Thursday, January 22, 2009

about field work

some ideas i have been collecting in conversations with people

- use archival work as collaboration work
- to work with "portenyos" make tours around the city (ask them to show me around the places they use the most)
- videotape places at different times of the day - different days and make focus groups watching the videos
- make field note chronolgically, one file per month, link the interviews to the notes.
- make a semi analytical report per month.
- think about ethnography at home, think what suposedly "non ethnographic" situations tell me about my work too, all conversations will be important.
- Collaboration:
- photos - video
- networks with ca and tacu
- reprint books formosa
- info network with indy and nik

Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Documentaries on the Multicultural City

call for films on some common topics

Documentaries on the Multicultural City
Diversity in Place: Making Documentaries on the Multicultural City April 24th, 2009
http://diversityinplace.wordpress.com/

More than half of the population in the world now lives in cities, and the urban share of the globe will continue to increase dramatically to reach 70 percent by 2050. Migration, both from within and among societies, is a major source of urbanization, with multicultural cities on the rise everywhere.

Call for Documentary Film/Video Entries

In an innovative way toward mutual learning, we invite the submission of video and photo documentaries whose emphasis is on exploring multicultural cities and processes of place-making. Scholars, teachers, students and practitioners alike are searching for alternative methods to conventional data analysis and academic writing to be able to capture ethnic diversity and multicultural interactions in real world settings. The use of documentaries to show the daily practices of multiculturalism in the city can make several key contributions to research, teaching and action.

Videos not in excess of 15 minutes are requested for submission to screenings which will be held at the conference venue at the University of Hawai’i Manoa Campus on April 24th, 2009. Selections of videos to be included in the seminar will be made by a committee of students and faculty who are organizing the event. Artists, video- and filmmakers, researchers, writers and others interested in the relation between people and places and the making of multicultural cities are invited to join the project, participate to the seminar to discuss their ideas and work.

Questions, themes, topics and issues to be addressed in the documentaries can include, but are not limited to:

* How documentaries by recoding the presence of people of different origins over time can reveal ‘invisible’ minority cultures in a way that no other media can.
* The efforts at historic preservation of elements of the city that might otherwise have been overlooked but are of high cultural value to members of a community.
* How multiculturalism can work well in practice and thus contribute to a more positive attitude about and pride in the multicultural city, and thereby assist in fostering mutual accommodation and tolerance.
* In an age of global migration in which significant segments of multicultural cities do not have citizenship or are otherwise marginalized in the city, how documentaries can help identify issues of social justice.
* How multiculturalism inscribes itself into the city by everyday uses of urban space and lead us to a greater appreciation of the many different identities that make up the multicultural Cosmopolis of contemporary times.

By combining the reflections and findings emerging around the objectives of the conference, and understanding the inevitability of increasing diversity in urban places, this conference aims at drawing lessons and recommendations as to what makes the creation of ethnic spaces possible, and further what helps to form and shape livable cities with healthy intercultural relations, namely, cities as multicultural places where migrants’ place-making is understood and acknowledged as an inherent human right to the city.

This conference is sponsored by the Student Equity, Excellence and Diversity Initiative (SEED), University of Hawai’i at Manoa.

Submission Deadline and Guidelines

The purpose of the call is a selection of a maximum of eight documentaries to be screened in a one-day conference on April 24th, 2009 at the University of Hawai’i.

Submission deadline: March 1st, 2009

Guidelines

Videos should be short — no longer than 15.00 minutes. International and Domestic submissions are encouraged.
The formats accepted are: DVD
Please include: Synopsis, Bio, CV and Contact Information. All submissions will be added to the Diversity in Place Video Library for possible inclusion in future projects. If included in other projects, artists will be contacted for permission.

Send submissions to:

Vera Zambonelli, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Saunders Hall, 2424 Maile Way, 96822 Honolulu HI

Travel and lodging aid:
Pending application, the Project will cover part of travel expenses and lodging in a Youth Hostel for participants residing outside of Honolulu. If traveling to Honolulu is not an option, we will arrange videoconferencing through skype.

For more information: diversityinplace@gmail.com
http://diversityinplace.wordpress.com/


--
Merlyna Lim, Ph.D.
School of Justice & Social Inquiry and
Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes
Arizona State University

mailing address:
CSPO, Arizona State University
PO Box 875603
Tempe, AZ 85287-5603
United States