Annenberg School of Communication, Greenfield Intercultural Center, and 900AM WURD present
Urban Ethnography: Documenting the City of Brotherly Love COMM320/ANTH320/URBS 321
Mondays, 2 to 5 p.m.
Professor John Jackson
How do qualitative social scientists study urban communities? What kinds of powerful tales can be told about urban lifestyles and social issues/conflicts in places like Philadelphia? This course will allow students to study various ethnographic treatments of urban communities in the United States, using films, articles, TV serials, and books as guides for the framing of their own independent research on the streets of Philadelphia. Students will also form production teams of two or three people, and these production teams will be responsible for (i) identifying and researching an important urban issue in contemporary Philadelphia and (ii) turning that research into a 15-30 minute radio documentary that will be broadcast on a local Philadelphia radio station, WURD 900AM. Mixing radio/audio journalism with ethnographic methods, studies will enhance their skills at archival and social research, participant-observation, interviewing techniques, sound editing, and production. This course is intended to be a rigorous and exciting opportunity for students to tell empirically grounded stories using the voices of their subjects and the sounds of the city. Potential texts include: Sidewalk (a book and documentary film my Mitchell Duneier), Righteous Dopefiend (a book and museum exhibit by Philippe Bourgois), and excerpts from other ethnographic work by Ana Ramos-Zayas, Elijah Anderson, Todd Wolfson, David Grazian, Setha Low, Ulf Hannerz, Leith Mullings, John Gwaltney, Dana-ain Davis, Carol Stack, Melissa Checker, Katherine S. Newman, and others.
Would you like to learn about ethnographic research?
Have you ever wanted to learn to make radio documentaries and have them aired across the city?
Is there a topic or a community in Philadelphia you have always wanted to explore?
Then apply to this class!
Questions? Contact Angbeen Saleem at angbeens@gmail.com
Please fill online application. Application Deadline is Monday, November 7th, 2011 by 5 p.m. Must submit application, participate in a brief 15 min interview and be given permit to register.
To apply, visit: http://www.vpul.upenn.edu/gic/form-Urban_Ethnograp.php
