Six Weeks With No Dog

A Tumblr of my Anthropology By The Wire project out of Towson University. Six weeks of uncovering Baltimore's mysteries, getting lost in Baltimore, doing interviews, living in Towson, getting lost in Towson, and whatever else comes my way.

[anthropologybythewire-blog]

Towards an Ethics for Networked Anthropology

Samuel Gerald Collins

Matthew Slover Durington

As periodic crises in our field continue to make clear, ethical dilemmas are intrinsic to anthropology, and the problems we experience are not likely to be solved with the adoption of a particular code of ethics.  We believe that’s a good thing—anthropology is first and foremost an ethical discipline, with every instance of fieldwork opening up onto a shifting and complex ethical landscape.  This is certainly the case with what we are calling “networked anthropology,” an anthropology undertaken with community partners to produce and distribute ethnographic content through networked social media. 

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[anthropologybythewire-blog]

Characteristics of networked anthropology

1.       It’s about process.  The point behind a networked anthropology is to articulate your work through the network, and that means posting up data, ideas and theories that are still in motion.  The moment the book is printed, or the article published, then that process stops, and your work has been ossified—reified—into a singular, static work.  Instead, networked anthropology takes a sometimes terrifying step into revealing ideas that are not fully formed. 

2.       It’s connected.  What does it mean to be connected?  It means more than just putting something up online. 

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[marmite]

My hometown in the ’40s. Honestly doesn’t look that different.

[phollandnsf]

It looks both the same and so different.

[phollandnsf]

Musings

So it took me a bit to get my thoughts together but here goes.

I was asked in my exit interview to explain the process of ABTW and while I thought my answer was bordering on clinical Dr. Durington requested that I put it into text on here.

We started out the first week with lots of readings and at the time these readings seemed slightly disconnected. As we progressed further into the program though I realized how grateful I was for having read those pieces. I could look at what we were doing and the interviews we were conducting and see the connections between a man with HIV, an unemployed steel worker, and a church member from a local AME church. The connections were clear and I felt more prepared each time. What happens to one group of people affects every other group of people. The more I worked the more I found myself looking back at the readings from the first week and finding more and more connections. In the final week I was able to take all my collected media and create visual and audio documentaries that gave a window into not only the project itself but also the people who worked with us to provide these windows.

Would I have understood the connections without the readings? Maybe, eventually I would have seen them. But the readings gave me a step up. To be able to make those connections from the beginning and bring the project full circle so that the products of my labor can be used in the future as we used the readings this time around.

I can only hope that my meager offerings are as enlightening and helpful as I found those initial readings.

[phollandnsf]

The End?

As today is probably going to be a little crazy and so will Friday, I think now is the time to get out the final thoughts.

I can't say I will never edit again because I thought it was a lot of fun. Plus I have to finish my projects over the next six months.

I can safely say that my computer is on it's last leg after all this.

To date I have spent more than 50 hours in the editing lab...a lot more actually.

I can now ride the MTA bus system without having a panic attack (in fact yesterday morning I listened to music instead of freaking out about what stop I was at)

I have a whole slew of new places to go and pictures to take.

I was already pretty jaded when it came to what went on in cities, but this project helped me shuffle that stuff into a more organized list.

I met some great people at JACQUES, Local 2609, and Ebeneezer AME.

...and that's just the tip of the iceberg. But I am ready to go home, I am ready to go back to my routine, but maybe I'll come back next year. Until then it's almost the end of my six weeks with no dog.

[phollandnsf]

Pick Of The Litter

Top 3 Posts:

A Recap of Monday...

A Language All Their Own

A Visit To St. Mary's Cemetary

10 Tags About Us:

#"The Hat"

#It Must Be Purple

#Selectively Passionate

#Logical

#Interesting

#Focused

#Siberian Husky

#History Buff

#Honors

#Spirited

2 Media:

RG Steel Piece and City Uprising Piece

[slouchingtowardsbmore]

These are my favorite photos from today despite (or maybe because of) the fact that they were goofs.

[rsargentnsf]

They did say we could choose which picture xD

[cscottnsf]

THIS IS ART!

It shows our true selves. I think candid shots would be cool for the gallery. 

[phollandnsf]

I want the hat pic instead of the other ones :) no seriously

[phollandnsf]

I can't decide whether I have too much time to do this project or too little. After having squirreled myself away for the entire day yesterday I thought I would come back to the lab with fresh eyes and a fresh attitude. NO! I sat in front of my computer and began to curse my existence within the first five minutes of editing out all the dead air, ummm's, errr's, ahhhh's, and all that damn foot tapping.

Oh my lord I feel like Thursday is both too close and too far away. Then Friday we move out and say our farewells.

[phollandnsf]

With the computer lab closed the last four days I have been working offline with my stuff. More of that today while my partner has the computer today. Then it's back to the lab tomorrow to finish the last quick touches to my RG Steel and Ebeneezer AME piece. So excited to see my pieces with everyone else's on Thursday.

[phollandnsf]

I Feel Like I'm Missing Something

I keep feeling like coming into the final week of the program that I am forgetting something. I sure hope not. The closer I get to the end the more I worry but I also start to calm down more because I know no matter what happens in one week I will have experienced six of some of the most meaningful, controversial, moving, and enlightening weeks of my life.

[reyairia]

70% of editing is just looking at ur work for a few hours with this face

[rsargentnsf]

This is relevant to this week.

[phollandnsf]

I second that

[phollandnsf]

Home Stretch

No more field work, no more new footage. It's time to edit ladies and gentlemen!

I have timelines for all three projects and I am ready to go.

[phollandnsf]

What A Weekend

I spent Saturday preparing for our visit to Ebeneezer AME Church in Sharp-Leadenhall. When Sunday arrived I was dressed to the 9s just like my mother had always taught me was the right way to go to church. However that was the only "normal" thing that day.

I grew up mostly Catholic so I am used to sit, stand, kneel, repeat. What happened at the service Sunday had me in shock for the first half hour. Lots of singing, random standing, people shouting at random moments, and no communion. I was in utter shock, this was not even close to my idea of church. From the looks on some of my companions faces they had even less of a clue what was going on than I did.

Overall I enjoyed the service but it left me a little shaken.

Afterwards we went downstairs and conducted some interviews with members of the church. Some were in their seventies, eighties, and even nineties. One of the ladies I interviewed had been attending Ebeneezer for 45 years, my parents were in elementary school at that time!

Finally we made our way back to the dorms where I promptly went home to decompress and sort out what the heck just happened.

[dreavesnsf]

YOU KNOW THAT YOU’RE FROM BALTIMORE WHEN YOU SEE THE “RUNNING MAN" 

The “Running Man” (also known as Keith Bossier) does not have time to get caught up in people’s stares. Nearly 23 years that he has been running around Baltimore City, people have been wondering about him; if he’s insane, homeless, or is he running away from his demons. But none is true.  He has made a seamlessly rational decision to run at least 20 miles a day, every single day a year through the streets of Baltimore as a self-inflicted fitness routine. He owns his own his own home. He has a job working as a carpenter in which he is often building decks with his relatives. His floppy socks are actually expensive runner’s socks that he makes last as long as he can, and his shoes are dirty and worn because they have traveled1, 200 miles in the last two months, which is about the time and distance at which he replaces them. Everything in Boissiere’s life, from his vegetarian diet to his rigorous workout schedule to his attire, is by his own design.

[phollandnsf]

My idea for the David Harvey film using my media. I can't draw.

[phollandnsf]

...And Tuesday

As I sit here at 11:30 at night, more than 7 hours after leaving City Uprising I still don't know how to put into words what I saw and experienced today. I wish I could wax poetic about community and the effects of gentrification on the neighborhood we walked through with our ambassador but it just won't come.

Even going over everything I still feel like it was someone else out there today. Maybe when I can look back at it from tomorrow I might be able to think more clearly but all I know is today was definitely not something I ever thought I would do in my life

[phollandnsf]

A Recap of Monday

Monday: As you may have seen from some of my pictures Monday we visited the Local 2609 USW Union Hall. I was fascinated by this and so pictures made it into a post that I put together as I fell asleep (literally typing with one finger on my computer that sat on the floor because gravity does most of the work when you type like that). I was worn out and knew I had another hectic day coming up. Monday also brought a lot of emotions to the surface for everyone involved. Here were people who had their very identity forcefully removed and then were told to go do training, or school, or get a job. Some did, some didn't, and some are still struggling with trying to sort out their lives and find a stable place from which to try and start over. They never did anything to deserve this they simply gave their heart and soul to their career. They were Steel Workers! That was their life. And now it's not now they are students, or truck drivers. But they still cling to that identity in their connections to their former co-workers and friends from the mills. Seeing the emotion on my participants face as he talked about helping out a former co-worker to fix a car, his eyes started to water as he talked about having two hours where he felt like it was old times again. I don't know how these people do it day after day, and I don't think anyone can understand the amount of respect these people deserve. Not pity, never pity, respect.