March 2, 2011: Learning Journal 7

To kick things off, I think that the most interesting thing I have learned about this week is reciprocity.  My good friend Maggie wrote a great blogspot about it that pretty much summarizes all of the things I felt when I went to Ghana, Africa last summer.  I highly encourage anyone to read it.

Reciprocity was also something we had the opportunity of discussing in the prep class on Monday.  Dave Shuller, the previous field studies coordinator, came in and gave us a brief lesson on it.  Reciprocity is really just a fancy way of saying the give and take in society, but it is something we as Americans are not so good with.  He says that the word itself needs to be fancy because then we will think about it more.  Some powerful rhetoric that we use over and over loses meaning, but he argued that this particular word is unique so that it will keep us thinking about this subject.

Dave said that the reason why Americans are not really great with reciprocity is because we operate on a contract system.  I've talked about this in my Peoples of India class too.  We seem to all act as contracting, independent individuals.  We see time as money, and money as the exchange for pretty much everything.  However, other cultures are much more interested in kinship.  Time is an investment, and being a part of a family is necessary.  Merely paying off our host family and getting them a nice present is not going to cut it.  That is not reciprocity.  That is the exchange of goods, what we are used to.

I wish that I could have learned more from Dave, and maybe I will get a chance to talk to him about it again, but a good recommendation he had was to bring a photograph.  As many issues as I sometimes have about the ethics of photography, it really is a great thing in a number of ways.  For one, I think it is a great ice breaker when it comes to getting into the community, and for reciprocity it is also priceless.  It is something that means just a little bit more than the average gift, and I think it can be appreciated for the most part across the board.

Still, this is such a sticky subject I do not know what to do about it this time around.  Do you have any ideas about proper reciprocity?  It would be nice to find something specific to Tibetans as well...

Speaking of community access, another important thing we discussed in class was the National Geographic photographer,  Stephanie Sinclair, who looked at the FLDS population.  She has some great insights in this interview about gaining access to the community.  As a photographer, this really speaks to me.  I never felt like I was able to really be okay taking pictures when I was in Ghana, and to hear how many months it took for her to get to that point helped me remember my limitations.  She also worked through a few gatekeepers, or people she had to get permissions from (such as the prophet, etc), and it was only then that she was able to do her work.  She had to go through this process through every different community she went to, but in the end she got some amazing footage that no one else has ever captured before.  In class we also talked about how humor was something that can help in getting access to a community.  For her, it was pretending to fall off a ladder in order to get some great smiles for that awesome first picture.

As far as other updates, I have completed my first IRB draft and am glad to report that I have not forgotten everything that I learned last year during the process.  I think this will be a much cleaner project, so maybe I will not have to go full board this time around.  I have gathered some pretty sweet sources for the week, including an official citation to why stories are important to this particular community.  Finally found it!  I am still looking for more support for that argument though.  Doing this makes me stop and look at my own paradigm and figure out what stories mean to our culture, and what they mean to me personally.  I am so excited to start this project!

And the best part?  It is really happening.  I bought my plane ticket and everything.  I am going a week earlier than my group to set up housing, and my friend Hailey (doing a field study in Deli) is coming with me!  After the program I am doing about 5 days of travel in North India, then I am doing four days in France and 4 days in Rome!  I am one lucky, happy girl.