anthropology - my submitted questions

for the "Pop Culture Watch" page:
I was just thinking about the different ways we perceive time and thought it might be interesting to post a little of my research here. I find it intriguing that time perception can vary across cultures, and that just by seeing this facet of our daily lives differently, we can begin to lead a different life. Especially when time tends to be something that is seen as static and resistant to subjective criteria [Olympic records, fastest this or that in the world...], but when we really think about time - it is malleable. We perceive time and space differently when we are rushed versus when we are bored, sometimes spaces may seem more cramped or too bright when we are in a hurry. I wonder if this phenomena is the same across cultures [maybe it's an adaptive thing, for protection]? Or do some people really have a more consistent view of time [and is this in relation to their lifestyle/ stresses]? I think being in architecture school has given me a unique perspective on time... in a video I found it talks about how annoyed Americans get when their computer starts slow, how we are a people with very little patience, we can't handle waiting. But being in Architecture and being rushed on a daily basis, I've come to cherish the time it takes my computer to boot-up, or the time it takes to make dinner - these are the activities that define my day and make me remember the things outside of school work that I still belong to. So I thought I'd include that interesting video - it touches on some of these topics [and is pretty graphically captivating] and a Wikipedia article about the perception of time Chronemics.

- Christianna 

Phil Zimbardo (speaker in that video above) is perhaps most famous for having conducted the Stanford Prison Experiment; see http://www.prisonexp.org/
The anthropology of time is a huge and fascinating literature, well reviewed by Nancy Munn (one of its most interesting practitioners here: http: www.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/10.1146/annurev.an.21.100192.000521




week 2:

"Globalization does not spread evenly, and its interactions with, and effects 
on, local cultures vary substantially." [p 19 - Ch1 Cultural Anthropology] 

I have a few questions out of curiosity and possibly a misunderstanding of 
what goes on in fieldwork, inspired by the above quote taken from Barbara 
Miller's book. First, are there "rules" or regulations about what types of 
technology can be brought and used in front of the people one is studying? 
Cameras and/or video must be shocking to some remote civilizations?

Another question I have is: what happens when anthropologists who go to a 
place where there is a very little-known language, and how do they learn to 
communicate? 

Also, are there certain communities that are protected from being studied? 
And what happens to anthropologists if they get sick on the job? Are they 
obliged to follow the practices of the community in which they reside? And 
how do anthropologists maintain communication with the outside world while 
visiting a community? 

week 3:

Taken from American Anthropologist by Annette B. Weiner, "Ethnographic 
Determinism: Samoa and the Margaret Mead Controversy":

"Both Malowinski and Mead saw that behavior and values surrounding the most 
fundamental human relationships they studied in the field differed 
dramatically from the morals and values of their own societies." [p. 917]

It is apparent that different cultures have a variety of ways of adapting to 
situations, and that traditions also vary widely across the world. But how 
about emotions? Are there any known societies that do not express, or seem to 
express certain emotions? Or, even stranger, is there or could there be 
additional emotions/ feelings that we do not have access to in our daily 
lives, but that other people have naturally learned to understand? 

week 4:

In "The Muslim Woman" article, there is an idea on page 3, "... when these 
forms of dress had become so conventional that most women gave little thought 
to their meaning".

There is a great quote in the Architecture building that says "Seeing is 
forgetting the name of the thing one sees". I feel that this quote could have 
great potency in the field of anthropology as a whole, but I am curious as to 
whether anyone has studied this concept? Or maybe I'm interested in ideas 
about convention? What makes a group of people forget meaning? And how can 
they lose a meaning, for something that is so present in their lives [for 
instance: clothing, architecture, even words/language today have origins that 
we are now oblivious to]? Are there things that we have forgotten globally? 
Across many or all cultures?
week 5:
Why has the Western world forgone the idea of community healing when its 
affects are recognized by our society as a whole? Often in medical miracle 
documentaries there is a comment about the ill person surviving because 
someone was "there for them". Why haven't we changed our practices from 
healing in private if it is in fact detrimental to the healing process? This 
is especially interesting since we consider ourselves an "advanced" culture - 
even though we are clearly holding ourselves back.
week 6:
Does the gender flip-flop in the Minangkabau make a difference in the way 
these people learn, visualize, construct things, and organize? I have always 
been taught females don't have as keen a three-dimensional visual sense as 
boys, so does this reverberate in different ways in the things the 
Minangkabau produce? Is their aesthetic different - as guided by the females? 

An article I found on my own, delves into the cultural values these people 
have - most of the mythology revolving around the mother - her struggles, 
woes, her importance. I wonder how all of this translates into their material 
culture? Does the eye of a female chance the necessities of a given people? 
Does it change the way they build? Their techniques and spatial 
understanding?

midday wonder

Why is it that whenever there's a ton to be done I chose to do nothing? This is not the typical for me. I usually love budgeting my time, filling it up with so much work, spurts of organizing things, spending time writing and drawing to figure everything out... and suddenly now, I do nothing. Maybe it's that I'm on that cusp of having just some work, but not enough to really threaten my entire schedule. I think it's this workload that induces some diminishing desire to work. I could be driving off to deposit a check I've had for weeks, I could be applying for a couple more jobs I'm interested in... could be doing an Anthropology annotation, writing something of minimal intelligence for Sensory culture, and hmmm... maybe designing something?

I feel so horrible for the person I've been lately. I'm flaky, out of my skin in this job - I would never typically treat people like I do at the firm - I'm just so unhappy there I try and avoid it all. And DBell, too... I don't disrespect him or am trying to avoid him, I just don't have the motivation to do this work like I did last semester... well maybe even then it wasn't a desire it was more of a dire need to do things.

Ah, so what is in store for me this week? I'm sure it's going to pass quickly. And by the weekend I'll have to put together a competition entry - one that is now lacking in form, "zero energy" strategy, and order... hahaha - we'll see where this goes. Then there's going to be work on Friday, and horseback riding tomorrow which will highly depend on how willing I am to sacrifice my muscles in sub-zero temperatures at nine in the morning. What do I really want to accomplish? Tonight I want to find a real card for Eric's parents, and maybe there'll be one I'm satisfied with. I'd like to sketch out a real circulation diagram for studio, or some sort of experiential strategy [does it have to be linear? maybe that's where I'm getting held-up]. Writing should always get done early... I've been slacking lately - and maybe in a couple minutes I can go and find that Minangkabau reading in Folsom - write one of my three annotations due before Spring Break. I have to outline my 3-5 focus areas for the project maybe define some parameters for what needs to stay and what can be sacrificed. Alright, well I think food and some form of ambition should be in my future...

- c

pleats!!!!

Awesome website Marissa gave me:

http://www.pleatfarm.com/

- c

a bad fourth-year

I'm a pretty bad fourth-year. My desk crits are vast, conversational emptiness. My project is now  the shadow of a good idea. My effort in classes is at a minimum... what has DD done to me? Or better yet, what did that firm destroy in me? My hopes are low for many things right now. What am I going to do about grad school? I like fashion design, but I feel so stupid saying that to the other archies... it seems like it would be such an intellectually recessive decision. [ie the imagery of me being the misunderstood genius sewing and reading goethe in the corner of a big clothing design studio] ... it would be quite funny though. I also feel like I would be behind going into that field, not having a textile-related background, but maybe a spatially-oriented background could give me a unique perspective to come in from.

The whole Anthropology idea has sort of gone out the window. This class is absolutely tearing it to shreds for me. All the professor does is read student-submitted questions back to us during class, we watch a movie [every class] and read from a textbook designed for middle-schoolers. He has good intentions and he is a very nice guy, and intelligent, too, I'm sure but the way he runs his class is not making me more interested in the material at all. The book he chose is absolutely horrendous. Although I did become interested in a small blurb in the book from the last reading I took from it. The blurb was about the Minangkabau people of Sumatra. They are the largest matrilineal culture in the world, where land and economic means of a family are controlled by the women and passed on from mother to her daughters. Oh how amazing America could be... It makes me also wonder if this gender disparity makes a big difference in the way these people learn, visualize, construct things, and organize. I have always been taught that females don't have as great a three dimensional visual sense as boys, so does this reverberate in different ways in the things the Minangkabau produce? Is their aesthetic different? Or the things they value? Another article I found on my own, delved into the cultural values these people had - most of their mythology revolving around the mother her struggles, woes, her importance. I wonder how all of this translates into their material culture? Does the mind's eye of a female change the necessities of a given people? Are their priorities and therefore their self-organizational tasks very different from our own? I wonder if anyone has asked these questions before, or if they are superfluous?

Well, anyway at least that was a good read in the text for once.

Ah, I didn't get the chance to write about this yet, but in my previous lesson with Lisa - the new eq team coach - I got to ride Luke! It was so different than before. And kind of depressing to think about how different a person I used to be... before I even just took the break from riding in college. The "sense" I used to have when riding a horse seems gone, replaced by some dumb thoughts about people or my daily life - I hope this isn't adult thinking taking over my brain.... I would really prefer to keep my youth. But Luke seemed different, more angsty, smaller in size, and less bouncy than when I was younger. I came across pictures of me and Butzel, too. I didn't realize that he would be the horse I miss the most, but maybe it's because he sort of became my project as everyone else at the barn slowly stopped riding him. I remembered taking him out to ride in the rain one day and just cantering around the outdoor ring for what seemed like forever. He was always a nervous horse - being blind in one eye - and there was thunder and lightening out in the distance, but he didn't spook. He was so steady and calm that day, it was like he and I just understood this was a good thing to do. We had a mutual understanding and "need" to be out there in some of the most miserable conditions, just to be together and ignore the rain. It must sound so romantic to someone reading this... it really wasn't. I don't think I was even aware of the rain, and maybe he wasn't either. All I was aware of was his calmness, and mine too and the steady, consistent pace we kept out there it was as if we were just thoughts being processed through time. And then there was Bob - Tammy's horse. When Julia and I started moving around to different barns, Bob was my ride... usually she preferred Rudy - she'd been working with him for a long time. So I got to deal with Bob - the silly young guy with a number of tricks up his sleeves. Bob was green and had many things to learn, but that's what I liked best about him, he was a rebel, misunderstood, just like me as a teen. And then there was the day we were out having a lesson - it was some warm summer day at [ACME ?] I think that's the name of the barn we were at then... but I'm not really sure. It had a big barn with a small, sandy ring in the back, nestled under a steep ridge to the right and hills/woods to the back. I was riding Bob, and Julia was there with Rudy, Tammy on the ground giving us a tough groundwork lesson... and then I got Bob to really extend himself. He was usually always fussy, too into his own thoughts to let his legs and muscles fly out ahead of him, but for some reason he was responding to me. He was really doing an extended trot! Probably one of the most taxing and exhausting moves for a horse to do... and he was doing this for me. Well I saw Julia's eyes that day... and boy was she jealous. I'm pretty sure it was after that day she started riding both Bob and Rudy on our barn excursions and I got to cool them off, untack them, and groom them... only. After this I think I went onto the crazy mom and son barn - the one where they wanted me to move to Florida with them and be their points rider to earn them money... and me some pocket-change... basically for me to be a big, jumping jockey... yea that wasn't happening.

Ah, well that was a digression. Thankfully my legs have been getting better each week of riding. The first week I couldn't walk right until a day before my next lesson... that was a pretty sore week. This week I think it was maaybe a day or two of soreness and then I was back to going down the Greene stairs without looking like I was half-murdered.

Some sidenotes:
- dear blank, please blank is a great website
- zero energy design sucks and evokes too much thinking about the stupid "green" movement for it to be legitimate to me
- on that note: I HATE LEED
- also, I do like recycling because it ACTUALLY DOES SOMETHING
- I need my Salt Falts design to be more refined... hmmm
- the Adirondack job was a great let-down, but also maybe an indicator of something better...? [ I can only hope ]

Alright, well that's all for now... I'll probably have something more to say to distract me from this work in another hour or less...

- c

retirement of the old image

Time to change up the header of this blog. We all need a little change, right?

Goodbye, beautiful Hungary Pavilion.

- c

where's my motivation?

It's a three day weekend, and I'm still sitting in my apartment at half past noon. I should be out shopping, traveling, doing SOMETHING, but I have no motivation anymore. During DD I would be so fed-up, so frustrated and overwhelmed that it was easy to come up with a reason, or ways of escaping, but now that there's  not much pressure, or much of anything going on... I find it hard to stay focused. I should be scared out of my mind for the studio midterm on Thursday, but I think this feeling of being ahead in the class is also making me even less motivated to do anything at all. I can just see what will happen though - that being those students who fear they are behind will overcompensate and do a tonn of work, and I'll be working steadily... and slowly to hardly any avail and will probably end up ruining my great idea because of the little amount of work I will have put forth. But this seems to be the case for everyone else in my grade... which is kind of sad and disappointing for each of us to see in each other, and also sad for DBell to have to deal with on a daily basis... I don't think he has much hope for us as a group. I really wish I could just sit down in studio, make and test a few rhino models, maybe make another small physical model... something little that would reveal to me the true nature of my project, but every attempt I make is a huge failure.

Sitting in studio now without the urgency that was all-encompassing in DD, it's hard to find a focus, or any reason to figure something out. DBell is also so laid-back it's hard to find something to work towards. I'd say at this point, too, everyone I know is tired of architecture. For the most part, we are all looking for our out, while reconciling with the fact that we have to get through this for another year before we graduate. I don't know if I'm still concerned with the deep questions in architecture, do I have a need to solve some big architectural issue? My motivation is so low at this point... I don't know if it's just one of those "signs of the times" things, or if it's that I've truly lost interest in this subject. I wouldn't be surprised either way.

So, of course it's back to the topic of grad school... what am I going to do? Even though I've lost a lot of interest in architecture, I still like being in school... work is by far more depressing and frustrating than going to class. But what kind of work do I want to do? I think I realized architecture wasn't for me a long time ago, but sitting in the firm... especially in those "learning seminars" when everyone is arguing about LEED points, and what is meant by them... THAT was when I knew this was not what I want to do with my life. I don't want to sit and discuss issues like those everyday, about a stupid system that is so flawed any seemingly "intelligent" conversation about it - in my opinion - is garbage. Ahh, and GRE's - what should I do about those? If I choose to go back into the design world I will most likely not be required to take the test... but if I do want to  go into the humanities, or something not design-related I should try to get the highest score I possibly can... I mean it's tempting to just not take the test and be "stuck" going into something like fashion [which truly is on my mind as an option, even if it's marketing or management of fashion/ art] - but there's a snag already, if I want to be a museum curator I will definitely need to take the GRE's... it's a competitive field, but also one that values intelligence... hmm... maybe that could be a really viable option. Nothing really prepares us for decisions like these. I feel like when my parents and grandparents were younger it was infinitely more easy to choose a career. My grandparents knew it was off to school or into the factory, and even if they went to school... it was just to enter another factory. My parents grew up with less pressure than we have today, they weren't in a market with no jobs, a future only with the aid of your second-hand, a computer, they had so much more freedom growing up. Looking back I was tossed in too many directions, I was good at everything... making it hard to focus on my strengths.. I don't think I know what my strengths are, or if I have any anymore... maybe I'm just "okay" at everything now. Architecture has turned me into the average American college student, someone without a heart, a soul, or a brain. I think having direction helps someone exude intelligence. Someone who has a goal, a lofty, beautiful goal has something going for them. They aren't lost, swimming in an abyss of unknowing. I wish I still had life dreams like I used to. And maybe I used to have too many dreams, but now I have none... I would give anything just to have one, one great big dream to work towards...

- c

textiles

- c

fashion

- c

music, beer, america

I can't believe we're already approaching the fourth week of the semester! In studio my idea is still only a tiny, cloudy dream deep in my mind... my drawings only shades of what it should evolve to be... in only three weeks. In my other classes its also been a slow start... I've nothing for Anthropology or Titus's class but go to class and listen, I've scraped the surface for Ecology, and done what I'm told in Sensory. Having this little to do, makes me sooo inefficient. It's like I need to be extremely busy to have any genius at all. I feel especially bad for DBell who probably feels like he's wasting his time on a bunch of useless students who do the bare minimum. Half of our studio are people who just got done with DD and REFUSE to do anything and the other half are 3rd years who mostly suck.

At least I feel like I've gotten over my boredom and depression that carried on from winterbreak into the onset of this semester. I don't know where it came from... but my haunch is working for the firm. I'd have days from 8 to 6 and then get home, barely have enough energy to eat, sit in front of the tv unable to move, and then just pass out... only to wake up again at 6.30. I don't think 9 to 5's in offices are any good and I don't understand why this working-model hasn't been challenged or changed... it's completely depressing! Especially in architecture... or at least at this firm... all we do is sit, cad monkeys in front of the computer screen all day. It makes me think of what Titus said, how the computer was meant to make things quicker and easier... architecture included... but look at us. Architects don't spend less time in the office because of the computer, if anything it makes learning this subject more difficult than it could be, and opens us up to a plethora of chances for mistakes and misreading. Who thinks about what they are drawing when they make lines in split seconds on the computer? I know I don't a lot of the time... a lot of the time it's just sitting there thinking about some measurement and some angle that things are moving at, not what those things mean to be unfolding in space, or what they are doing to delineate spaces. Drawing is much more attune to figuring out architecture, I honestly don't know how people can understand their work if they are only working in Rhino, Maya, or other computer programs without first sketching something out. Even through sketching it's hard to see what you are trying to flesh out, but at least when you draw a line you are thinking about many more things at once, you hand can feel as though it is building up walls, creating barriers, and enclosing envelopes of space... you don't get this same sort of knowing-connection with the computer. But I'm not trying to completely put-down the computer, that would just be stupid. It offers a lot in the development and materialization of an idea, just not in the forming and fleshing-out of one.

So what more with this life? I start horseback riding [officially] on Tuesday morning, I'm nervous but at the same time I can't wait. I hope Lisa is a good instructor and I also hope I don't completely embarrass myself... it has been over two years after-all.

All I want to do right now is travel. I really wish I went away on the India trip... that I was out exploring new places and new people. It gets pretty boring here, taking the same paths into and out of campus as I have for so many years... repeating the same acts of boredom and repetition in going to classes. It would have been a much smarter idea to have gone to India. Too bad thesis has to be done here, I don't want to continue living in Troy/ Albany I'm yearning to get out somewhere else, start off new and fresh and break out of all my habits. I just hope a job or after graduation something will get me out of this routine.

- c

the black plague

Sooo what comes with a new studio? New reservations! hahaa As if today couldn't have been worse... being on my deathbed and sleeping through Anthropology, and then my crit with DBell... prooobably one of the worst experiences of my life. For some reason I can feel comfortable and excited talking about my work with my friends and classmates, but when it comes to talking to the professors I turn into the most annoying, introverted, not talkative, unexciting person. DBell was YAWNING... yes, yawning during my talk... and okay I was really trying hard not to cough on him, but I don't think he was very interested to start with. I heard him saying processes other people were trying were going to be interesting... but he didn't say that for me. He did say not to throw out my idea... but he also didn't make it sound like it was one of the better concepts he'd seen. I know I need to work on my explanations and "selling" my ideas, but I also wish I could be recognized for having good ideas, or at least quality ideas. I know my main drive in architectural design is the "experience"... I think Blindfield goes to show for this idea in my work... I'm all about giving people a rich and unique place in to wander around in the world. I'm not opposed to phenomenological work, to ideas concentrating on metaphysical experiences, things outside the realm of numbers, parametrics, abstract order... I am interested in fields, heights, the wind, sounds of rustling, the feeling of sand, of concrete, or wood, I'm interested in Brion Cemetery, Castel Vecchio, Enric Miralles, Peter Zumthor... all of these designers who put us in the moment, who shape materials and conditions that help us to remember very instantaneous feelings even years after having been inside of their dreams. I want to create places that will make people come from miles to see, to experience, places that will be written about, the scenes of love stories, dramas, adventures... a place for large groups, and the most desolate loner.

And then I think about what I want to do in my future... these are my dreams for the spaces I am creating in my undergrad curriculum... but I can't stop thinking about philosophy class from last spring. I want to go back to thinking like that... to learning about those things, thinking deeply about.... everything. I really wonder if philosophy could be the "thing" for me... I know whatever it is should let me be creative, and probably also require me to write... I love writing. I think maybe what I need to take away from these last few years in undergraduate school is how to carry on an interesting conversation... with anyone, especially these professors. I need to learn to bring up good conversation, interesting topics... maybe I need to research more into the things I am truly interested in... or just learn to articulate my true intentions a lot better. Maybe just as I have to write a question for Anthropology every week... I can try to bring in a question or two for every studio class. And what would some of those be now? Well one of my first questions is why DBell wants my tower to be a viewing deck on stilts? I don't know why I didn't question that in our discussion because that's not what I had in mind for the site at all. I really want to ask if my idea is tackling "big" enough questions... as he's brought up multiple times in our group discussions... But I guess at this point in general I just need to dive into this idea. I have to quickly make some 3d models... get something into the computer and start looking at what it's doing.... how the spaces are acting and interacting. This should be another project that I can make a walkthrough video for... one like I made for Blindfield... not that this makes my project 'awesome' by any means... but just interesting that the ideas that come from me... the ideas that I truly understand I can already visualize as being there and walking through.

Alsooo, today is Eric's 22nd birthday! I can't believe this will be our last time celebrating his birthday in college. It seems to foreign and strange that after this semester tonnss of the people we know will be gone. What is RPI going to feel like? It's already a lonely, odd place to be trapped in... but what is it going to feel like with hardly a familiar face? Even people I don't know I recognize. I'm really scared for Eric, too... what's it going to be like for him without Karl and Dre? His weekends are filled with fun times spent with Karl, and he and Dre are like brothers at school. I think I'm a lot more nervous for his happiness next fall than my own... I'll be depressed and scared enough being in thesis, but he'll be doing all of his work somewhat alone and all the way out on 16th Street.

- c

cabin fever

Still bored... it's unbelievable how down I am. Is it being stuck inside all day? Sitting on the same couch? Looking at the same computer? Am I depressed about not having enough work? Belonging to the same routine? I don't understand what's the matter with me. I keep getting headaches every evening, and accomplishing barely anything. I'm nervous and embarrassed about what I've produced to show for tomorrow, I'm somehow feeling guilty for getting into the architecture elective that I want, and I'm debating whether or not to join the equestrian team again. I know I want to get out of these routines, but somehow I hold myself back. I'm also getting more anxious about not having a finished portfolio to show, and what I do have... not being anything too impressive. And what are some positives? I am confident in my resume - it's pretty nice, I'm in a good studio with a great professor, I'm signed up for classes I wanted to take... soooo why am I so unhappy? 

I really hope something turns around... and for the better. I also hope I don't completely embarrass myself in front of everyone in studio tomorrow. 

- c