Thursday, January 22, 2009

Youtube Reflection

I saw that in this video the creator is trying to send us a message of how dynamic the web has made our world of information. How that at first we were the things that connected each other but the "machine", the internet, is quickly taking the place of face to face interaction and physical research. The video is basically showing us how the evolution of the internet has changed our world, and the way we collect and organize information. The presentation of this video was very well done, I liked how the creator made it seems like I was watching the evolution happen right in front of me, the pace of the video kept me focused on what was being said.

Monday, January 19, 2009

Chatper 1 Response

Chapter 1 Response

I found this Chapter very helpful with understanding and learning how to start becoming an ethnographer. I especially liked the "Body Ritual among the Nacirema" by Horace Miner, and how he took the American way of life and made it sound so strange. What we thought was so familiar if said differently can be seen as 3rd world to us, "making the familiar strange, and the strange familiar. When I discovered that "Nacirema" is American backwards, I felt that my own beliefs and out looks on others ways of life needs to be more open minded. I also enjoyed towards the end of the chapter how it gave us the writing strategies and example collecting methods of some of the writers, I think this will be very useful later on when we actually start to do observations of our own, because that seems to be one of my biggest problems, getting started writing.