Sociology 90W Senior Seminar

A propos our informal discussions of the poor network performance in the Sociology lab, this is the latest announcement from Mark Gold, director of ITS at BC.

Over the past 2 weeks, network services for faculty and staff users, including access to the Internet and to some college servers, have experienced almost daily slowdowns and some significant interruptions. ITS has been addressing each issue in turn, but the problems have typically been the result of traffic overloads affecting various central systems. After extensive analysis, and working with our network infrastructure vendor, ITS have determined that some key network components have software bugs that can create spurts of uncontrolled traffic, and this traffic could be the cause of the problems. We are also finding a substantial amount of traffic that is being caused by computers on campus infected with viruses.

I've updated the points. Use GradeQuery to see your scores.

Points leaders are: Hana M, Lydia M, Tiffany M, Lawrence C, Nicole M, and, Sarah J. Excellent work.

Don't forget to turn in your bibliography. The annotated bibliography is due on Thursday, 10/25.

Think about the aspect of culture you are studying. If you were able to observe the phenomenon from an omniscient perspective—in other words, all seeing and all knowing—what would the phenomenon look like? Try to convey some of the visual details as you imagine them. Next, think about the question of availability. Since you are not omniscient, how visually available is the phenomenon to the ethnographic researcher? How will it appear to your camera?

What did you think of the field session? Reflect on the experience of taking ethnographic photographs. Briefly describe one thing you learned from the field session or one aspect of your thinking about your research project that has changed as a result of the field session.

If you were not at the field session, write a paragraph about how you plan to take photographs for your ethnography.

Select two pictures from our multimedia archive. One should be about material culture and one should be about symbolic culture. Think about how the two forms of culture are similar and different. How do you determine the meaning of the practices in each case?

Select one photograph from our multimedia archive. (These are photographs by Professor Krase from the BrooklynSoc archive.) Think about the difference between how you would use the photo as evidence (the positivist perspective) and how you would use it as interpretive (the post-positivist perspective). Write a paragraph from the positivist perspective and a paragraph from the post-positivist perspective. Try to write about the same content, varying only the language you use.

We'll talk about the differences in the kinds of things you can say about photographs.

To build on the insights gained from our Writing Fellows, Corey and Jessica, take another look at your submission to the research projects thread and rewrite your proposal summary here using the professional writing voice that Corey and Jessica discussed.

UPDATE: Please note the new time: Sat. 10/13 at 1pm.

Our field session on taking ethnographic photographs will take place on Saturday, October 13. Let's meet at the corner of Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues (on the 5th Ave side of the street) at 1pm. We will take a short walk around the neighborhood taking photographs and discussing strategy and ethics. The session will last for 75 minutes. At the regular class meeting on Tuesday, October 16 we can discuss the results of the field session.

Bring your camera and a notebook to the field session.

The regular class meeting on T 10/23 will be replaced by the field session. We will not meet at our usual time on the 23rd.

Our writing fellows will be visiting on Thursday, 10/4. As part of their materials, please read the following article before class.

The two other documents will be used in the classroom exercise.