ANTH 610
Writing Ethnographies
Spring Term 2014
Wednesdays 2:00 – 4:50 PM
313 Condon Hall
Professor Sandra Morgen
Office Hours:
Professor Lynn Stephen, 316 Condon Hall, 541-346-5168, stephenl@uoregon.edu
Office Hours: Tuesdays 12:30 – 2:30 p.m.
Short Course Description:
Course Content/Expanded Description:
This course seeks to
Learning Objectives : After successful completion of this class, students will be able to:
Course Requirements/Evaluation Criteria:
Four ethnographic writing exercises, 10 percent each, 40 %
Individual Ethnographic paper 45%
In-class presentation of research 15%
Assignments and Grading : Students are expected to complete all required readings
(approximately 150-200 pages per week) , actively participate in class discussions and group exercises, and turn in the following assignments.
Individual Ethnographic papers (1-25 pages) Two page summary and bibliography also required in third week of class. Paper due on the last day of class.
Late papers and exams will be graded down one full letter grade .
Class attendance and participation. Because this class has a high level of student participation, attendance at every class is important
PLAGIARISM IS NOT PERMITTED IN THIS CLASS. Plagiarism consists of turning in a paper or exam or exam question written by someone else, taking something written in a book by someone else and including it in a paper without quotation marks, and paraphrasing parts of books as if they were your own. This includes anything that is on the internet in electronic form as well as in printed form. If you are quoting more than four words, put quotation marks around it and footnote it. Even if you note something in your bibliography and fail to put quotation marks around it in the text, it is still plagiarism. Any plagiarized papers will receive an F. No negotiations.

Incomplete Policy. No incompletes will be given in this class. No exceptions unless there are extreme circumstances such as a documented critical illness or a family crises. If you register for the class and do not complete the assignments you will be given credit for the work you turned in and receive an F for work not turned in. This will be calculated as part of your final grade.
Student Engagement Inventory
Educational activity Hours student engaged Explanatory comments (if any)
Course attendance 30 3 hours/week
Assigned readings
Writing assignments
80 150-200 pages/wk.
65 four writing exercises, final paper
Total hours: 175
The following books are required:
Emerson, Robert, Rachel Fretz, and Linda Shaw
2011 Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, Second Edition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Holmes, Seth.
2013 Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies: Migrant Farmworkers in the US. Univeristy of California
Press.
Lassiter, Luke Eric
2005 The Chicago Guide to Collaborative Ethnography. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Narayan, Kirin.
2012 Alive in the Writing: Crafting Ethnography in the Company of Chekov.
University of Chicago Press.
Additional Articles listed below by date will be available on the class Blackboard site under folders for each week in the “course documents” section.
Week I. Introductions, Class Organization, First fieldnote writing exercise, sharing and revising.
.
Wed. April 2 nd
Week II. Weaving Theory with a Story
Wed. April 9 th
Read: Holmes, Chapter One, Introduction, Chapter Two, We are Fieldworkers, Embodied
Anthropology of Migration

Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, Chapter 1, Fieldnotes in Ethnographic Research, Chapter 2 In the Field: Participating, Observing, and Jotting Notes
Narayan: Chapter 1, Story and Theory.
Week III. Establishing Place and Structure
Wed. April 16 th
Read Holmes, chapter 3, Segregation on the Farm,
Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, Chapter 3. Writing Fieldnotes 1: At the Desk, Creating Scenes on the Page, Chapter 4, Writing Fieldnotes II; Multiple Purposes and Stylistic Options
Nayarin, Chapter 2, Place.
Week IV. Creating Dignified People in Ethnographic Writing
Wed. April 23 rd
Read Holmes, Chapter 4, How the Poor Suffer: Embodying the Violence Continuum, Chapter
5,Doctors Don’t Know Anything.
Nayarin, Chapter Three Person.
Week V. Points of View, Voice, Authority, and Written versus Oral Knowledges and
Histories
Wed. April 30 th .
Whose side do you tell a story from? What is truth? What is fact? What is the line between fiction writing, history, and ethnography? What is the position of the author? Who is the
"subject?" How do you represent multiple view points, multivocality?
What do testimonials represent? Whose voice(s) do they reflect? What is the role of taping, transcribing, and editing in testimonials and other work? What is the role of silence? Are testimonials a part of ethnography? Is traditional ethnography more Atruthful@ than testimony?
What are the political stakes of contradicting testimonies? Are ethnographies hidden testimonies of the authors? Can testimonials and ethnographies co-exist?
Read: "Identity in Mashpee" by Clifford
Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, chapter 5, Pursuing Member’s Meanings, Narayan, Chapter 4
(Voice)
Week VI. Self: How much of yourself do you put in? Self versus interpretation and theory
Wed. May 7 th
Read: Holmes, Chapter Six, Because They’re Lower to the Ground: Naturalizing Social
Suffering, Conclusions.
Nayarin: Chapter 5, Self.

Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes: Chapter 6, Processing Fieldnotes: Coding and Memoing,
Chapter 7, Writing an Ethnography.
Friday, May 9th 4 p.m. Please attend UO colloquia with Prof. Kimberly Theidon
6:30 p.m. Dinner for class with Katherine Blee, at Lynn Stephen’s home, 2346 Alder St
Week VII. Writing Difficult Stories: Activist and Collaborative Research, Challenges in
Life and on the Page.
Wed. May 14 th .
Wendy Vogt Visit to class before lecture, Read AE piece, Lynn’s on collaborative Activist
Research, and Lassiter
Wendy a. Vogt. 2013. Crossing Mexico: Structural violence and the commodification of undocumented Central American migrants. American Ethnologist 40(4): 764-780. (PDF on
Blackboard)
Lassiter, chapter 1-6 ,pp. 1 -116.
Stephen, Epilogue, Notes on Collaborative Research, in Transborder Lives: Indigenous
Oaxacans in Mexico, California, and Oregon. pp. 321-325. Duke University Press, 2007
Week VIII. Ethnography, Fiction, Testimony, and Literary Non-Fiction: Shared Tools of the Trades?
Wed. May 21 st
Stephen, Chapter 1, Testimony: Human Rights and Social Movements. In We are the Face of
Oaxaca: Testimony and Social Movements, pp. 1-35. Duke University Press, 2013.
Erica Bornstein: Stories of poverty in India: An ethnographer reviews Katherine Boo's Behind the Beautiful Forevers. American Ethnologist. 41(1): 180-186. PDF Blackboard under week 8.
Katherine Book, Beyond the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity.
Prologue, Part One Under Citizens, Chapters 1-4,
Maria Teresa Tula, Chapters 1-8 PDF under week 8, pp. 1-89
Week IX Pulling it Together: Writing Conclusions, Introductions
Wed. May 28 th
Read: Lassiter, chapter, chapter 7-8,pp. 117-154.
Begin in-class presentations.

Week X. Final Presentations, Wrap Up
Wed. June 4 th .
Presentations. Final papers due in class.