This project involves fieldwork in the age of Covid-19 using the PhotoVoice ethnographic strategy. The class will be divided into five teams of 3 or 4 research partners. Each person is charged with documenting their experience of Covid-19 photographically. Specific topics for ethnographic focus should include (but need not be limited to) house-boundness, ways of life, coping strategies, concerns of illness or death, joys, compassion and hope under the Covid plague. Photograph what is around you, your walks, shopping, work, thoughts, Skypes. Those to whom you are close. Please let me have the names of the people in each research group.
Hold at least two Zoom events in which you and your partners share your photographs. Discuss them autobiographically, culturally, perhaps religiously – in any ways meaningful to you . Encourage discussion. Your in-class presentation and final paper will involve writing up key themes that emerged in the discussion. In the presentation and in your paper, restrict your discussion to no more than 4 photographs.
Research partners must meet at least twice to show and discuss their work. Each of the meetings should be at least an hour – probably longer. The meetings are your opportunities for collaboration and ethnographic research. Your first meeting may inspire you to take other photographs to show in your second meeting.
Each group meeting should involve three points of focus: (1) each photographer will show their own photographs and speak about how they reflect their life (this is the auto-ethnographic focus); (2) each person should consider – and to some extent discuss – how they interpret the photos of their research partners to reflect the partners’ lives (this is the strictly ethnographic focus); and (3) the group should discuss how the project and all of the members’ work affects everyone in the group (this is collaborative ethnographic focus). One last thing to discuss in your group meetings is to agree which photographs each of you will discuss in orally and in your paper. (Special pictures may be discussed by more than one group member).
Your oral report and final paper must not be based solely on your own ideas and ethnographic research. The research must be integrated with ideas in the following literature: Strack (2004), Rodriguez (2018), Collier and Collier (1988), and Cardarelli (2019). Be sure to watch Rodriguez’s PhotoVoice video and Gawrin’s video. They too will give you inspiration in how to understand your own ethnographic findings.
My Group Partner was Elizabeth
Things that my Group partner and I discussed:
What happens to the United States already Homeless population during and ever after the pandemic is over
What will happen to those that may are on the verge of becoming homeless and could become homeless because of this pandemic
How far does the US Stimulus check of 1200 really help. In California vs other states when the cost of living this less expensive.
With many states not reopening in the near future will there be any future government assistance?
When the states reopen, how are we expected to operate as normal? What is normal?
What happens to the economy once the pandemic is over? How will it recover and how long will it take?
With many retailers filing for bankruptcy, what are American expected to do about the job loss?
How will social distancing be up-kept, sanitizing, masking, and small gather, are these forever?
Video- https://vimeo.com/305528000
