Family Discourse

So I suppose this had to happen. My anthropological lens is seeing different Discourses. Gee's article really opened my eyes and gave a name to what I tried to call societies. Discourse is so much richer, because it includes all the values and non-verbal or intellectual manners in a group. Something I think about is family literacy. I think I've mentioned (possibly too much) that I have a blended family. My two older daughters are my husband's, and the two younger are mine. I spent six years alone after I lost my first husband. I thought of myself and my children as a kind of a triumverate. We created our own family Discourse, because we had no family for 900 miles. Over the years, I gave my children a different upbringing. They have knowledge of so much of history that many parents don't provide their children. Not necessarily the history in the books, but - I'm trying to put my finger on what to call it. They know who Ruby Keeler is. They can identify a Bob Fosse film. They can identify the movie with the phrase "what an ***hole" (Ghostbusters). They know what a 741 is (it's the dewey decimal number for humor under the old library system). They're computer literate (occupational hazard). They have their own political views and we have spirited discussions when the subject arises. They can become VERY spirited, but that's okay. Boscherts don't raise their voices. Lillemons do. And it IS a discourse. Tom (my husband) is very aware that there's a closeness between the three of us that's kind of different. I imprinted on my children and we have a Discourse that our older daughters aren't a part of. It's not anyone's fault, though. It's just what evolved because of our lives. Tom has become a member of our Discourse; he's the only father the children know. He's not 'like' us, but he has his place. And I'm aware that I have to modify our environment when all four children are with us (we try to vacation together every year). For years I saw the Discourse of my husband's family, but never had a name to put to it. I just knew I wasn't a "Boschert". Could I teach my older daughters the literacy of the triumverate? I don't know. I tried putting Bloom's Taxonomy to it. Could they remember it? Could they apply it? Could I analyze it? Some people just accept things the way they are. I have a tendency to analyze. So now I will be trying to remember the new taxonomy to look at what we learn. I've always used the old Bloom. To quote Holden Caufield, "So it goes."

Conducting case study interviews

I'm thinking about the interviews for my case study and how to keep them on target and still be semi-structured. I have been thinking about how to get my stakeholders to give me more than what the questions will ask. I think that if I write my critical research question first, and then ask what a stakeholder would derive or would hear, it may keep me focused. Our class interviews showed me that there's so much more to ask than the question; what I have to figure out now is how to step back and let the subject move in its own direction. My friend Maggie (with whom I walk almost every morning) is a good sounding board; she knew immediately that the interviews, if conducted right, would give me information I might not think to ask. I reflected on my pedagogy in my case study, which veered me off track a bit. It's hard to separate the two sometimes. Think think think. Just ruminating, so I don't expect comments on this one : )   Joyce M.

Coming Apart

I'm reading a book by Charles Murray called "Coming Apart: The State of White America". It's rather disturbing that the author makes points about the coming apart of what he calls "The America Project". It looks at how America is different from other countries, often comparing it to European countries. In the first part of the book, he offers statistics that show how so many things are happening in our society that are detrimental to our social well being. Things that we think about, but he has the numbers to back them up. In the next part, he compares two fictional towns, one lower class and one new upper class. It's a little like Freakenomics, a book that looks at things we see in a new way. He talks about the four foundations that created what is great about America and how we're losing them. I haven't finished the book yet, but he does have a theory of how our problems can be solved and we can become the America of before. So far, he's hoping that when we see what has happened to the welfare states (countries) of Europe, that we will see that it is not a societal model that can survive in America. I don't know that we can rescue ourselves at this point, but the book gives hope if the right/enough people read it and take it seriously. There is a section on education and how it affects the different societies. What he says makes sense, but if you say some of these things without the numbers to back it up, you would sound like an ultraconservative. He has the numbers. He talks about college students and how they end up living the lives they do, and how their children have an advantage from being the children of these adults. He says bluntly that the children with the most successful lives are those raised by two biological married parents. He shows that children of single mothers who have not graduated from high school do not have a very good chance of success in life, and that those that do succeed are the exception rather than the rule. This was one of the books Dr. Muth showed us in class, and it's very interesting. If anyone else is interested in reading it, I'd enjoy a discussion of its contents afterward.

Anonymous

      This week I am looking at the first question “What is Belfiore doing?”  We talked briefly in class about how she was putting herself in the story using an anthropological style of writing in “I” form.  I view it as she is not only putting herself in the story, but also pulling the reader in so that we are standing right next to her.  The sentence “I’m in one of those large, anonymous and endlessly reproducible shopping malls with department stores, super stores and specialty boutiques” put me there.  I almost think it was the particular use of the word “anonymous” that told me this could be me too, whatever I picture in my mind is correct.

     I admire an author that has the power to pull me into the story.  It’s not an easy task, hooking the reader, making the reader care.  Maybe it is me, but textiles and weaving did not hold my interest as pickles did.  Was it the writing style?  I sew, I weave, and I actually prefer those as pastimes, over pickles.  I am pressed to try and determine why one chapter grabbed me and another did not.  I haven’t started hotels yet…

      From here my mind jumped to the novel Push, also written in an “I” form letting the reader in on the young girl’s vivid story using an anthropological lens.  Well, first I have not seen the movie, so although I knew the outline of the story from hearing others talk about it and my own daughter announcing she was going to be a social worker after viewing the movie (she has since switched to an English major) I had ultimately avoided the story.  It was too much for me to take on, to become emotionally pulled in when I already hear/see too many stories of children lost in the educational system.  I wasn’t ready to live the life of a child lost in the same world that I struggle to keep students from falling into, but this week I began this novel; required reading.  Forty pages in one sitting and I needed a mental break.  This is not to mean that I am not hooked, but that I am drained from being in the story with Precious. 

      Sapphire, the author, has put us right there, hurting, brutalized and fighting back.  The first line of the story, "I was left back when I was twelve because I had a baby for my fahver." made me ache. The broken writing, the street language, the fragments and the resistance that Precious offers  from page one puts us right there, visualizing, suffering and aching for her.  I go back to the word “anonymous” used by Belfiore.  By letting the reader see through that anthropological lens, Sapphire has written the story of an anonymous character and given her life.  When I am emotionally prepared to be drawn in again I will lift the book and persevere.