The purpose of the ethnographic narrative project was to understand ourselves and our students in a more in-depth manner. The ethnographic narrative project has allowed me to explore myself, my students, my classroom, the community I teach in, and the link each of these has to social justice. In order to best serve our students as educators, we must comprehend all of the funds of knowledge our students possess and utilize these facets to aid their learning. I have found that understanding my students cultural, social, academic assets is critical to fulfilling their needs both as students and individuals. I have also explored my own strengths and areas of growth as an educator and solidified my teaching identity. As educators we must not only teach our students academic skills teach social and emotional assets as well.

The Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGAs), established to combat the rise of chronic disease in America, serve as the primary source of current nutrition science in the U.S. These guidelines dictate nutrition policy, programming, and medical efforts nationwide. Rates of diet-related chronic disease, however, continue to increase, despite the efforts of the DGAs and subsequent programming. This is particularly prevalent in low income communities and communities of color. In examining the DGAs, we found a lack of relevant discussion regarding the impacts of cultural differences on nutritional health. Efforts to integrate culture were limited to static cultural competency discourse. Thus, we propose an alternative model to understanding cultural experiences within nutrition. An in-depth literature review revealed the importance of three elements as a part of the cultural ethnographic model: structural barriers and inequities, cultural consonance, and cultural healing methods. In an effort to apply this framework to a sample population, we looked at experiences of South Asian populations in and around the United States to create a survey format that incorporates ethnographic considerations into guidelines on nutrition.

Among various fan sites dedicated to pop stars, GagaDaily is one prominent online collective that centers around Lady Gaga. This study is a piece of ethnographic research focused on two claims – GagaDaily constitutes a Community of Practice (Eckert, 2006) in an online setting, and the regular use of humor by users fulfills social and pragmatic roles in the discourse. Communicative phenomena (both textual and graphic) that characterize the linguistic repertoire of GagaDaily members were catalogued from the first 100 pages of one thread within the forums. These data were grouped into categories corresponding to different dimensions of language use as well as media/literary devices. Alongside a quantitative analysis of various tokens and types of data, a qualitative examination of selected excerpts from the sample confirm the veracity of the two main claims. When analyzed with regard to Wenger’s definition of a Community of Practice (Wenger, 2009), GagaDaily meets all three of his requirements. Likewise, the analysis of humor reveal that GagaDaily users regularly engage in the first dichotomy of the tactics of intersubjectivity, adequation and distinction (Bucholtz & Hall, 2004) and incorporate GIF images in their humor to express their alignment with stance objects (DuBois, 2007) and other members.

This study documents the attitudes and perspectives toward Japanese language education of seven “newly-arrived” Japanese immigrants, jp. Shin-issei, who are raising bilingual or multilingual children in New Orleans, Louisiana. The participants of this study consisted of six mothers and one father who speak Japanese to their children at home and act as teachers of this language at the Japanese Weekend School of New Orleans, jp. Nyū Orinzu Nihongo Hoshūkō, a supplementary language school. Grounded in ethnographic fieldwork and interviews, this thesis has two interrelated objectives: One is to analyze parents’ attitudes toward Japanese language maintenance and show that although the home remains the crucial site for language education, the Japanese School of New Orleans represents a relevant site for the maintenance of the Japanese language and the indoctrination of Japanese cultural values. The second is to explore how these parents connect the process of teaching at and attending the school to a sentiment of diasporic nationalism. This study calls for a renewed ethnographic focus on often ignored —or known by few— immigrant communities in Louisiana by recognizing the presence of Japanese immigrants in this area, their constant efforts to maintain ties and connections to their home country, and their motivations to do so.

Thesis (M.A. (Translation Studies)) --University of Limpopo, 2013 / The research reported in this mini-dissertation is an ethnographic case study which sought to investigate the development of biliteracy in one of the rural primary schools in the Limpopo province. Its focus is on how Grade 3 learners engage with texts and the strategies that teachers use to promote biliteracy (in English and Sepedi). Data collection methods included classroom observation, semi-structured teacher interviews and analysis of teaching and learning materials and the print environment. A brief analysis of the school’s language policy was also completed. The research revealed that the learners are hardly being taught to read and write whether in Sepedi, (their home language) or in English. While the school language policy states that English should be introduced in Grade 2, it is actually taught only in Grade 3. Additionally, as the learners do not understand English, the teachers frequently code-switch into Sepedi and therefore the learners hardly get any exposure to English. Many other negative aspects were uncovered. Out of the 28 lessons scheduled to be observed only 20 lessons actually took place. The learners are therefore not actually spending the allocated time on literacy development. The teaching is highly routinised with teachers, by and large, using an approach that emphasises repetition and rote-learning. The learners hardly ever get a chance to engage with texts independently. Even the textbooks available are not used but are stored away in the cupboards. Teachers painstakingly copy material from the textbooks on to the chalkboard and learners then copy this into their exercise books. The classroom environment is uninspiring, as there are hardly any learning materials on display. The interviews showed that the teachers had not been adequately trained to teach literacy and were in fact unaware of more effective ways of getting learners to engage with texts. They saw themselves as victims of frequent policy and curricular changes and blamed Government for poor training and lack of resources. The study in fact confirms findings of earlier research that the acquisition of literacy is simply not taking place in the poor, rural schools of South Africa and there is indeed a crisis in education in these schools

Among Filipinos of lower SES 1/500 babies are born yearly with an orofacial cleft. This is one of the highest birth prevalence of orofacial clefting in the world. The main purpose of this study was to obtain contextual information prior to planning for community based health interventions in the Philippines regarding orofacial clefting. A descriptive ethnography was used to describe working class Filipinos' (including healthcare workers') current beliefs about the causes, prevention, and treatment of orofacial clefting, and vitamin taking practices during pregnancy. Modifications of Kleinman's explanatory models were made to include questions about people's general and personal beliefs about cause and prevention of cleft. Innovative methods were developed and used in field research and included an oral back translation method and double translation process. Filipinos reported the following explanations for cause of cleft inheritance, falls, cravings, environmental exposures, and God's will. Beliefs about prevention of cleft included limiting their number of children, being careful not to fall, and avoiding environmental exposures. Filipinos seek surgical repair as treatment for their cleft. Iron was the supplement women reported taking most often during pregnancy. Female participants reported that feeling better, cost of multivitamin, side effects, and bad smell and taste were reasons why they quit taking micronutrients before they had completed the recommended course. This study is the first to construct a Filipino explanatory model specifically for clefting. In constructing Filipino's explanatory model for clefting we found that people's general causal explanations for cleft were not always congruent with personal causal explanations, and people's causal explanations for cleft were not always congruent with their prevention explanations. Modifying Kleinman's explanatory models to include questions about general and personal explanations for cause of illness and questions about prevention should be used to educe a more complete explanatory model. Results from this research can be used to inform the design of health campaigns and/or possible vitamin trials. These campaigns could include but are not limited to developing information brochures and programs about the cause and prevention of clefting, or developing public health campaigns to promote the use of prenatal vitamins in women of childbearing age.

Much of the scholarly work on professional wrestling is based on the assumption that beyond a simple mimicking of sporting combat, the wrestling show is a spectacle that constructs and interrelates socially situated, morally significant categories. In this thesis, I focus on wrestlers themselves, and treat wrestling as a traditional practice that guides how wrestlers relate to their bodies and how they interact with their audience. This project was carried out using ethnographic methods of observation and interviewing. While participant-observation of three independent wrestling promotions provided context, twelve semi-structured interviews carried out with wrestlers at the Florida Wrestleplex in St. Petersburg yielded a model of what wrestlers experience inside the ring. The model emphasizes shifts of consciousness, performer-crowd intersubjectivity, and anomalous experiences of resistance to pain. Respondents describe an in-ring shift in consciousness, alternately referring to it as an altered state, high, or trance. After interpreting these results with reference to anthropological discussions of ritual, embodiment and practice, I argue that hardcore wrestling and the phenomenon of backyard wrestling are best understood as bodily practices that elicit altered states of consciousness for participants. By understanding what it feels like to wrestle, and what the experience of wrestling means to wrestlers, we can re-interrogate the coded messages of wrestling with regard to the practice by which they are produced. This project is intended to contribute to greater anthropological understanding of altered states of consciousness such as channeling or possession trance, as well as broader issues such as how cultural life is variably mediated by the body and by transcendent social narratives. It is my hope that by describing how they relate to their craft, this paper will humanize wrestlers, and place firmly in context some of the aspects of the genre that lead critics to suggest that wrestling contributes to social problems of violence, misogyny, homophobia, or jingoism.

Little is known about the perceived changes in identity and sense of self in individuals with aphasia. Seminal research using qualitative methods and personal narratives has been conducted in England regarding the experience of living with aphasia (see for instance Parr, Byng, Gilpin & Ireland, 1999; Parr, Duchan & Pound, 2003; Byng, Pound & Hewitt, 2004), but the use of such methodologies is still emergent in the United States. In addition, despite the great achievements of the disabilities movement in countries such as the U.S. and the U.K., individuals with aphasia have remained largely at the margins due to the very nature of their impairment (Pound & Hewitt, 2004). How can one reflect upon and adjust to the changes brought about by a disability when one is devoid of words? According to Brumfitt (1993), individuals with aphasia, especially during the acute stages of recovery, have the tendency to idealize their "prior self." However are these identities transformed in relation to the acquired disability as individuals enter the chronic stages? If so, are these changes perceived in the same manner by survivors and caregivers? The purpose of the present study was to investigate these perceptual changes in identity using a qualitative ethnographic methodology. Seven individuals with aphasia and five caregivers participated in in-depth ethnographic interviews addressing perceived changes in sense of self after the onset of aphasia. Interview analysis resulted in ethnographic narratives in which participants and caregivers reflected on their perceptions of change and adaptation to disability. Common themes included the discovery of new identities, the gradual compromise between rehabilitation and adaptation, divergent perceptions of change, and the role of support groups during the rehabilitation process. The study was concluded with reflections from the investigator and the participants on how the results from this research could be used in our clinical practice.

This thesis is an analysis of the pros and cons of doing ethnographic and oral history research with elders. The subjects are women born before 1933 and residing in Sulphur Springs, Florida for most of their adolescence and adult lives. They were selected from attendees of the semiannual reunion of students who attended the Sulphur Springs School during the years it served both elementary and junior high. This method of research, with an elder population presents specific challenges and rewards. The pros and cons of such research are discussed within the context of doing ethnography of Sulphur Springs from the perspective of a select group of women. Interviews were conducted with eight (8) women in their homes, yielding approximately fourteen (14) hours of recordings. A list of questions was developed to prompt memories during the interviews. A small tabletop recorder was used to record unstructured interviews regarding their years in Sulphur Springs, with emphasis on the years they consider most memorable. A social network analysis of attendees of the recent reunions was conducted with the responses to a mailed questionnaire. The study revealed the importance of understanding the culture of a generation through the lens of history and place. Special considerations need to be made in preparation of survey instruments and interview questions for any physical limitations and/or security concerns. Researchers also need to be flexible in the application of their pre-determined research designs in order to assure maximum quality and quantity of resulting data.

Hospices use interdisciplinary teams to aid patients and families as they cope with the imminence of death while helping them achieve a death free of physical and spiritual pain, also known as a good death. This study investigated the communication between hospice team members and their patients regarding spirituality, dying, death and a good death. Through 300 hours of participant observation and interviews with hospice staff at one large not-for-profit hospice in the Southeastern United States this project shows that team members understand patient's spirituality through a religious frame potentially compromising spiritual care. Talk between patients and their care team rarely focuses on what constitutes a good death and team members eventually come to narrate all hospice deaths as good.