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I was away for the first three days of this week, and although I could participate in the Ethnographic Film Unit 3 class on Dziga Vertov and Sergei Eisenstein on Tuesday night, I didn’t have any time to read during those days.

I was therefore slightly unprepared for the Digital Anthropology Unit 3 class on Thursday, but it was so interesting that I read all the recommended readings after class. (I was partly late with my readings for Unit 3 because I had started to look into those for Unit 7, since that’s where I’ll be having a presentation.) I really love this course and think the readings are very well chosen, with a few exceptions. I get lots of ideas all the time about things to research, and I write them down.

On Saturday I took a day off to edit my first five minute movie from Ethiopia, where we go to Azwa Mariam Monastery on an island in Lake Tana by Bahir Dar.

Study

Ethnographic Film, Unit 3

• Film: Sergei Eisenstein: Battleship Potemkin (1925, 75 min)

Ethnographic Film, Unit 4

• Unit 4: Early Documentary/Fiction Film: Realism & Neorealism. Module introduction.
• Grimshaw, Anna (2001): The light of reason: John Grierson, Radcliffe-Brown and the enlightenement project. In The Ethnographer’s Eye: Ways of seeing in Modern Anthropology, pp. 57-68.

Films to this unit:

• Roberto Rossellini: Rome Open City (1945, 102 min)
• Edgar Anstey & Arthur Elton (prod. by John Grierson): Housing Problems (1935, 15 min)
• Harry Watt & Basil Wright (prod. by John Grierson): Night Mail (1936, 22 min)

Digital Anthropology, Unit 3

• Postill, J., and Sarah Pink (2012): Social media ethnography: the digital researcher in a messy web. Media International Australia, 14 p.
• Daniel Miller et al. (2016): Introductory chapters. In How the World Changed Social Media, pp. 1-41.
• Video: Daniel Miller introduces Tales from Facebook
• Frömming et al. (2017): Digital Environments and the Future of Ethnography. An Introduction. In Digital Environments. Ethnographic Perspectives across Global Online and Offline Spaces, pp. 13-21.
• Collins, Samuel et al (2017): Ethnographic Apps/Apps as Ethnography. In Anthropology Now 9, no. 1, pp. 102-118.

Digital Anthropology, Unit 7

• Baym, Nancy (2012): Fans or Friends? Seeing Social Media audiences as musicians do. In Journal of Audience and Reception Studies 9, no. 2, pp. 286-316.
• Baym, Nancy (2015): Connect with your audience! The relational labor of connection. In The Communication Review 18, no. 1, pp. 14-22.
• Abidin, Crystal (2018): Preface. In Internet Celebrity. Understanding Fame Online, p. ixx-xxii.

Other

Articles

• The Economist: The truth about a no-deal Brexit
• The Economist: Why Donald Trump is wrong to ignore the murder of a Saudi journalist

Podcast

• Alexandre Enkerli: Rapport: The Informal Ethnographer Podcast 3: What it means to be an ethnographic fieldworker.

The Ethnographic Film series continued with Unit 2 – Margaret Mead and Timothy Asch. Unlike for Unit 1 (Robert Flaherty) I didn’t do all readings, only the two mandatory ones. I watched all videos though. I will be the presenter of Unit 5, about Robert Gardner and Forest of Bliss, and will therefore focus on the readings to that unit, while only reading the mandatory ones for the others.

We had a session on grounded theory in Qualitative Methods, and I must say I really, really like it. The introductory readings were not that easy to get through, but I felt excitement at grasping something that was completely new to me, and which makes such perfect sense. This is exactly what I hoped to be able to learn at this programme. “So this is how they do it”, was the feeling. The social scientists, that is. I’m now thinking about how I will be able to use grounded theory in my future research. Next session, in two weeks, will cover coding.

The second unit of Digital Anthropology had lots of introductory readings to the course as a whole, and many of them were really interesting. I especially liked Boellstorff’s notion of “the gap” between virtual and actual, and how it is the gap that defines the virtual as virtual, and thereby also the actual as actual. Without the gap, there is no virtual, but also no actual. The gap is therefore what defines us as human beings. It is essential.

With so many interesting readings, not much in the “Other” category!

Study

Qualitative Methods, Unit 8: Interviewing

• Video lecture on interviewing.

Qualitative Methods, Unit 9: Grounded Theory

• Module introduction: Grounded Theory (objectivist and constructivist).
• Willig, C. (2013): Grounded Theory Methodology. Chapter 7 in Introducing Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3 ed., pp. 69-82.
• Charmaz, K. (2000): Grounded Theory. Objectivist and Constructivist Methods. Chapter 19 in N. K. Denzin, Y.S. Lincoln (Ed.): Handbook of Qualitative Research, pp. 509-535.

Ethnographic Film, Unit 3: Dziga Vertov

• Barnouw, Erik (1974): Reporter. In Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film, pp. 51-71.
• Petric, Vlada (1978): Dziga Vertov as Theorist. In Cinema Journal, Vol.18 (1), pp. 29-44.

And the film:

• Dziga Vertov: Man with a Movie Camera (1929, 80 min)

Ethnographic Film, Unit 5: Robert Gardner

• Loizos, Peter (1993): Robert Gardner in Tahiti, or the rejection of realism. In Innovation in Ethnographic Film, pp.139-168.
• Ruby, Jay (2000): Robert Gardner and Anthropological Cinema. in Picturing Culture: Explorations of Film and Anthropology, pp. 95-113.
• Parry, Jonathan P. (1988): Comment on Robert Gardner’s “Forest of Bliss”. In SVA Newsletter.
• Cooper, Thomas W. (1987): Forest of Bliss by Robert Gardner. In Film Quarterly, Vol. 41 (1) (Autumn, 1987), pp. 58-61.
• Mishler, Craig (1985): Narrativity and Metaphor in Ethnographic Film: A Critique of Robert Gardner’s Dead Birds. In American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 87 (3) (September 1985), pp. 668-672.
• Östör, Ákos (1988): Misreading the Metaphor: A Comment on Mishler’s “Narrativity and Metaphor”. In American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 90 (4) (December 1988), pp. 978-980.

And these films by Robert Gardner (I’m starting to realise what an amazing resource Alexander Street is, which we have access to through our university):

• Forest of Bliss (1986, 90 min) (mandatory)
• Dead Birds (1963, 84 min) (recommended)
• The Nuer (1971, 73 min) (recommended) – by Hilary Harris and George Breidenbach, but Gardner was involved
• Deep Hearts (1980, 50 min) (extra)

Digital Anthropology, Unit 2

• Haraway, Donna J. (1985): A Cyborg Manifesto. In Manifestly Haraway (2016), pp. 3-90 (or 5-68 without the fluff). 😑 (I wish I liked this text more!)

Japanese

• Memrise: 24,200
  • 2136 Jōyō Kanji by Grade, still level 16 → 645 of 2136 kanji learned (no progress!)

Other

Articles

• The Economist: Mumbai unions force Uber and Ola into a corner

Podcast

• Alexandre Enkerli: Rapport: The Informal Ethnographer Podcast 2: Ethnography as an Approach

So it has begun for real and we’re flooded with readings. Had to take a break from my Japanese studies and other obligations and focus entirely on Digital Anthropology, which seems very promising and excites me a lot!

In addition, this week was a classless reading unit on Interviewing for Qualitative Methods. I had read Bernard’s texts on Unstructured and Semistructured Interviewing as well as Structured Interviewing – both very good and inspiring – in week 43, and now continued with two texts on sensitive questions.

We also had our first session of Ethnographic Film, which was about Robert Flaherty and Nanook of the North. I had read all mandatory and recommended readings for this unit (plus the one we got during class, see below), which I probably won’t manage for all the upcoming units, considering how the classes are aggregating and my focus lingers toward the classes on Digital Anthropology and Qualitative Methods.

Study

Qualitative Methods

• Unit 8: Interviewing. Module introduction.
• Gunaratnam, Y. (2003): Threatening topics and difference: Encounters in psycho-social space. Chapter 7 in Researching race and ethnicity. Methods, knowledge and power, pp. 157-177.
• Lee, Raymond E. (1993): Asking sensitive questions: Interviewing. Chapter 6 in Doing research on sensitive topics, pp. 97-118. (Really good overview of pros and cons of various interview techniques, surveys vs deep interviews, etc.)
• Online QDA: What is Qualitative Data Analysis (QDA)? (extra)

Ethnographic Film, Unit 1

• MacDougall, David (1978): Ethnographic Film: Failure and Promise. P. 405-425 in Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 7 (1978).
• Video: Cronofotografía – Félix Regnault

Digital Anthropology

• Boellstorff, Tom (2008): Chapter 1: The Subject and Scope of this Inquiry and Chapter 2: History. In Coming of Age in Second Life. An Anthropologist explores the Virtually Human, pp. 3-59. (A very geeky approach to background and terminology – I liked it!)
• Hine, Christine (2015). Chapter 1: Introduction and Chapter 2: The E3 Internet: Embedded, Embodied, Everyday Internet. In Ethnography for the Internet: Embodied, Embedded and Everyday, pp. 1-54. (A bit redundant in style, but with important points for the ethnographer.)
• Video: Christine Hine on Online Research Methods (extra)
• Pink, Sarah et al (2016): Chapter 1 (Introduction – What is Digital Ethnography – Digital Ethnography across Disciplines – Principles for a Digital Ethnography). In Digital Ethnography: Principles and Practices, pp. 22-53.
• Video: The coming transhuman era: Jason Sosa at TEDxGrandRapids (It’s a Ted talk and I didn’t see how it fit in to the syllabus.)

Japanese

• Memrise: 43,800
  • 2136 Jōyō Kanji by Grade, still level 16 → 645 of 2136 kanji learned.
• Conversation: Two morning sessions with K (Wednesday and Thursday).

Other

Articles

• The Economist: Japan pampers its pets like nowhere else
• The Economist: The collapse of an American retail giant
• The Economist: Angela Merkel will step down as CDU party leader in December
• The Economist: The legalisation of gay marriage meets resistance in Taiwan
• Wired: The Brief History—and Uncertain Future—of Foldable Phones

Film and video

• Langfocus: How I Make a Langfocus Video!
• Quinn Benet: HALLUCINATING in a HOSPITAL: STORYTIME
• Marques Brownlee: Let’s Talk About the Foldable Smartphone!

Podcasts & radio

• Alexandre Enkerli: Rapport: The Informal Ethnographer Podcast 1: Inaugural Episode

Work

It was time for another podcast episode.

Online classes began with a training session on Tuesday, followed by a missed inhouse class on Photography and Anthropology and a seminar on Academic Writing on Friday.

Next week the classes begin for real, with Ethnographic Film and Digital Anthropology. I’ve read up on Robert Flaherty and watched Nanook of the North, which will be discussed in Unit 1 on Tuesday. As for Digital Anthropology, we have just got access to the readings, so I haven’t looked into them yet. And I’m still a bit overwhelmed by the amount of material to read in Qualitative Methods. Even so, I kept to my favourite Spradley.

My Japanese got a boost when K and I took up our tandem trainings. Three mornings this week I came by him on my way to the studio.

In addition, S has begun taking German classes, so I’m helping him every evening, teaching him accusative, dative and genitive the way I was taught it in junior high.

Got a flat on my bike last night, so I took a Berlkönig for the first time.

Study

Qualitative Methods

• Spradley, James P. (1980): Chapter Two: Ethnography for What? P. 13-25 in Participant Observation.
• Unit 8: Interviewing. CMS overview.

Ethnographic Film, Unit 2: The Camera as a Research Tool

• Ruby, Jay (2000): Researching with a Camera: The Anthropologist as Picture Taker. P. 41-66 in Picturing Culture: Explorations of Film and Anthropology.

Japanese

• Intermediate Japanese. Review of Chapter 10.
• Memrise: 71,900
  • 2136 Jōyō Kanji by Grade, level 16 → 640 of 2136 kanji learned
• NEW! Conversation: 3 meetings with K (1h + ca 45 min + 30 min).

Project

Today I met with an informant that I want to interview. Let’s call him ”A”, since he’s my very first informant. He was not prepared to be recorded today, but we might do it next week or sometime soon.

Other

Articles

• The Economist: Arabic, a great language, has a low profile
• The Economist: A visionary abstract artist finally gets her due
• The Economist: Angela Merkel will step down as head of her party
• The Economist: A massacre in Pittsburgh illustrates America’s disunity
• The Economist: Obituary: Pik Botha
• Committee to Protect Journalists: How the Saudis may have spied on Jamal Khashoggi
• The Independent: Jony Ive interview: Apple design guru on how he created the new iPad – and the philosophy behind it
• BBC: What is ‘primitive technology’ and why do we love it?
• Süddeutsche Zeitung: Der Asphalt gehört den Radfahrern
• Tagesspiegel: Die Straße bitte im Sprint überqueren
• Morgenpost: Taxivereinigung und BVG streiten über Berlkönig

Film and video

• Jordan Peterson on Skavlan (39 min)
• The School of Life: The Danger of Being Too Polite in Love (4 min)
• Apple Special Event. October 30, 2018.
• Parker Walbeck: How to Shoot an Interview

Podcasts & radio

• WTF with Marc Maron: Episode 961 – John Cleese
• The Mutant Season: Sean Bonner
• Sveriges Radio: Spanarna