routines. Such activities can be seen from neighboring households, but mainly through social media. Being an ethnographer in such circumstances is incredibly convenient because of the new material one could obtain. As a student of ethnography, however, the situation was not as rewarding, due to various factors.
Personally, I wish that I had devoted most of my time in writing a full developed ethnography on the changes Coronavirus lockdown has impacted our society. However, since I was caught up in different errands and obligations, my time was limited. Moreover, my anxiety has been the major obstacle in conducting such research. In the beginning of the pandemic, long before Kuwait restricted outings, I limited my own space and surrounding; I rarely left my home and expressed my worries to my family members who did. Nevertheless, what pushed me to leave was the first assignment regarding this pandemic: our second observation. In conducting such assignment, I have found that my clouded mind prevented me from gathering rich detail of the environment around me. I tried to stay in a place that did not contain as much people for my observation. In retrospective, I can see that my distressed mind did not retain significant and detailed information that would have impacted this ethnography. Moreover, the place that I chose, which was Shaheed Park, was not ideal for gathering information; there was a limited number of people and the place did not fit the concept of Coronavirus. (It would have been best if I observed a supermarket or even by the seaside.)
Nonetheless, as time went on, the anxiety from the pandemic and lockdown began to settle down and I had found myself curious of the change rather than worried. Another obstacle that came by, however, was stress on maintaining my studies as well as completing house chores (especially during Ramadan). Balancing the two have taken up most of my time, which limited me in forming detailed observations on my surroundings. Nevertheless, I would observe out my window, or balcony, the people (or lack of) passing by and going on walks/runs as much as I could. I recall in my journal the first day the curfew was set. I opened my window just to experience the “thrilling tranquility” of the city. It was strangely quiet—never has a city been that quiet before—but the stillness had an uneasy edge to it. After days, the curfew sank into our routine and we adapted to it. Following those days, the streets became emptier. A month later, however, a day before the full lockdown, I woke up and noticed out in the streets so many cars passing by on the Gulf road and on the neighboring streets. For a moment, I had forgotten how that used to be a norm; the number of passing cars and people walking reminded me of a time that was long gone.
DeleteThe full lockdown brought more curiosities to the way people adapted. In those two hours permitted for people to leave, I would see a number gathering around in parking lots and streets doing activities that I normally don’t observe them doing. In all my years of living in Kuwait, I have never seen such life in the outside world. I noted down some of my observations on May 15, what I had seen: a family of four kicking a soccer ball to one another (they seemed Western); an Arab family on the side of the parking lot, the father helping his son on the bicycle; a man pouring bird food across the parking lot for the pigeons; at least 5 people jogging/running down the sidewalks (sometimes on the street). Every day I would observe the people during those two hours from my window, they looked like zombies walking around aimlessly, yet it felt surreal seeing so many people and so much activity. I decided to go out for a walk a few times, one of those was merely for observation. It was strange seeing so many people scattered throughout the streets aimlessly walking. I wish I would have developed my ethnography research solely on that, but due to the time constraints I was unable.
Coronavirus did not significantly affect my research, for I was able to interview an expert regarding theatre. Without the pandemic, however, I would have been able to experience and become a part of Kuwaiti theatre and learn its differences. Nevertheless, I took my initial topic and built it on how the scope might’ve got affected by this pandemic: how theatre is taught or practiced under lockdown. I learned so much and could potentially learn more from my informant. I greatly enjoyed my interview, as I have noted in my analysis section; however, I wish that it could have been done in person. Again, the obstacle I faced was my anxiety in this assignment; however, it was caused by an insecurity: poor Arabic language. I believe that if I were better in communicating and expressing myself in Arabic, I would have been able to develop my interview.
DeleteIn general, there exists strengths and weaknesses in doing ethnography online. The pros in this case is the wide range of informants and mediums. It is easier to connect and speak to various people, rather than meeting them in person. In contrast, the main cons is not being able to meet them in person. In developing ethnography, in my opinion, it is best to build a connection with the informants. That way, the data an ethnographer will gather would be rich in detail and better represented. I have mentioned the main weakness I experienced in my online ethnography; it was generally caused by the concern of the pandemic. Other weaknesses were lack of focus in the ethnography as a whole and the lack of time. My ethnography had a general scope: life under lockdown. Other than that factor, my field notes collectively do not seem to have a theme. The strengths, on the other hand, were the mobility of choosing informants, I was able to interview/observe a wide range of people; and, ironically, the pandemic that we experienced. A pandemic rarely occurs, and in this time and age especially, it was intriguing to note how people globally were affected by it. This world has become globalized to the extent that we are all affected by the same virus and are able to express it collectively.
Shana Bijumon
ReplyDeleteS00049829
Ethnography by its nature is a platform to understand individuals, culture, and also what is happening around us. It has been of great interest to me to conduct and collect a series of data about people. But being an Indian immigrant in Kuwait I had no access to explore through the ethnicity and culture of this place. Therefore, I decided to focus and shortlist a number of ideas on groups and people which I would get access to. After, a few days of spinning wheels on different ideas I confirmed to conduct an ethnography on house nurses. My aim was to identify and collect information on the cultural differences and impact it had on house working nurses. My first participant observation was held in the nurse’s dorm, it was quite uncomfortable for me to avoid any interaction as some of the nurses would come up to me for a talk, mostly because of the vibe of being from the same country. I tried to avoid any possible interaction for as long as I could though I kept having recurring thoughts on how disrespectful it was to avoid them being in their dorm. I should say my experience being in the dorm helped me give an insight into the routines of home care nurses and also understand my weaknesses as an observant. Shortly after a while, Kuwait was hit with coronavirus which made it impossible for me to reach the dorm for a second observation due to safety reasons. I had to change my second observation and relocate to a place that was safe enough. It was easy as it was conducted within my family. Over the span of two months, the virus had increased, and the country set curfew which made me pause the fieldwork and work on a topic not very different from the initial topic. I started working on collecting contacts of general nurses who are working frontlines during Covid-19, I was able to contact a government nurse who is a former colleague and a friend of my mother. Prior to the interview, I kept in touch with my informant through calls and texts trying to build a comfort zone later on for both of us. While the pandemic was getting even worse in Kuwait there were also reception issues in my area which made most of my classes and works get delayed. I would not say this pandemic affected the whole of my research but not being able to access a proper connection was my main disadvantage. Knowing that forming a rapport with my informant would help me develop a better interview I tried to maintain the contact. I had constant feelings of incapability to conduct an interview without any fieldwork experience. Nevertheless, I managed to move forward with my idea and questions because an ethnographer should utilize the available opportunity. I found online ethnography both useful and weak at the same time, what was of advantage was the cost of travel and time. An onsite interview would have consumed time and energy with traveling back and forth. Meanwhile, it would have given me the opportunity to explore and gain resources that did not work out well in case of the online ethnography. One other weak point is the connection between an ethnographer and the interviewee, which would have been better with a non-virtual interaction. It helps us enhance trust and demonstrate the importance to the other person. During the online interview, it was hard to understand certain cues due to the clarity and troubles with the connection, I had to reconnect the call about 5 to 6 times and continue the interview. The strength while carrying out the interview was the comfort both of us got being in our homes. There were mistakes I assume while conducting the interview because it was my first experience and I will look for more opportunities to correct my mistake and make room for learning new things.
Finally, all of this would not have been possible without the co-operation of my informant and her willingness to accept the interview.
Doing ethnographic research means you would have to step out and gather data for what you are researching. You would have to be on the field experiencing what you are researching firsthand where you are welcome to passively watch or interact with the environment. When unusual or unexpected things happen, for example, you are there to witness it rather than listen to people sharing their opinions that you cannot safely confirm if true. Research is not necessarily limited. You have the freedom to go and take in what you need from the field as you desire.
ReplyDeleteOf course, this all changed once a pandemic spread across the globe. People are encouraged to stay and, in some places, including Kuwait, it is the law. You would not be the only one staying home but so does everyone else, meaning that even if there are times where you can leave legally, the area you are researching in is likely closed and abandoned. Doing ethnographic research now is a different experience. Collecting data remains to be the goal, however, it is all done from home. Data can no longer be gathered at times where the areas are active. Getting to speak to people is an entire process on its own. You would have to set up a time to meet online together or in person which is more difficult. People are not often too comfortable with interviews as it is that they will likely go for an online meeting and when they do, they choose to turn off their camera which leads to a basic phone call. Interviews over phone calls are risky in terms of how much data is sufficient. It is not easy to tell if the person on the line is being genuine while remaining serious and professional with them.
My personal experience was not too bad. For the interviews, I only had to do it once and I did it with a close friend so understanding his tone was not a problem. For the introverted people such as myself, working in solitude and away from human interaction is preferable and much more comfortable. The Pandemic has altered my approach in a way that I am reluctant about since I can work in my comfort zone. On the other hand, I will admit that this is the only thing I enjoy about virtual ethnography. Being out there on the field where the events are happening in front of me, as uncomfortable as it is for me, truly is the simplest and effective method of researching
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ReplyDeleteThe Coronavirus has definitely affected my ethnography research because of the current lockdown that halted down everything. The lack of not going out and observing different interactions and engagements of people with one another, has caused the ethnography process to suffer. However, it was not all bad honestly, when I stayed home and did participant observation from my home on April 25, 2020, where me and my sister decided to cook together, to me this was the first genuinely interacting with someone from my family. We had a great time and I managed to observe things and details that where not observable before. Therefore, the strength about ethnography.
ReplyDeleteRight before the lockdown, we were given observation assignments. I remember when I visited a coffee shop on a busy weekend to conduct an observation as an ethnographer in public, it was great seeing people engaging and interacting with one another. I was able to clearly capture the facial expressions, gestures, and attitudes. All these elements where crucial for my field notes. However, when the lockdown took place and I was stuck at home. It was hard to be a professional ethnographer because I was unable to capture the true expressions, genuine feelings, and people's reactions like I did before the lockdown. During the lockdown, I started observing my family members and I started taking notes on each and every one of them. This was a new experience and to be honest, it was refreshing. The idea that I could observe the people in my house has never occurred to me, but this was a great experience. However, as I was observing my family members, it was very hard to observe them all at once, because every member was seated in different place inside the house. This is one of the downside of doing internal ethnography during the lockdown because I was unable to take notes of the group interactions that my family could have done. On the other side, it was great to take field notes about the personality of each of my family. When I reviewed the notes I have taken about the family members, I realized that everyone is different than the other and that for instance my sister likes to compliment my father she enjoys how reacts to her compliments.
Even though there are more weaknesses about online ethnography, I believe it also has some great strengths related to it. For instance, it allows you to closely observe the people you live with in more details than regular ethnography. In addition, doing online ethnography also allows me to have a better and genuine interaction with myself because I was doing it from the comfort zone of my home. However, online ethnography is not the same as traditional ethnography because the later offers more dynamic, social interactions, visual expressions, gestures and other things that could tell me significant thing about a group or individual interactions. In addition, doing traditional ethnography requires an open space and through that space, I will be able to have better field notes taken in a professional manner. Doing ethnography at home might sound simple and easy, but its complex and tricky because there is not a lot to observe especially when the people are your family members, but one thing for sure is that I was able to greatly understand and observe how each of my family members interact, engage, and behave in a closed setting.
S00038573- Rugayah AlAnnaz
My experience doing ethnography was great. Although I am more interested in doing crime/addiction ethnography but for the sake of safety I did about small businesses. My first experience in ethnography was observation, I went to Mubarkya which is a famous and cultural place, and at tha day there was a festival due to Kuwait National Day, there was a place that had all the small business lined up. I remember having to sit in a certain area, that made me view the whole place. Comparing it with my first online ethnography which was during the Covid 19 pandemic, which was at my families gathering. Actually I felt weird in both situations, but the one on site felt different due that there was a lot of odd things happening and the background was different. I wasn’t in my comfort zone as much as I was in the gathering. Furthermore, I did an online interview with a teacher, assessing the teaching during the pandemic, efcourse that’s after having my informant of my main research cancelling at the last moment. Although I knew the person I was interviewing, the interview was so formal. Having it online didn’t change the formality, or maybe because that it was a video call it changed the whole experience. I never experienced an interview on site before so I can't say if it would be different, but maybe it would be less formal. I think the pandemic wasn’t a bad thing to the research, although it changed the research slightly, I think I had the chance to do an ethnography during the pandemic, I actually wish I do a whole research about the people on the first line, people with the sickness, people in general and how they live with in the pandemic. I covered the feelings of teaching online, and covered the feeling of people in gatherings during the pandemic, but I feel that with more research in the pandemic, would give a beautiful final result. The difficult challenges I encountered online differed from on site, while I did my first observation which was before the pandemic, I felt released, more free, but, during the pandemic which was online, I felt I had to go with in a certain thing, my options wasn’t open, as it was before. I actually wanted to continue my research on small business because I heard they got effected horribly during this pandemic, but sadly my interviewee cancelled at the last moment. It was a challenge to find a substitute to that, and at the same time I feel its easier to do the work online.
ReplyDeletehallenge to find a substitute to that, and at the same time I feel its easier to do the work online. Why easier? Because you dnt have to move from place to place, its just one click and the task is on. I believe that one of my best strength is that I have patience and enjoy looking at things in a different perspective, In other words, I like to put myself In places that I can experience other views. A weakness I may have, is that my looks can be viewed a bit dangerous to others, because I realize that people try to avoid me, so this can affect me having to talk with people during the ethnography. Moreover, I did a participation assignment with my family members, it was fun, we did it the whole pandemic, but we stopped at Ramadan, during the pandemic things have changed slightly, responsibilities as well. I am the eldest in my home & I’m the man, so I always had responsibilities, during the pandemic I had to stay home a lot. Doing the ethnography at home wasn’t as bad as I thought. Maybe it lacked the real ethnography experience, but I don’t doubt it if the ethnography changed to be online in future. I believe seeing things with your own eyes has a different taste, you can view the person in front of view, and see their body language. While doing it via video call, you can see the face, and I believe gestures such as the hand and other areas on the body is important. The work had to be done, and I did it. I scheduled a meeting online with my informant, and I did it via zoom, I recorded the interview with my phone, the recording helped a lot, to gain back on the interview. I believe whats missing in the online ethnography is the sight, when you view things with your own eyes, you realize things that isnt realized with a video call, also, I believe that online ethnography has its pros. Its easier to communicate and do the work online. To be honest, although the online ethnography lacks the real experience, it can still do the work if you the informants are available. On the other hand, it is hard to participate during online and I mentioned before, viewing the body language of the person infront view changes the whole perspective.
DeleteNasser Al Mualla - S00043793
This was one of the most challenging things to do, being used to do the work in the actual field, with meeting people in person & then have to switch off and try to do it at home or in an online interview, was way harder. Trying to be an outsider in an observation at your own home is not the best thing to do. Specially trying to keep up with writing notes and asking questions without allowing your emotions to come over with your own judgement to take over the observation was a whole battle to fight in your mind while working. Also, moving out of the main idea and filed that you were planning to work on since the beginning of semester wasn’t really good thing to happen. The thing that you need to keep updating yourself about the whole new topics in everytime can be confusing, but still it give you more experience and new points of view to observe. Including or questioning your thoughts about the whole lock down & reaching to the same realization with your informants, helps in deepening your data and observation throughout your informants, which was really interesting. As for the interview taking notes during the online interview is never easy plus having the informant already requested to not be recorded, made things much harder to keep up with. In addition of not being able to stay focus because of things out of your control like someone just came in during the interview or the place you are in suddenly decided that it would be good to have music in the background, also the internet connection that keeps getting bad in the most important parts. However, having online interviews is less stressful & time saving. In the end, the situation was manageable but an opinion that I would not made with my free well to have it in this way, as I prefer working in the actual filed and people face to face. The good thing was; more new point of views, easy access to number of informants easily online & time saving. The disadvantage of it; hard to keep up with the informants and taking notes process with showing them your full attention.
ReplyDeleteFatima Mir Ahmadi- s0003573
Fatma Al-Mutawa
ReplyDelete45792
We were asked to pick a research topic in the begging of the semester. The topic had to have an objective, ask unanswered question about a group, a place, or an event, have a fixed place where I have access, and make sure the topic is not a sensitive one. In order for me to pick a topic I had to stop and observe my surrounding and ask myself who am I? and where do I belong? I still do not know, but I made a list and come up with some ideas. Based on my list I wanted to do research about Alshaya since I have a relative that does Heseeneyat every Friday, but decided not since it is a sensitive topic, so I went with diabetic patients. My theme was living with diabetes. I wanted to know more about other people’s experiences, and knowledge. Are we the same? I did not think so everyone has their own experience. like how did they know they had diabetes? How was their family’s reaction or their own? What were their feeling, thoughts about their illness? How does religion shape their way of thinking about it? How did they choose to deal with it? And did sellers ever tried to fool them into thinking they have the cure? I had access to Dasman Diabetic Center, so I was able to go through with it.
For my first observation assignment, I had to stay sit in a specific area in Dasman Center. I had to take notes of everything around me including the time, weather, description of the place, ambiance, people, how they look, estimate their age, I had to assume their mood based on their facial expectations, and body language for 50 minutes. I did the observation on Thursday, in the pharmacy waiting area on 6 Feb 2020, 10:19 -11:03. There were many people coming and going mostly, elderly people who from the way they dress seem from either the upper or middle class. Some of them had trouble walking. A pharmacist who is about 40 years old, was the most active pharmacist. The line would move quickly but it was not a guarantee that the patient would get their medicine right away. In my first observation, I was very conscious of people being conscious of me. I had to write my notes quickly, so it was hard for me to pretend like I was not observing them, not that I had to keep it a secret but wanted to avoid being called out. I had trouble looking at their faces. It was in the earliest stages of Corona virus when neither people nor the government took it seriously. I was one of the few ones who were wearing masks.
In my second observation, I wanted to attend an event in Dasman Center, but it got cancelled because of the pandemic, so the only place where I was sure a lot of people would be there was the pharmacy. At that time, the university stopped operating because of the pandemic and we were told to wait for further notice. I went on Tuesday, but I found out the pharmacy opens only on specific days. So, I went on Wednesday 4 Mars 2020, 5:46 pm- 7:01 pm. Daman Center prepared the place for the patients by putting a nurse next to the elevators to check their temperature, ask them when is the last time they travelled, and their ID number while noting it down on a chart. They also placed posters about Corona on walls and tables. Even though the government was taking extra measures to deal with the virus, not everyone was wearing a mask, and were taking it less seriously. However, the number of people wearing masks was still much higher than in the first observation. The workers were taking it more seriously, they were wearing masks, glovers, some were wearing a plastic coat. The place was much calmer at night. The people around sounded more comfortable and sociable than in my first observation. They were asking and talking to each other more. Most of the people were elderly, but I had seen few youngsters. I felt a lot more comfortable doing this observation, either people the atmosphere allowed me to be, or because the people probably know that I was a diabetic patient since I placed my medicine plastic bag next to me so they...
part one
...did not have to worry about me. Since more people were wearing masks, I could not note down everyone’s facial experience. The active pharmacist was the only pharmacist present. At a certain time, he was not, the people were waiting, and some were wondering, and some of them suggested that he was taking a break to pray. I noticed that the pharmacist was a very polite persons and knows how to respond to people.
ReplyDeleteFor my participant observation had to shift our focus from our research topics because of the pandemic. Even though at that time the government had cancelled the curfew, the Dasman Center was closed. Patients were not able to book appointments with their doctors. Instead doctors would give them a call. If the patients wanted to get some medicine, they had to book an appointment. Then go to Dasman Center, the gate guard will check the time of their appointment and ask them to wait in front of the front gate for the pharmacist to come and give them their medicine. I know this because I went there. Because of this obstacle, I had to do my participate observation with my mother, Ombraim a single mother in her 40s recently retried, while visiting the Al-Jaafariya Cemetery in Al-Sulaibikat, Monday August 31, 2020, 9:46 - 10:43. Later I had an Interview with my mother from 3:30 to 4:00. Some of the obstacles were the very hot weather, my mother wanting to take picture for my assignment and writing notes while trying keep up with my mother pass. I found out that Al- sheeya dedicate a lot of their time, money, and effort for their deceased as it is an important thing in our society because it shows that the deceased has good relatives and is still connected to them. some of the things they do are clean their graves, leave Quran next to it, read Surat Al-fatehah upon them, distributing water, food, sweets, and money to people in need, visitors, and the graveyard workers and give the recompense to their deceased. It was interesting to look at the modern graves’ decoration and design. The graveyard was a pit empty because people tend to visit it on Fridays. I started to think maybe I want to change my research topic, to do research on cemeteries. However, I’m still not sure, since it might be a sensitive topic, and I need to have access which I don’t. Though I still want to explore the cemetery more and ask the workers some questions relating to their work.
For my semi instructed interview assignment, I wanted to interview a doctor from Dasman Center since it related to my research topic, but they did not answer. Therefore, I did an interview with a mid-student, Yousef from Sudan in his final year, currently living in Kuwait, and volunteered to help in the Aemerre hospital during the pandemic. I interviewed him on Friday, September 11, 2020, 3:44 - 4:19. Mid students had to assent doctors, by doing paperwork, but not help them deal with infected patients. Their schedules, and the type of work tended to shift, and they had to interview some patients. To him it was exhausting experiences both physically and mentally since he had to be in quarantine several times. They did not get reworded. Some families got infected because one family member did not quarantine themselves. Some doctors had been infected and some students were in danger because they were in contact them. I thought his family would be more careful and conscious of the disease since their son is a mid-student. However, they were like any other family, they quarantine themselves, sanitize everything that comes from the outside, and were masks when heading out and nothing more. My informant was very smiley, friendly, cooperative person, and had a lot regarding my questions.
Part two
...For my second semi instructed interview I interviewed my sister Sharifa 25 university student in her fourth-year majoring in Health information and informatic management on Monday September 14, 2020, 10:12 pm to 10:23 pm, break, 11:03 pm to 10:20 pm. My other candidates were busy with their exams and assignments. I choose her because she is diabetic and wanted to know more about her perspective of the Corona virus pandemic. Unlike what I expected she was not worried about the virus because she did some research and found out only 2% had died from it. Still she thinks that people should be careful even if it was not that dangerous. Similar to the mid student she would wear masks and use hand sanitizers when she when out. She did not need to contact her doctors, and if she needed any medicine, she would contact Dasman through WhatsApp. As a student she preferred online classes because it saves time. As a Muslim, she was able to worship her god more in Ramadan during the lock down by reading more Quran. Though she thinks gaining weight was one of the negative effects since a lot of sweet dishes were cooked in Ramadan. As a human, the lock down did not bring her closer to her family because they were practicing social distancing but brought her closer to her cats. One of the side effects was her cats gaining weight because she kept feeding them. In her opinion not having gathering was a pleasing because she knew people will not follow the guidelines and because they made her feel sick. One of the things that happened to her during the pandemic was that her grandmother died a natural death. It was fun to do an interview with her. However, one of the problems I faced were not having enough questions, some of my questions were short ended, she gave me short answers, and she was vocal when it comes to her opinion. In both interviews I had trouble writing my informants facial expressions and writing the time because I was taking handwriting notes. Usually I write on my phones note, because I find it easier, cares less weight, and a can see the time. Writing hand notes was not bad either, but I just keep forgetting to wear a watch. I learned to prepare as many questions as possible, let my informants speak, and ask them to elaborate as much as proposal. Doing ethnography will my family was fun and helpful but some time they tend to disrupt the work, not understanding that there is a way if doing things and a reason for it to be done that way. However, it is indeed fascinating hearing other people's stories like Lila Abu-Lughod wrote in her book Writing Women's Worlds it is better capture the qualities of "life as lived" in this community."(2)
ReplyDeletePart three