What point am I at?

The semester's off to a helluva start. I'm still taking one class, a journalism history class that I felt important to have. My relationship with the professor, I feel, is often tenuous because of my writing. It's not that my writing is bad all of the time. But I feel since this excursion into graduate work began, I haven't been writing as well as I could. I'm working on it. Compounded by my vertigo about my writing - which this professor has suggested is problematic because this is my third year and certainly I should have improved - I am also reading a lot of material for other projects.

One of these projects is an ongoing ethnography at two local newspapers. I am working with a professor to flesh out the project that began this past fall. I am also reading from a list of readings with her, for my comprehensive exams at the end of April. I have read some of the books. I grew fascinated with George Marcus in the fall, after reading most of Ethnography Through Thick and Thin. The professor suggested before the holiday break to also read a journal article by Patrick Murphy and Marwan Kraidy. I did read the article, but felt I needed to read more of Clifford Geertz to understand what Kraidy and Patrick are driving at. I'm almost finished with the first part of Local Knowledge, and will hopefully sit down this weekend to begin fleshing out my outline for the professor's reading list. (Not her suggestion, but my own idea, to help organize the information).

I hope partially to gain some understanding of the debate on positionality. Marcus, in the aforementioned book, talks a great deal about multi-sited ethnography. At first, and I will be honest because it was my first adventure into ethnographic research, I'm not sure what he meant. I felt like it was similar to what Kraidy talked about in his book, Hybridity; he explains the concept as "critical transculturalism." Kraidy's work, combined with some Manuel Castells and Nestor Garcia Canclini's works, provided the basis that I needed to break away from the traditional view of cultural imperialism. We all have agency, in varying degrees, and we aren't just subject to subjugation simply because we engage in cultural exchanges.

So we have Paper "X" and Paper "Y" in a large Northeastern American city. The journalists feel the ground moving beneath their feet. The ownership is experiencing financial difficulties, as presumably many companies are. But the newspaper organization, if not part of a larger sprawling media empire, is experience extraordinary difficulties in the face of shifts in readership, technology, and global flows of information. They have competition, readerships have options, and as Henry Jenkins so eloquently points out, none of these companies has determined the best way to offer content across multiple platforms to make as much money as they would like. As one of my students pointed out on Thursday (from the mouths of babes), they are making plenty of money - just not as much as they want.

These journalists are like journalists around the world. They have ideas and theories about how they do their jobs, why they do their jobs, and what role that job plays in the larger society. But if you look at surveys, like the Freedom of the Press survey by Freedom House or the Media Sustainability survey by IREX, you might see what I see. While these surveys have utility, their underlying assumptions are buttressed by Western notions of government, economy, and media operation. Can we use these surveys to truly understand what occurs outside of the United States? What about nations whose development does not map onto our own? I avoid or sidestep the entire controversy about the words, "developing", "underdeveloped", etc.

Multi-sited ethnography seemed to be a great thing. And it just dropped into my lap. Although the literature that I read was clear, I was still unclear about several things. As a white American woman, can I effectively research in Africa? Can I be fair? Will I impose erroneous ideas onto people who might not even want me there? These are all questions that seem especially pertinent now, given the financial ripples felt globally.

I went to my professor, and I explained these ideas. And she explained to me what I needed to read. And that understanding my positionality wasn't just about calling myself out and being transparent. It seems to also include my voice as a researcher, understanding my underlying assumptions and motivations for research, and laying my cards on the table. Additionally, I need to prepare myself for the inevitability that people will criticize, question, and maybe cajole. "Okay," I think to myself as she's talking, "now I'm a little worried." But she did it, and she's incredibly strong and intelligent. She's also very honest about her journey, her own doubts, and her own struggles to find her place. This information helps. I have an anchor and not necessarily adrift.

I hope to understand more of these readings soon. Having anecdotes in my life that provide context for these epistemological and methodological issues helps. I will give one example, to wrap up this tremendously long post. As I sat grading papers, I had one paper that required a decision. It was not that I wished to scold the student for some of the information. If I were more hard-nosed, I guess I could rip him on his wording; some might take affront to what he had written. I simply wanted to call his attention to what he had written, and ask him to reflect upon the representation created by his choice of words. When a colleague walked by, I ask her impressions. She gave me a stock answer, as I knew she probably would. The kid is a frat boy, and she indicated that he probably wouldn't care what I had to say.

Her point was poignant, but duly noted. It didn't bother me as much as what she said next. "Yea," she said, "I can't seem to get my students to write objectively either." I think she felt me wince, though I'm not sure if it was visible to her. I really had to sit with that idea, objectivity, to understand why I winced like I did. I think it's because I find her statement more a reflection of herself than of her students. I also found it reductive and intellectually dishonest. By reductive I mean the interactions, purposes, and results involved in teaching are truly complex. To reduce the process by criticizing students for not fitting our mold, and in such simplistic ideas, well, it's reductive. And intellectually dishonest to divorce yourself from the educational process altogether. They haven't done what I want; I'm not getting the results that I think I should get. It has nothing to do with me. Dishonest.

Perhaps it's because I'm reading these materials on positionality and have such strong opinions about my classes and their being student-centered. I teach two sections of persuasive writing, so when the word objective is thrown into a conversation, I begin to wonder what's going on in other classrooms. I also believe by not engaging in self-reflection, we will continue to reinforce a power structure that is truly slow to change. These students are already carving the paths for their children's children, in using technology, their exposure to different things, and their access to information. They understand more than sometimes we give them credit for.

Back to objective because it all hinges on what you mean by that word. If she means that students should maintain a distance between themselves and the issues that they feel are important, well, I wholeheartedly disagree. Did she mean that the students need to take a more vigorous approach to issues, weighing carefully their claims, their goals, and other perspectives? If so, then this perspective makes more sense. But only insofar as you have taken the time to explain to the students what you expect, have guided them through a process of self-discovery, and assessed their ability to meet the requirements.

But it goes further than that. In our complaints about students, we convert our students into others. We preclude them from participation in the process by ranting and raving about their inadequacies. I am no less guilty of this than others. And even though some of these students throw me curve balls that I never could have anticipated when making the syllabus for class, most of them work hard to improve. These students are anything but inadequate. They are truly complex beings born into a world that is NOTHING like previous generations. They operate within this sprawling digital network that boggles my mind sometimes. They have thoughts and feelings, and more often than not, have been lulled into a deep sleep by their respective school systems. Many want to continue with the habits of the high school English class, and are quite jolted when I challenge those notions.

All this writing to say this: It occurs to me that is just as important to recognize the power differentials in my own life as I try to untangle the research in the future. In many cases, I am perched atop, squashed beneath, or squeezed inbetween. The true talent, then, comes from using these various perspectives to draw parallels with others around me.