CAST 300/301
Situated Research and Practicum
Fall 2004
Professor Gina M. Pérez
Tuesday 9-10:50am
Office: King 141D, x58982
Office Hours: Tuesday & Thursday 12-1.
Wednesday 1:30-2:30
Email: gina.perez@oberlin.edu
Situated Research is a qualitative methods course that uses community-based learning
pedagogies as way to reflect on and critically engage with issues of power, advocacy research,
and the production of knowledge. This field-based course explores the experiential and
analytical aspects of participatory research through the study of institutional practices, social
interaction and the production of knowledge. It is also a course that invites students into a deeper
engagement with the larger Oberlin and Lorain County communities and brings together
scholarship, community service, and community-based research in order to reflect on the ethics,
challenges, and methods of qualitative participatory research. Both CAST 300 and CAST 301
(the practicum) are required for all Comparative American Studies majors.
The principal goal of this course is for each student to prepare an ethnographic report by the end
of the semester. In order to meet this goal, Situated Research consists of two components: 1. A
weekly seminar which provides space to reflect, analyze, and discuss social theory, the
production of knowledge, power and the ethics of positionality as well as mechanics of data
collection, analysis and writing of ethnographic texts. And 2. The practicum in which each
student will volunteer on a weekly basis at a local community organization, agency, grassroots
organization or research site. Mature, engaged, and responsible participation in both components
is absolutely critical in order to complete this course successfully.
Required Texts
Martin F. Manalansan. 2003. Global Divas: Filipino gay men in the diaspora. Duke University
Press.
Helen Gremillion. 2003. Feeding anorexia: Gender and power at a treatment center. Duke
University Press.
Nicole Constable. 2003. Romance on a global stage: Pen pals, virtual ethnography, and ‘mail
order’ marriages. University of California Press.
David Naguib Pellow and Lisa Sun-Hee Park. 2002. The Silicon Valley of dreams:
Environmental justice, immigrant workers, and the high-tech global economy. New York
University Press.
Sidney Mintz. 1974. Worker in the cane. W. W. Norton & Company.
Lorna Rhodes. 2004. Total confinement: Madness and reason in the maximum security prison.
University of California Press.
All textbooks can be purchased at the college bookstore. Additional articles are available on
reserve at Mudd Library and through ERES (Mudd Library’s Electronic Reserve system).
SEMINAR AND PRACTICUM REQUIREMENTS
Seminar participation and attendance
Situating field research assignments
Research project assignments
15%
20%
65%
I. Participation and Attendance
Students are expected to attend and participate in weekly seminars as well in their chosen
placement for the practicum.
Weekly Seminars
Weekly seminars provide a space to share the experiences, challenges, concerns and joys
of student placements and the research process. Discussing the ethics of research and disclosure
is absolutely central to this course, and our first seminar meeting will be dedicated to discussing
not only the ethics of research, but also to issues of confidentiality. Because each of you will
bring reflections of your placements and of the people with whom you work into the classroom,
as a class we will establish the seminar as a confidential space and stress that information,
stories, concerns, and issues shared cannot be discussed outside of the seminar. Weekly
seminars will also include a discussion of assigned readings. The reading list will include articles
discussing the ethics of research; issues of social stratification and hierarchies based on race,
class, gender, sexuality; the challenges and importance of interdisciplinary and advocacy
research; as well as a discussion of other methodologies, including feminist approaches, visual
and literary criticism, archival research, survey and content analysis. Course readings will also
include ethnographies as a way to think through methodological questions and concerns students
will face throughout their placement. An important course goal is for students to be able to
identify various methods scholars use, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of various
methodologies and to use their deep engagement with ethnographic methods a way for
understanding other methodologies.
Engaged discussion, reflection and engagement with the reading are absolutely required. I
encourage each of you to use the readings to reflect on your experiences as researchers and to
bring that analysis to each seminar.
Practicum
Each student is required to spend 5-10 hours weekly in her/his placement. The time you
spend at your field site is determined, in large part, by the number of credit hours you have
chosen for the practicum component, although you may choose to spend more time than is
required at your fieldsite if you choose to do so. Once you begin working at your chosen
fieldsite, each of you will be required to take fieldnotes documenting your experiences and
observations. Your fieldnotes will be the basis for your final ethnographic paper.
Your practicum grade will be based on your placement attendance (50%) and your
weekly fieldnotes (50%).
II. Written Assignments
This class is writing intensive course and as such includes a variety of written assignments
designed to introduce students to the process of recording fieldnotes, proposal writing and
research design as well as ethnographic writing.
Fieldnotes Due at the beginning of class each week
Taking, writing and circulating fieldnotes are a central requirement to this course and will
be the basis for your final ethnographic paper. While there are clearly important concerns about
the writing of fieldnotes (issues of power, representation, and textuality, to name a few), this
course is premised on the notion that there is value in close documentation and observation of
different field sites in order to, as homelessness activist/researcher/anthropologist Kim Hopper
notes, “render a faithful (“just”) reconstruction” of people’s points of view as one way of
effecting lasting social change (Hopper 2003: 9). In order to facilitate this methodological
enterprise, each student is required to take daily fieldnotes, at least 5 pages for each day at
your placement. I will collect, read, and provide critical feedback on your fieldnotes on a
weekly basis, with the goal of helping each of you improve data collection, to engage you with
issues of ethics of data collection, and to help you analyze your fieldnotes in order to construct
grounded theory. I will also meet with you regularly to discuss the mechanics of taking
fieldnotes and documentation and work with you to use these data to design a research proposal
and ultimately write the final ethnographic project.
Situating Your Field Research Assignments
Your ethnographic research this semester is part of a larger body of knowledge, research,
and activism, and as researchers, it is your responsibility to learn as much as you can about the
problem and issues at hand. To this end, you will have several short assignments aimed at
providing that context for your project. These assignments will also introduce you to other
methods of research (literary, archival, census data, etc.)
1.
2.
3.
4.
Fieldsite Description, September 17th (5%)
Literature Review, October 15th (5%)
Census Report, November 5th (5%)
Coding Fieldnotes, November 12th, (5%)
Ethnographic Project Assignments
Your fieldnotes will serve as the basis for your final ethnographic paper, which will also
incorporate class readings and situated research assignments to provide a framework for your
project. You will be invited to meet with me in the first few weeks of the semester to discuss
your project. Each of you will be required to identify a research question that will serve as the
basis for your ethnographic project, although aware of the intersubjective nature of engaged field
research, I suspect (and expect) your understanding of the research question will change over the
course of the semester. Final papers should be 10-15 pages in length.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Project Proposal, October 1st (5%)
Rough Draft, November 23rd (10%)
Panel Presentation, final three weeks of class (10%)
Ethnographic Report, due Finals Week, date to be announced (40%)
SUMMARY OF KEY COURSE DEADLINES
September 17th, Fieldsite Description
October 1st, Project Proposal
October 15th, Literature Review
November 5th, Census Report
November 12th, Coding fieldnotes
November 23rd, Rough Draft
CR/NE: If you are taking this class CR/NE, you must fulfill all course obligations to receive
credit.
LATE WORK: All assignments must be completed on time. Papers not turned in at the
beginning of class on the specified date will be considered late and will be penalized 1/3 grade
for each day it is overdue. Late papers will not receive written comments.
ACADEMIC INCOMPLETES at the end of the semester will not be given except case of an
emergency.
HONOR CODE: The policies described in the Oberlin College Honor Code apply to this class.
Written work must include proper citations and must be the product of your own work. You are
also required to include the following statement on all written assignments: "I affirm that I have
adhered to the Honor Code in this assignment." If you have any questions about how to properly
cite sources or about the Honor Code, please feel free to approach me. For more information on
the Honor Code, see http://www.oberlin.edu/students/student_pages/honor_code.html
STUDENTS NEEDING EXTRA ASSISTANCE: Please speak with me if you need disabilityrelated accommodations in this course. Student Academic Services is also an important resource
for students needing academic assistance. Please contact Jane Boomer, Coordinator of Services
for Students with Disabilities, Peters G27, extension 58467.
CLASS SCHEDULE
Week 1: Introduction and defining ethnography and situated research
September 2 Organizational meeting, discussion of placements and taking fieldnotes
Week 2: Histories, Motivations, and Mechanics of Ethnographic Research
September 7 Emerson, “The development of ethnographic field research” (ERes); Jackson, “I
am a fieldnote,” (ERes); Ristock, “Community-based research,” (ERes); Rosaldo,
“Imperialist nostalgia” (ERes).
Week 3: Method, Methodology and Epistemology
September 14 Becker, “The epistemology of qualitative research” (ERes); Harding, “Is there a
feminist method?” (ERes); Limón, “Representation, ethnicity, and the precursory
ethnography” (ERes); Newton, “My best informant’s dress,” (ERes).
Friday September 17th Noon, Fieldsite Description Assignment due
Week 4: Advocacy Research and Defining a Research Problem
September 21 Pellow and Park, The silicon valley of dreams.
Week 5: Oral History and Ethnographic Research
September 28 Mintz, Worker in the cane.
Friday October 1st Noon, Project Proposal due
Week 6: Power and Ethics of Research I: Insider Dilemmas
October 5
Zinn, “Insider field research in minority communities,” (ERes); Twine, “Racial
Ideologies and racial methodologies,” (ERes); Islam, “Research as an act of
betrayal,” (ERes); Gallagher, “White like me?” (ERes).
Week 7: Power and Ethics of Research II: Representation and Making Research Available
October 12
Gremilion, Feeding anorexia.
Friday October 15th Noon, Literature Review due
*********************Fall Break**********************
Week 9: Transnationalism and the Politics of Location
October 26
Manalansan, Global divas.
Week 10: Globalization and New Ethnographic Sites
November 2 Constable, Romance on a global stage
Friday November 5th Noon, Census Report due
Week 11: Data Analysis and Managing Fieldnotes
November 9 MacLeod, “On the making of Ain’t no makin’ it” (ERes); Charmaz
Friday November 12th, Coding Fieldnotes due
Week 12: Ethnography of Power
November 6 Rhodes, Total confinement
Week 13: Ethnographic Film
November 23 TBA Rough Draft due at the beginning of class
Weeks 14, 15, 16 Panel Presentations
November 30 Final Presentations
December 7 Final Presentations
December 14 Final Presentations
FINAL ETHNOGRAPHIC REPORTS DUE EXAM WEEK
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Becker, Howard. 2001. The epistemology of qualitative research. In Contemporary field
research: Perspectives and formulations, Robert M. Emerson, ed. Propsect Heights, IL:
Waveland Press, pp.317-330.
Charmaz, Kathy. 2001. Grounded theory. In Contemporary field research: Perspectives and
formulations, Robert M. Emerson, ed. Propsect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, pp.1-26.
Emerson, Robert. 2001. Introduction: The development of ethnographic field research. In
Contemporary field research: Perspectives and formulations, Robert M. Emerson, ed.
Propsect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, pp.1-26.
Gallagher, Charles A. 2000. White like me? Methods, meaning and manipulation in the field of
White Studies. In Racing research, researching race: Methodological dilemmas in
critical race studies, France Winddance Twine and Jonathan W. Warren, eds. New
York: New York University Press, pp. 67-92.
Harding, Sandra. 1987. Introduction: Is there a feminist method? In Feminism and methodology:
Social science issues, Sandra Harding, ed. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, pp. 114.
Hopper, Kim. 2003. Reckoning with homelessness. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Islam, Naheed. 2000. Research as an act of betrayal: Researching race in an Asian community
in Los Angeles. In Racing research, researching race: Methodological dilemmas in
critical race studies, France Winddance Twine and Jonathan W. Warren, eds. New
York: New York University Press, pp. 35-66.
Jackson, Jean E. 1990. “I am a fieldnote”: Fieldnotes as a symbol of professional identity. In
Fieldnotes: The making of anthropology, Roger Sanjek, ed. Ithaca: Cornell University
Press, pp. 3-33.
Limón, José E. 1991. Representation, ethnicity and the precursory ethnography: Notes of a
native anthropologist. In Recapturing anthropology: Working in the present, Richard G.
Fox, ed. Santa Fe: School of American Research Press, pp. 115-135.
MacLeod, Jay. 1987. Ain’t no makin’ it: Aspirations and attainment in a low-income
neighborhood. Boulder: Westview Press.
Newton, Ester. 1996. My best informant’s dress: The erotic equation in fieldwork. In Out in the
field: Reflections of lesbian and gay anthropologists, Ellen Lewin and William L. Leap,
eds. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, pp. 212-235.
Ristock, Janice. L. 1998. Community-based research: Lesbian abuse and other telling tales. In
Inside the academy and out: Lesbian/gay/queer studies and social action, Janice L.
Ristock and Catherine G. Taylor, eds. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, pp. 137154.
Rosaldo, Renato. 1989. Imperialist Nostalgia. In Culture and truth: The remaking of social
analysis. Boston: Beacon Press, 68-87.
Twine, France Winddance. 2000. Racial ideologies and racial methodologies. In Racing
research, researching race: Methodological dilemmas in critical race studies, France
Winddance Twine and Jonathan W. Warren, eds. New York: New York University
Press, pp. 1-34.
Zinn, Maxine Baca. 2001. Insider field research in minority communities. In Contemporary
field research: Perspectives and formulations, Robert M. Emerson, ed. Propsect Heights,
IL: Waveland Press, pp.159-166.