[Last modified: October, 13 2024 11:31 PM]
I was wandering around the campus. I knew that the assignment topic was “observation”, but I couldn’t decide whom to observe. My tentative theme is “Well-being among vulnerable people in the UK”, but who are the vulnerable people?
Then, I talked to two of my master’s course classmates in medical anthropology in a crowd of students. As a “Shy Shy Japanese”, I hesitate to talk to unknown students.
One of my classmates, “J”, came to the UK from the Czech Republic about 15 years ago and is currently working as a tour guide. She has published three books. She always talks calmly, and I feel her confidence with deep knowledge.
The background of the other classmate, “F”, is a bit complicated. I once asked him, “Are you British?” He clammed up and said, “I was born in the UK, but my parents are from Africa”.
After we parted, I met up with another classmate, “S”, who also had no direction for the assignment.
“S” is an international student from China, a nurse and has experience volunteering in rural China.
“Let’s go to SOAS to look for ideas” was “S” ‘s suggestion.
As we walk around, we talk about the education system and language barriers since we came to the UK. As we talked, we discovered our own vulnerability as immigrants, confused in front of the differences in the education system and the language barrier. Do people notice that sometimes only “Westerners” participate in discussions in classrooms? Do people notice that some international students hesitate to join if they feel a limitation in their English skills?
“I’ll try to talk to the Chinese people.”
“S” said in a student space in SOAS. I thought that she was also a “Shy Shy Chinese”.
“What about that person? She looks Chinese.”
“No, she’s talking with her friend. I don’t want to disturb her.”
During the course that started two weeks ago, I noticed that “S” is a very attentive person. Whether this is related to her background as a young female Chinese nurse is hard to determine.
Eventually, “S” approached “J”, a young female Chinese student who was warming up her lunch. Surprisingly, she was also a master’s student in anthropology. “J” ‘s lunch box was a metal two-tier with a cute pastel-coloured character printed on it. I thought it was a popular taste in China and Japan, but metal lunch boxes are not that common in Japan. Japanese often use plastic lunch boxes.
‘”J” said, “Do you want to talk over there if you want?” and pointed to one of the tables. This was the table we avoided to disturb them. She introduced us to her friends, both of whom were also anthropology students.
“Z” was a student from Eastern Europe. She had studied the basics of anthropology, so she was very helpful in teaching “S” and me, who had entered the masters course without having studied them. “Z” was in her fourth year of undergraduate studies, and I asked her, “What are you going to do after graduation?” She replied, “I haven’t decided. I have to do something with the money…”. She seemed to be worried.
Although it is questionable whether this was a successful observation exercise, it was at least a great benefit to have made fellow anthropology students at another university.
(552 words: too long)
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Task: Writing Exercise
Write a short (400 word) ethnographic ‘vignette’ based on your observation exercise.
Tell a story that you encountered in the field, describe the situation, what happened, why is it linked to your research topic etc. You can include audio, visual or other materials. Try and write in such a way as to convey the experience of ‘being there’ to the reader.