|
Multimedia Interdisciplinary Research in Anthropology
collaborative and comparative study of tourism
destinations and cultures
Selections from Student Evaluations, OSEA
Summer Field School 2005 - The MIRA Project
Personal
and Intercultural Experience
Overall
Program Structure
Facilities
and Lodging
Educational Experience
- Evaluate the seminars, professor's lecturing and seminar style,
ability to communicate concepts and lessons, preparation and organization
for seminars and classroom activities.
- Evaluate the interactive/on site learning experiences with the
professor and tour guides in Mérida, Playa del Carmen, Pisté,
and archaeological ruins.
- Assess the relevance and value of the readings-what was especially
useful? What could/should be added or cut?-and the scheduling of time
to accomplish the reading assignments.
- Where the field work and research assignments clearly communicated?
What was the quality of feedback, support, encouragement, and other
forms of help that you received in the conduct of your project?
- How would you rate the overall educational experience? Please comment
on the value and merits of the learning experience that you gained.
Participant #1.
1. Evaluate the seminars, professor's lecturing
and seminar style, ability to communicate concepts and lessons, preparation
and organization for seminars and classroom activities.
I highly enjoyed the seminars, they were incredibly thought provoking
and Quetzil constantly challenged us to consider new angles of every
issue we discussed. He was highly knowledgeable of the readings and
incorporated them into our discussions so that we might understand
them better and on a deeper level. I liked how we would discuss the
readings in light of our own research and always ground them in what
we were doing, making sure they were relevant. Quetzil's lectures
were interesting and it was nice to feel able to contribute when we
had something to say. He is a good communicator, always seemed prepared
to discuss the topics we had planned to cover that day, and kept us
engaged. I enjoyed starting out the seminars by talking about how
our research was going, what we had been up to in the field; it was
a great way to segway into the readings or seminar material.
2. Evaluate the interactive/on site learning
experiences with the professor and tour guides in Mérida, Playa
del Carmen, Pisté, and archaeological ruins.
When we arrived in a new destination, Quetzil would always show us
around, of course with an "ethnographic" focus. This was
incredibly helpful for familiarizing ourselves with the area and getting
tips on places to do our research or things to be aware of. He was
always flexible to address our interests, and let us guide the tours
with our questions or affinities for particular areas. It was always
great fun to "tour" around with the group.
3. Assess the relevance and value of the
readings-what was especially useful? What could/should be added or
cut?-and the scheduling of time to accomplish the reading assignments.
I loved the readings, they were always relevant to our study and covered
a wide range of subjects related to tourism studies and specific studies
of the sites where we were conducting our research as well as general
ethnographic strategies. The level of reading difficulty ranged, which
was nice. It was interesting to challenge ourselves with something
like Deleuze and Guattari that was quite abstract but with discussion,
able to be understood on a useful level. The amount of reading assigned
was difficult to fulfill with the given time, considering we would
always have so many other things to be working on. The first few weeks
felt quite frazzled with all the reading on top of field notes, field
work, etc. But I think all the reading we did was valuable…I
couldn't say what to cut out because I liked it all. I had less interest
personally in Pink book on visual ethnography, but I think some students
benefited greatly from being able to read it.
4. Where the field work and research assignments
clearly communicated? What was the quality of feedback, support, encouragement,
and other forms of help that you received in the conduct of your project?
Quetzil always answered all of our questions about doing field work
and the assignments. He was thorough in giving instructions, and when
things were unclear, the process of learning them ourselves was valuable.
If I had needed anything at any time during the time I was working
on my project, Quetzil would have been ready to help me in any way.
5. How would you rate the overall educational
experience? Please comment on the value and merits of the learning
experience that you gained.
The overall educational experience was invaluable in my opinion. I
learned a ton and was exposed to lots of ideas that I had never considered
in my anthropology studies at my university. Tourism studies is a
field worthy of further exploration and this program sparked my interest
to the point where I would love to return to do more field work and
also continue writing my paper to include the 2 sites we studied besides
Mérida. It was a great learning experience all around.
Participant #2.
1. Evaluate the seminars, professor's lecturing
and seminar style, ability to communicate concepts and lessons, preparation
and organization for seminars and classroom activities.
I thought Quetzil was very well prepared. I found the seminars intellectually
stimulating. I liked the way he pushed us to ask questions and also
come up with our own interpretations. I liked the free flow discussions
would take, anything someone had to contribute was always welcomed.
I really enjoyed our time in Piste when we got to watch and discuss
some of the documentaries. That was a nice way to keep the discussions
fresh as well as present an opportunity for us to tie in the readings
in a new media.
2. Evaluate the interactive/on site learning
experiences with the professor and tour guides in Mérida, Playa
del Carmen, Pisté, and archaeological ruins.
Our first day visiting Chichen was so much fun. Though we got rained
upon, it was a lot of fun to walk along the ruins and learn some tid-bits
of information about them on the way. Also, I felt really privileged
to be able to visit 6 or 7 times in a week. I don't think I would
have learned so much about the zone itself had I not been lucky enough
to go so many times. Victor was also really nice about giving us the
tour of Ek-Balam. I feel as though the only place we didn't have so
much structured interactive learning experience with the professor
was at Merida. However, this was understandable given the variety
of everyone's individual research project.
3. Assess the relevance and value of the
readings-what was especially useful? What could/should be added or
cut?-and the scheduling of time to accomplish the reading assignments.
The readings were a great way to introduce us to some of the key topics
of the Anthropology of Tourism. I was unfamiliar with many of those
topics until doing the readings. I think we did a good job of covering
all of them. We even tried to get through the more difficult ones
(Deluze and Guattari), maybe without so much progress, but I still
think it was worth reading. Even though we had a lot to read, I think
the professor was reasonable and understanding in the instances where
we weren't able to finish entire readings due to time constraints.
I also found the workshop packet very useful and helpful, especially
the section with the glossary of terms.
4. Where the field work and research assignments
clearly communicated? What was the quality of feedback, support, encouragement,
and other forms of help that you received in the conduct of your project?
I think that the assignment was clearly communicated. Had we only
been able to have the 6-page explanation we got the last week at the
beginning of the program, or even earlier, I think we would have had
a better idea of all the work we would have had to do and been able
to budget our time a little better. I liked doing the presentations
as a way of getting feedback from both the group and the professor.
It proved to be a useful exercise.
5. How would you rate the overall educational
experience? Please comment on the value and merits of the learning
experience that you gained.
I felt it was a great experience. I fully enjoyed doing my own research
project, conducting my own interviews, and gathering all information
first-hand. It made my whole project feel like it was my own. I also
thought the field school was a great way to see what it was like to
be an anthropologist; the time it takes to really get to know a place
and people. It was also an eye-opening experience to be in Mexico.
I feel like I got to know the country in a new way. This gave me a
better appreciation of my own home, in the US.
Participant #3.
1. Evaluate the seminars, professor's lecturing
and seminar style, ability to communicate concepts and lessons, preparation
and organization for seminars and classroom activities.
I found the lectures intellectually challenging, engaging, and stimulating
and the seminars were very helpful and encouraging in terms of addressing
fieldwork problems, questions, and frustrations. Some of the lectures
seemed to get "off track," as they inevitably do. If the
tangents were relevant to the themes we were discussing they were
allowed to go, and if not, Quetzil did a good job of steering us back
on course, or integrating them into the discussion.
2. Evaluate the interactive/on site learning
experiences with the professor and tour guides in Mérida, Playa
del Carmen, Pisté, and archaeological ruins.
Going out with Quetzil the first couple of nights in Merida was very
helpful in terms of exploring the tourist space there and stoking
our imaginations as to ideas for doing visual ethnography of tourism-
what are some things to think about, problems, challenges, the role/place
of the tourist-ethnographer. The "walking tour" in Playa
was helpful in very similar ways, especially in terms of spatial and
geographic orientation, recognizing Playa´s different tourist
"zones" and exploring ideas for doing visual ethnography.
Touring Chichen Itza with Quetzil was a helpful orientation, and interesting
touristic experience. He seemed less the professor and more the tourist
in Chichen. Going to Ek Balam with Victor was also a very helpful
touristic-ethnographic experience in terms of thinking about the problem
of the tourist-ethnographer, as well as providing a comparison to
the experience at Chichen.
3. Assess the relevance and value of the
readings-what was especially useful? What could/should be added or
cut?-and the scheduling of time to accomplish the reading assignments.
The readings were for the most part very relevant and germane to the
lectures, seminars, and practice of doing fieldwork. Quetzil´s
"cheat sheets" (i.e. tourism handbook) that accompanied
some of the more difficult readings and complicated concepts were
very useful. I was surprised/concerned that no readings of local (i.e.
Yucatec and/or Mexican intellectuals) were included in the reading
assignments. It would also have been helpful to have some contextual
readings assigned to discuss during the program perhaps as brief social
and historical orientations.
4. Where the field work and research assignments
clearly communicated? What was the quality of feedback, support, encouragement,
and other forms of help that you received in the conduct of your project?
Fieldwork and research assignments it seemed were given somewhat on
a whim. This was fine at the beginning of the program because they
were given as experiments meant to help us address certain problems
and questions we had brought up in seminar. I found some early writing
assignments very helpful in terms of initial brainstorming for the
final essay. We were not given hardcopy instructions for the final
project until about a week before it was due. This made it difficult
to gauge how much time was needed to complete the various sections
of the portfolio. In the future the earlier hardcopy instructions
are given as to the exact requirements of the final project the better.
However, it was more than clear that if we wanted or needed support
that it was there for us to take advantage of.
5. How would you rate the overall educational
experience? Please comment on the value and merits of the learning
experience that you gained.
Overall, the MIRA program was an excellent intellectual and emotional
educational experience. I was challenged in very dynamic ways. I was
forced to rethink and reconsider so much of my "taken for granted
self." I was exposed to new and critical ideas that enriched
and made more complex my way of learning and experiencing life. I
am better equipped intellectually after participating in the MIRA
program. I have more questions than ever.
Participant #4.
1. Evaluate the seminars, professor's lecturing
and seminar style, ability to communicate concepts and lessons, preparation
and organization for seminars and classroom activities.
I really enjoyed the seminars and they were one of my favorite things
about the program. I think that the professor is an interesting speaker
and I enjoyed the lecture sections of the seminar. I especially think
that he did a good job of explaining theory.
The only thing that I might change would be to keep the class more
on the subject, with less digression in the conversation, but that
is more of a personal preference of mine.
2. Evaluate the interactive/on site learning
experiences with the professor and tour guides in Mérida, Playa
del Carmen, Pisté, and archaeological ruins.
I think it might have been helpful to have had a little more hands
on help with the fieldwork, though that might be logistically difficult.
One idea that could work would be to do some sort of short group project
or guided fieldwork at the start of the program, like for example
everyone look at this question for today and go try and interview
the vendors about it. I just think that this might be helpful to get
students more comfortable with the process and allow for certain issues
to come up right away, i.e. potential problems or difficulties, and
to be shown how they can be dealt with at that moment, instead of
in later discussion. Overall, it just would have been helpful for
me to have a little bit more of a visual or mental model of doing
fieldwork to build upon or work with, although I do understand that
it is a rather amorphous term and activity and that there is no one
'correct' way.
3. Assess the relevance and value of the
readings-what was especially useful? What could/should be added or
cut?-and the scheduling of time to accomplish the reading assignments.
The readings were relevant and interesting. They were also good in
the sense that some were from writers or dealt with issues that would
come up in other Anthropology classes or field settings. Deluze and
Gutari was difficult but eventually it made some sense and was important
for the double articulation concept. I also liked the readings that
focused on practical aspects of fieldwork and the use of photography.
I did feel that sometimes there wasn't enough time to finish the readings,
just with everything else there was to do.
4. Where the field work and research assignments
clearly communicated? What was the quality of feedback, support, encouragement,
and other forms of help that you received in the conduct of your project?
I feel that the support and attention to the projects was a good area.
I thought there was a good amount of time discussing personal field
work at the seminars and that these discussions were very helpful.
The professor also seemed interested in everyone's field work and
willing to discuss issues and provide suggestions.
5. How would you rate the overall educational
experience? Please comment on the value and merits of the learning
experience that you gained.
I feel that it was a valuable learning experience. I think that what
I learned about theory/philosophy and more practical field work experience
will be very useful in the future.
Participant #5.
1. Evaluate the seminars, professor's lecturing
and seminar style, ability to communicate concepts and lessons, preparation
and organization for seminars and classroom activities.
The seminars were casual affairs in which we discussed the readings.
Quetzil was very open to questions, and we all felt comfortable speaking
up in class. Key concepts were emphasized well, and I personally have
not taken much philosophy so some of the theory taught was useful
as well.
2. Evaluate the interactive/on site learning
experiences with the professor and tour guides in Mérida, Playa
del Carmen, Pisté, and archaeological ruins.
The actual field work was a little more free form. When on-site,
we were kind of left to ourselves to learn how to collect data in
an organized form. We did talk about it a little but for those of
us with no prior experience, it was a sort of a floundering feeling.
3. Assess the relevance and value of the
readings-what was especially useful? What could/should be added or
cut?-and the scheduling of time to accomplish the reading assignments.
The readings, for the most part, were interesting and relevant. The
scheduling of the reading assignments was fine.
4. Where the field work and research assignments clearly communicated?
What was the quality of feedback, support, encouragement, and other
forms of help that you received in the conduct of your project?
I think that if the instructions sheet given to us a week before
the end of the program would have helped us organize our fieldwork
and our projects a little more clearly if given to us a lot earlier
in the program. It was kind of a scramble at the end. As a result,
the projects were hard to organize.
5. How would you rate the overall educational
experience? Please comment on the value and merits of the learning
experience that you gained.
Overall, I learned a lot about the philosophies behind anthropology,
and some organizational behaviors of field work (even through my own
personal perception of failure at it.) I would rate it very highly,
and thought it was a very educational experience.
Participant #6.
1. Evaluate the seminars, professor's lecturing
and seminar style, ability to communicate concepts and lessons, preparation
and organization for seminars and classroom activities.
I actually learned a lot from the seminars, I would have liked more
discussion and less lecturing but they were fine. The only problem
was the lack of time the night before to read ALL of the material
before seminar. I liked that we got to eat between "class"
that made the long hot day more easy to deal with.
2. Evaluate the interactive/on site learning
experiences with the professor and tour guides in Mérida, Playa
del Carmen, Pisté, and archaeological ruins.
All the tours and other types of learning experiences were also great
I think I learned more about places and people than I expected to
learn from those outings.
3. Assess the relevance and value of the
readings-what was especially useful? What could/should be added or
cut?-and the scheduling of time to accomplish the reading assignments.
Again, the time given to read ALL of the material was not enough,
especially because we were expected to do fieldwork as well. But the
readings in and of themselves were very helpful I enjoyed them a lot
and have actually started using some of them for my anthro classes
at school.
4. Where the field work and research assignments
clearly communicated? What was the quality of feedback, support, encouragement,
and other forms of help that you received in the conduct of your project?
I think the final project can be a lot less structured and still produce
similar results, I think if the students were allowed more creative
outlet it would be a more enjoyable assignment.
5. How would you rate the overall educational
experience? Please comment on the value and merits of the learning
experience that you gained.
The educational experience I would rate highly. My fieldnotes got
a lot better from this trip, my ability to go into unknown situations
with more ease and flexibility also improved, overall I think the
use of field methodology improved.
Back
to index for MIRA2005 Student Projects
Back
to index for student evaluations of the OSEA Summer Field School
Personal
and Intercultural Experience
Overall
Program Structure
Facilities
and Lodging
|
