Reflections+(11-22)

Readings Reflection Page for 11-22 class (created by Sandy Schaeffer)

__Article Reflections for 11-22 (Jennifer Blassingame)__ Visweswaran: In my opinion, things can be viewed in many different ways. I never thought of being a hyphenated race as a negative thing. I am white. Black people are black, but they themselves chose to be called African-Americans. Honestly, I suppose white people are called Caucasian-Americans. I really am not sure about that. As narrow-minded as it may be, from that I assumed (which one should never do) that all cultures were pleased to include all of their origins in the name of their race. This article reveals a different side to the hyphen for me. Because I am not aware of the rules on obtaining a visa to visit India, I am not entirly sure how I feel about the questioning of the young lady at the beginning of the article. If the origin of the person is of need, then the young lady should have been prepared to offer that information. I feel as if the workers in the office should have been more personable and more forthcoming. They too should have been prepared to offer more information. It seemed as if this was the first time she had ever had to deal with her nationality. The situation turned into a racial issue and the customer service was in my opinion unacceptable. Now I will address what you told us to because I just found that on the page:) Okay... What stood out to me: the poor customer service of the traveling girl-- I was shocked by the way the customer service representatives treated the young girl getting a visa. Even though they had questions to ask her, it would have been respectful to not make her wait so long or just be honest about the time upfront. I understand the delay and the questioning process, however their was a breakdown in communcation that resulted in poor customer treatment which was racial. the lack of parental guidance on "who" she was-- Because of the cultural differences, the thought of children finding their own way is something I could see happening. However, it seems that because of the importance of girls remaining sheltered throughout their teen years, the parents would take an interest in ensuring that they know how to speak for themselves and how to carry themselves. By arming their children with little information on how to address issues relating to their heritage, the new generation is entering the next phase of life at a disadvantage. the narrow-minded world of inter-racial marriages-- I could not believe the fact about looking alike will allow a marriage to take place and that the rule was in affect until 1951. People should have the right to choose their life partners. Just because it is not something that I choose does not give me the right to impose my beliefs on the rest of the world. ignorace of people in general-- This is in relation to the section where the other person asked if she was mixed. She chose no response as the best response. I have a tendancy to speak before I think sometimes,so I admired her no response. I also couldn't help but think to consider the source. The way the piece was written played a huge part in my thoughts here because if it had not been written exactly like the words were spoken then I may not have thought about the social etiquettle of the questioner. I found myself trying to "walk in her shoes" during the reading of the article. Had the author written in a different form, the emotions and feelings would not have been provoked as well. I really enjoyed the article, and I could actually visualize the girl in the situations. I can see how the story would have been different written from a different perspective. The background and the sexuality must be comparable. Being a woman, I compared how I grew up and how I live now to the stories that I read. It is easy for me to judge the upbringing and the parental decisions that the people made when I, myself, was not the one having to make them. David spoke in his reflection of how we (the white americans) have given those hyphenated names to people with a different skin tone. I was under the impression that they chose those names for themselves. I may be completly wrong, but that's what I thought.

Chaudhry

I was moved by the adjectives used as descriptors of places, people and events throughout the article. I actually thought about the exercise we did in class. My thoughts ran to the more we told the story, the more descriptive we got. This piece really made me feel as if I were there, in the house. I could feel the emotions that all of the characters were feeling. I understood being torn, and I felt a familiar feeling of being torn between confidentiality and what needed to be done. Between the two articles, this one was my favorite. I followed this one more easily than I did the Visweswaran article. I really got into this story so much more than the other one, I think solely because of the descriptors used. I could feel my cheeks burning as she staggered to and from the podeum to speak from her heart. She felt so strongly, and then she had the courage enough to leave her handsome friend because he did not get her. I loved that. I was so proud of a woman who stood her ground in that moment. In that moment, she could have settled, but instead she defined her beliefs and did what she needed to do for herself. The final story in the series relates to this becasue the daughter has made something of herself by following in the father's footsteps. The mother's anger is evident throughout the piece. By punishing the father, she makes herself feel better. I really like the way the author writes thought to thought throughout the girl's day. Again, I put myself at her computer and in that exact same situation. I have screened my mother several times. However, my mother was not supressed by marriage. The mother in this story wants her daughter to succeed in ways that she was unable to. She is still filled with resentment and anger toward anything with education. The mother had no self worth and saw herself as a failure. She was unable to pursue the life she wanted and was then being rejected in the life she was forced to have. The woman's life was one battle after another. The whole story was very depressing and sad, but painted a portrait that would never have been seen had the story not been told in this manner. I love the narrative expression because even though it tells a specific story with specific events and even more specific details, the reader is left to create for themselves a story and a relataionship the characters. The story has different meanings for each reader, but to me it shows that it is difficult to overcome diversity and life is what you make of it regardless of your circumstances. Even though the mother was full of anger, regret and resentment, she still was there for her children. I think that may have been the best she could do in the circumstances. I feel as if the father was inherently a good man, and I'm not sure it was his fault even though he got blamed and punished for his wife's underdeveloped life. The wife chose to view her life in a way that portrayed all that she did not have as opposed to everything she did have. Life may not go as planned, but you take it and make the most of what comes along. The daughter chose the path of most resistance. She did not want to be a housewife, and she did not care about being a "suitable" match for marriage. Maybe she didn't want to be practical...maybe practical just wasn't enough.

I really liked how the author included questions the daughter was thinking, because at least in my case, I began to think and try to answer the questions. This article really encompasses the feminist perspective. It discusses the opression of women in a man's world. It shows the differences in the generations and in the cultures. Anita's definition helped show the feminist perspective in conjunction with the definintion from the handout section on our class website (which by the way, is very helpful to me). When I read Anita's reflection of this particular article, I gained more insight to the feminist perspective. She really describes things well where people can understand what she is saying. (Too bad you aren't a teacher!! :) Karen combined the articles which was nice to read because I had a difficult time putting them both together. Karen's ability to see beyond the words and get to the heart of the story was helpful for me to read after writing my own reflections. It made me rethink some of my own thoughts. I too had difficulty knowing exactly what the data was so I commented on the stories that I read. Now reading Karen's reflection, I see that the story itself is the data and the feelings provoked in the reader is the what the author is trying to convey. I began reading Gary's reflection, and I could hear him saying what he was writing. I know that this is totally random, but I never read other people's academic work that way until this class and well...right now. I guess this is an "ah-ha" moment for me. It is because of all of the discussions we have had in class, and I have gotten the opportunity to know all of you personally. It really has made a difference, and I look forward to hearing what you have had to say. This is why I know that I have to tell the stories of those who can't tell it for themselves. I hope that I can articulate the participants' feelings and emotions as well as you all have and as well as the authors we have had the opportunity to read have.

I want everyone to know that I have grown as a person during this class. This is the first time I have been involved with such a wonderfully diverse group of scholars. I am so proud to have been a part of this class. I don't feel as if I have contributed enough to all of you, but I want you all to know that you have made a contribution to my life. Thanks, Jennifer :)
 * Article Reflections for 11-22 (David Ogdon)**

Visweswaran:

As I read the Visweswaran piece I became aware of the real Predicament of the Hypen, that sense of being caught in the middle between two worlds, two cultures. What kept coming to my mind was my sense of, "I never looked at it that way." I've always been a one-dimensional thinker when it comes to hyphenation of the various ethnic groups in my country, especially with regard to those who are citizens of my country. That is, why do you have to separate yourself from your nationality as an American by holding on to your ethnic heritage by hyphenating yourself? Why can't you just call yourself "American?" In reflecting on this feeling while reading the piece I came to realize that I could afford those thoughts because I am part of the dominant culture that assigns those hyphenations as a way of classifying people. I realize now that that is a pretty Chauvenistic way of thinking. I agree with Gary's comment that we (white Americans) particularly assign those hyphenations to persons who have a higher melanin content in their skin cells than we do.

The piece strongly speaks to the sense of being "lost in the middle of nowhere" belonging yet, not belonging. Visweswaran illustrates this feeling with her reflection on her grade school experience of having the words "I am an American" being forced back down her throat, words that she was never permitted to say with any amount of certainty (306). Vrudhula's poem "Do not belong to this or that, but I am here" illustrates that sense very well too. Krishnan's story of Vasu, //Knowing Her Place// illustrates well the pain caused by hyphenation; "tortured by the inability to answer the questions "Are you Indian," and "Are you American" Vasu feels her fragile hold on selfhood and identity being attacked and finally attempts suicide" (308). The confusion of being caught in between two cultures is illustrated by Vasu's experience of reaching puberty while living in India and being shut away in a dark room for several days. While part of her knew that that custom was unacceptable in America where she had lived for most of her growing up years, part of Vasu also accepted the isolation, afraid, and at the same time understanding that it was impossible to ask questions (308).

This piece is true to the feminist methodology as it gave voice to those who often have none. It succeeded in that it increased my awareness of the difficulties that those we hyphenate experience not only because of our dominant white society prejudices but also because of cultural restrictions and the predjudices of others.

Chaudry:

Chaudry's work speaks to me from a stronger feminist perspective than does Visweswaran's. Chaudry, through the three vignettes of the piece tells the story or her quest to find her particular identity in her world as a muslim, a woman and as a person who is assimilating herself into a new culture yet, who is tied to the culture of her birth nation through family relationships. Her recounting of her experience at the rally tells of her desire to be part of the Muslim community only to observe that the community is fractionated by differences in beliefs, practices and nationality within that community. She states that her purpose was not to attack the beliefs and faiths of her fellow Muslims even though that's how she was perceived. Her desire was to reclaim and reinscribe the story of Muslim women as a Pakistani woman researcher (445).

Chaudry's story of her incident with Fariha took me back to some of our earlier readings that discussed the idea that an ethnographer must gain the confidence of his/her participants in order to collect complete reliable data. Chaudry had certainly gained Fariha's confidence. I wondered if in gaining that confidence Chaudry had become too intimately involved with Fariha and compromised her role as researcher. Chaudry gives voice to her cultural duality in describing her big sister/younger sister relationships with Fariha and her mother and then choosing to adopt her American mode of thinking in order to empower Fariha. Thus taking up the role of objective feminist (447).

I thought that the third vignette gave me the best insight into cultural struggles that Chaudry had as she sought to understand her mother's ambivalence toward her work on her PhD, the pride her mother expressed in her accomplishments and her frustration with books and higher education (450). This piece also helped me to better understand resistance in the context Chaudry's mother and Chaudry herself trying to break out of roles set for them by their Pakistani culture. I felt that of the three, this vignette had the strongest feminist voice for me as it gave voice to some of the forms of cultural discrimination against women in the Pakistani culture; "Then the woman who sometimes helped my mother out with her seasonal cleaning emphatically told my four-year-old little brother when I was ten that I could not be the prime minister to Abbu King and Mamma Queen because I was "paraya dhan," an outsider's wealth, and my brother Noman, who was the third child, was the one qualified for that position." (450)

Somewhat to my embarrassment, I used to scoff at feminism. I would ask. "What are they fussing about?" Now I understand, the feminist perspective does give voice to those that were previously unheard and they should be heard. All voices should be heard and all stories should be told. It is through this that we will learn to better understand each other. I must confess that I am still opposed the radical, man-hating form of feminism because just like it's masculine counterpart "Chauvinism" it seeks not to empower but to oppress and shut out those voices that need to be heard.

Article Reflections for 11-22 (Beth Newman)
Visweswaran

What struck me most throughout the reading of this article was the continual sense of conflict and discomfort experienced and described by the author. She never seems to feel at peace with herself or the world around her. I found that aspect of it quite disturbing. Like my classmates, I enjoyed the section entitled Hyphe-Nation and thought it interesting that Visweswaran suggests that "the hyphenated ethnic identity in the U.S. however has more often than not marked a move toward the center." I really had always considered those using a hyphenated identity as seeking to somehow differentiate themselves from the center of American life and culture and trying instead to cling to an aspect of their inheritance that would somehow explain or occasionally excuse their actions. Seeing hyphenation as an attempt toward the center, interpreted by me as acculturation, is just the opposite of how I have always previously viewed it.

I also really liked the quote from Hussein used in this piece stating that "what is even more curious about a hyphenated pair of words is that meaning cannot reside in one word or the other, but can only be understood in movement." That is a really succinct way of stating the meaning of this whole piece! Individuals caught between two different cultures, races, ethnicities, or whatever cannot be understood as static forces in either realm. Rather, they are constantly shuffling back and forth consciously and unconsciously between the two. They will never only be part of one world, but always switching or combining membership in both. It cannot be a static relationship.

All things considered, this was not an easy read, but thought provoking and worth the effort both as an example of research and as a commentary on cultural experience.

Chaundhry

This piece was a much easier, but no less moving read for me. Again, I felt uncomfortable throughout and could easily sense the high levels of emotion and conflict involved with each vignette. The observation made by Chaundhry in the first vignette that she was "struck by how American the competitors are in their body language, their accents, and their demeanors" and that "most of us who were actually born and raised in Muslim or Third World countries huddle further into our seats" held a great deal of meaning I thought about how much distance their really can be between individual experiences. The second vignette was compelling and like some of my other classmates, I wondered about whether Chaundhry should really be involved with these people, her research participants, on a level so personal that she is actually drawn into participation in their lives. The last vignette was most interesting for me and I attribute this to its autoethnographical nature. It really seems to give the most insight into what it is really like to be a female Pakistani Muslim researcher completing an education in the U.S. You are able to share Chaundhry's emotions on several different levels. It's almost like watching life take place by peering into a crystal ball. It feels intrusive and laden with guilt in some ways, but powerful too.

Like Sandy, I know little about feminist research. I looked to Marshall & Rossman (1995) for help with understanding and defining what a feminist researcher strives to accomplish. According to Marshall & Rossman, these studies “has the change of social systems as a primary purpose. (p. 4)” The researcher and participant play collaborative roles in creating questions and accumulating data. In recent years, feminist research has gained momentum. Popular topics in feminist research are gender bias, maturity of teenage girls, and confront the lawful dominant order that is established in society.
 * Article Reflections for 11/22 (Anita Wells)**

Chaudhry, L., Nazir. (1997) Researching “my people,” researching myself: fragments of a reflexive tale.

Chaudhry’s article is definitely laden with feminist definition. The author couldn’t have said it better, “the East and West are pulling me in different directions.” The entire article had a focus of one being //caught in the middle//. I like the use of metaphors in writing. In the article, Chaudhry speaks of the West as “the human cycle (birth, like, death). This metaphor immediately brought to mind the act of writing a story; there is a beginning, a middle, and an end. I do not know if this has any significant meaning, but it was significant to me.

As I read this article, I felt the author’s struggle in each of the vignettes. This is very appropriate for a feminist researcher. The vignettes were heavy with a desire for individuality. However, the culture in which the females were born pushed for the opposite and these females felt the oppression during a time of personal growth.

I think the feminist researcher treads a fine line and possibly a dangerous line of becoming too involved in the participants’ life during the research. On one hand, I applaud their effort to produce change. On the other hand, I think they cross boundaries that are personal to the participants. For example, as the author mentioned “I silently chide myself for being open to her about my divorce and my love life.”

In my opinion, the third vignette about hybridization had the greatest degree of ethics. As I write this, I begin to wonder about the ethics in qualitative research. Are ethics less strict in qualitative work, specifically in feminist work? Anyway, this vignette was about self and the struggle within the writer as she was caught again in the middle of her parents, education, and culture; she was caught in the middle of a search for identity.

Visweswaran, K. (1993). Predicaments of the hyphen.

This article talks about the hyphen generation that does not feel fully a part of either culture. This reminds me of my study of communities of practice (CoP). In communities of practice there are those people who are on the peripheral of the community. They do not feel that they belong; they do not have full membership of the community. Therefore, they do not get to enjoy the benefits like those people who have full membership. How does a person on the periphery, a hyphenated person, become a full fledged member? The article appropriately depicts the struggle for this group. The article also mentions the voice of the hyphenated group. Do they have any say in what goes on in the dominant culture? This immediately drew my thoughts to an article by Alecia Jackson (2003) titled Rhizovocality. This author discusses how qualitative feminists provide a voice for those who have their voices oppressed. This article describes “what voice does – how voice functions, what enables it to function in certain ways, and what it produces.” Sometimes “the silent voice of the libratory feminist researcher, as well as her potentially imperialist and racist representations, is incredibly problematic and irresponsible, particularly in emancipatory research on Other women: U.S. women of color, Third World Women, and those beyond the confines of race and ethnicity (pg. 697).” Jackson later states that many “poststructural feminists….work the limits of voice in their qualitative research. (pg. 703).”

I have mixed views on feminists researchers. Most of the time, I am impressed with the feminists’ drive for improvement and motivation for change. However, I think there are extremists (as with anything) that are abrasive in their feminist approach. About the readings for this week, I found the articles to be very informative about culture and the struggle for both improvement and change.

Article reflections for 11/22 - Karen Thurmond - Thanks for making the page Sandy!

Sandy Schaeffer (posted 11-18)** Since I am real novice at feminist perspectives, I am using this reading and writing opportunity to develop and strengthen my knowledge of feminism and the analytical methods associated with it (which is a significant aspect of this assignment). I started out the writing part of this assignment by going back to Creswell (1998) to review the major aspects of feminism as a theoretical framework. I will then organize my comments and reflections around these characteristics of feminism and provide examples from the readings that point to these traits of feminism. According to Creswell (p. 83) research done using the feminist theoretical framework: - Establishes collaborative and non-exploitative relationships - Attempts to place the researcher within the study so as to avoid objectification - Is transformative - Is one in which gender is the basic organizing principle - Has as its aim to correct the invisibility and distortion of female experience in ways that are relevant to ending women’s unequal social positions Methods typically employed include: - Sequential dialogic interviews that are interactive - Group interviews that provide deeper meaning and reciprocal educative encounters - Negotiation of meanings with the participants - Efforts to address issues of false consciousness - Self-reflexivity by the researcher of what they experienced in the effort For example, in both I felt a strong sense of emotional and personal investment by the researchers/authors; these were clearly not the third-person analytical style of a typical research article. This was most evident in the Chaudhry article in which all three vignettes told a story with gender as the anchoring theme and is clearly attempting to provide a public voice to issues that are highly relevant to the participants in these socio-ethnic groups. Another thing that was interesting in both, but more striking in Chaudhry was the relatively minor role that men play. While men were discussed at length in both the role of the men was to creating a context or launching-off point for the feminist issues being analyzed. The men had very little relevance beyond the negative issues they spawned in the lives of the female participants in these stories. Perhaps since this is my first time to carefully analyze a feminist study, I had some difficulty in really discerning what the “data” was in these two papers. Both writings seemed more like personal reflections and less like formal research analysis of collected data. Perhaps that’s it: the real data is the personal experience of the two authors as women. Certainly in the case of Chaudhry, the vignettes describe explicit experiences and activities related to her graduate studies. Some specific quotes from the two articles that I felt spoke directly to the feminist nature of these two papers (as defined by Creswell): Visweswaran (p. 308), “…the middle-class women’s housewife dilemma is far from resolved.” Visweswaran (p. 303), “…my father rarely spoke of India except to punish one of this willful daughters…” Chaudhry (p. 445), “.The main impetus…comes from my desire to reclaim and re-inscribe knowledge about Muslim women as a Pakistani woman researcher. I do not want to attack the beliefs and faith of my fellow Muslims, but that is how my plea for understanding was being perceived.” In both readings, it was clear to me that a strong sense of emotional and personal investment was represented by the authors as they told a story of anguish and frustration – perhaps even a bit of “the unfairness of life” from a woman’s point of view. Having said that, they were both very educational to me in terms of gender and cultural issues in ways that I had not considered before. There is no doubt that I now have a much more concrete understanding of what is unique about feminist methodology and analysis. By being asked to do this very exercise of analysis and reflection, I know my skills have been improved in recognizing (and perhaps contributing to) feminist research in the future.
 * Personal Analysis and Reflections
 * How I approached this writing:**
 * __What stood out to me__** in both readings was the strength to which both of them were true to these stated characteristics of feminism. An additional significant aspect to both was the complicating factor of racial/ethnicity/religion/citizenship issues that were woven into the story told. These were clearly not simple, one-dimensional stories, which in a way makes it more difficult for me to decide which issues are more relevant in the analysis.
 * Things I learned from the data represented:**

Chaudry:
I found the three vignettes effective ways to tell the stories she told -- certainly more engaging than the arcane droning that so often is used to "discuss" issues in the academic world. I was most taken with the first of the three stories.

In the first vignette: The last line of her introductory poem (about first- vs. third-world blood), I think, is true on many levels and defines so well what underlies so much of world politics. It was interesting to sit with the writer in the tension of the meeting she describes and to feel the presence of the different groups that were part of the meeting (as opposed to the clustered identity that is so easy to adopt in considering an experience that seems outside of our own). Within that meeting, there was a common experience that brought the group together, and yet so many sub-groups and so many individual experiences that both added to, and detracted from, that commonality. My awareness of that differentiation, however, caused me to wonder whether the "dominant modes of thought" to which she refers are as one-dimensional as that expression suggests -- or are there the same multitudinous variations among "dominance" as she portrayed in this assembly? But that kind of reasoning, so often, is used to dismiss the experience of those who are "minority" (the word itself is offensive) -- we get so busy defending our own turf/position/etc., that we can't hear what other people are saying. These issues are hard to talk about because they're hard to pin down (it seems for every assertion, there are hundreds of exceptions); perhaps that is one reason we shy away from these conversations and remain so divided. I was impressed with the writer's ability to stay close to her own experience in the way she related the overall narrative.

I didn't like the second vignette as well. I thought the writer did an effective job of communicating her conflict, but the story didn't grab my interest as much as the first vignette. I was struck by how this monumental situation came out of nowhere from the perspective of the writer -- just a phone call from a research participant that precipitated the cascade of personal dynamics that affected the lives of so many people. I liked the contradistinction posed toward the end of the article regarding, "issues of confidentiality, choice, and agency" vs. the sister's question, "What if this had happened to your own sister?" Both personal and professional boundaries can be difficult to maintain in the midst of what life brings us, and I thought the writer effectively communicated this conundrum.

In the third vignette, I felt a little embarrassed about being given this level of exposure to the writer's family. Shouldn't family members be accorded the same protections we are so careful to provide for our research participants? Obviously, such protections for family members would impinge on our abilites to write autoethnographic pieces, but it seems there should be some kinds of protection from this "exposure by association". I did like the writer's statement that, "There is no one right path to empowerment" (p. 449). It seems that truth has been played out repeatedly in world history. The follow-up remark, "What matters is the challenging of power relations" equally is true in my opinion. What is important about this remark, I think, is the increased prevalence of awareness regarding these power relations in today's world -- at least, partially, because of feminism.

Toward the end of the third vignette, the writer states, "I have been conscious of my marginality for a long time now" (p. 449). That word, "marginality", seems to capture so much of what runs throughout this article -- a sense of being different -- even marginal -- that becomes a way of relating to the world at large. There is tremendous pain in that word -- pain that feminism has helped to bring to light in the way it has given a voice to those who so often have gone unheard.

Visweswaran:
I found this reading less easy to get into -- probably because there was less narrative and more overt analysis. Nonetheless, I thought it was an interesting piece of work. What was most striking to me was the broken-ness that seemed to underlie the subject -- ""forced to reflect the world in fragments of broken mirrors ... I must reconcile myself to the inevitability of the missing bits" (p. 304). The thing I liked most was the section heading, "Hyphe-Nation" (p. 302). The writer tells her story in terms of finding an identity as an Indian-American or an American-Indian, but is there anyone in this nation who shouldn't be hyphenated in some way? Several of us probably would need several hyphens if the whole story were told. But we seem to reserve those hyphens for those whose skin tones have higher levels of melanin -- something by which we can differentiate between who are "we" and who are "they". Perhaps we would do better to approach the hyphen more as KB talked about the colon in 8561 -- a mark that tells us there is more to the story.

I thought the writer was effective in portraying the struggle of those who are labeled with the hyphen. It truly does, "take a long time to figure out where you belong" (p. 308). I think that is true for any of us, but perhaps moreso for those described in this article due to all the baggage that little hyphen carries.

Both the Choudry and the Vidweswaran article are good examples of feminist work as I understand it -- studies rooted in the experiences of women. I thought both of these authors were effective in using the experiences of women (including themselves) to speak to dynamics that were important to shaping the realities of these women. Some of these realities reflected the importance of gender roles and power dynamics, but neither writer restricted these women's identities to whom they are in relationship to men. The writers effectively told their stories in such a manner as to let each woman's experience speak for itself.