Methods and application

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The interview was executed at Rosenhof Market in Zürich.

The fact that the whole group helped creating a serie of questions which are connected, easily-directed and have coherence between them made the assignment much easier. But I also came up with the conclusion that by sticking to these questions, we got a bit restrictive, since I also came up with some questions during the interview. I think I was really lucky with the man answering my questions, since he really took the time and gave thoughtful answers. To the point were I wanted to hear more about what he was talking about.

As I did the interview I took some notes with basically keywords but most important I recorded it, which actually helped me a lot since I was able to go back to the recording and get some details back (that I would most likely have forgotten or missed)

As we checked in class last week, recording with the phone also helps, since you can just hold the phone on your hand and it becomes a normal situation to the point where you almost forget about it.

The only thing I didn’t really like was bumping into some stranger and bombarding him with questions, that dont need to be necessary taken too personal but the questions made are questions you need to take a few minutes to think about to give a fair answer. Before the interview I also thought,  these questions are going to be really representative but I dont know If I should be expecting long or short answers. Since, some old lay will go on telling you about Switzerland for thirty minutes, while young girl could walk just through you without paying attention.

It was really dynamic and enjoyed it.

Self-reflection

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I really enjoyed the interview process, and it has been so far my favorite anthropological project of the subject. It’s true that we knew that is really easy to „influence“ an interview and take it to your territory, but it was when I started that I realized the importance it has, the way you ask the questions and also the order of the questions.

I need to say that I was positively surprised by this interview.  Probably I got the biggest surprise by asking about the three words that would describe Switzerland: modesty, sincereness and „not showing-off“. I think as most of us I was expected at least some joke with cheese, money or of course chocolate. So I realized how much we limit ourself by sticking to those stereotypes.

I tried to ask him the question the other way around, like which words could you expect if you go now and ask somebody? And I immediately got the answers I was expecting, such as „living in the mountains“, and cheese and chocolate.

Also, if you mention one of those words Swiss people will most likely start laughing. Guess it is for me as people mentioning siesta, fiesta and paella regarding to Spain.

I also got the feeling (from the way he talked about Switzerland) that he is proud of Switzerland as a country, education system, countryside and also Swiss people. He mentioned Switzerland as a country that remains together, even if they have several languages and it is considered such a multicultural country. It was really nice to see someone appreciating another culture.

 

 

 

Ethnographic Vignette

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For my interview I went to Rosenhof Market in the heart of Zürich. I finally decided to go on a tuesday morning, so it was not that crowded. First, I stood in the square for about 5/10 minutes and observed the atmosphere while I was thinking about… who should I approach next? There were about 20 people walking around, some looked as foreigners and some look pretty swiss to me. I approached a young girl who was walking by, but she quickly told me that she was in a rush and walked away. The second person I approached was a probably 45-50 years old men who kindly told me he’ll answer my questions.

Before I started the questionnaire he wanted to know what the questions were about and also told me I could record it if I needed it as long as I’m not sharing it with other people or distributing it. Again, he was pretty enthusiastic about contributing to this study.

I’ll share the answers with you but first I’ll like to tell how I think the environment affected the answers. Rosenhof Market wasn’t crowded but still, some people walk by and that is obviously a distraction. I could tell the man somehow was looking for his answers on the surrounding stimuli.

So going through the questions, we’ll follow the established path.

First question, which is about the person’s roots ends up being pretty interesting. He was born in Germany (Berlin) but moved to Switzerland and has been here for over 25 years living in Zürich and also a few years in Bern. He proudly told me he will get his Swiss citizenship status next year.

When asking about the first three words that come to your mind he took a few minutes to think about it and finally came up with: modesty, sincereness and „not showing off“. If we think about it, these are all characteristics we will address to people, which actually surprised me.

Up next I asked him about swiss Identity, which he described as: diversified, sense of togetherness, make the best about everything and refined. I also asked him if he feel like there are more than one Swiss identities, and I had a big no. He said there are surely some differences if you focus in specific things in different villages, but what he understands as Swiss Identity represents the whole and unified country.

Following to the Identity question I asked him about what he thinks would be a Swiss custom, and what customs he has himself. He started talking about customs very broadly, but when I asked him for a more specific example he told me that he sees the „lunch break“ as a real thing in Switzerland. He told me about the one hour and a half he gets and the importance of it.He admitted to identify himself with most of this habits since he has been more than half his life here.

When talking about the impact Swiss habits could have on foreigners he told me: mostly the interpersonal relationships, since the Swiss are really polite and take it also really serious. It is much of a cultural shock for a lot of foreigners coming to Zürich. He gave some examples as an „elevator situation“ where Swiss people will look to you and say good morning, which is a situation you probably wouldn’t have at your hometown.

What do you think foreigners think about Switzerland? His literal answer was: „I really do think people have a lot of stereotypes about Switzerland, and I think they underestimate the strength of Swiss people“

Also, when asked about the possibility of this interview getting him more aware of his identity, I got a strong solid no.

 

 

Self Reflection – Will

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Playing the role of an interviewer wandering alone and approaching strangers in public that may not even speak my language was the toughest part of this project for me, as I do not have the confidence to undertake these types of tasks alone. Thus, I wasted a good hour wandering around in discomfort while looking for the best moment to approach somebody. On top of this, I spent a good amount of time in determining my method of approach and what I would say. When I finally mustered up the courage to approach somebody, the process was a lot smoother, as I do not have a problem engaging in conversations – even with strangers.

The conversation itself went well, however I did notice that the interviewee thought a lot about my questions and really tried her best to answer them. It made me realize that a lot of people do have strong feelings about national identity but struggle to find the correct way to express them in public as it could certainly come off as controversial. This could also have affected my data collection process as the interviewee may have modified answers to be best fitted and most appropriate for the current situation. As a result, some of the conversation felt rather generic, as the interviewee may have had different or more extreme opinions as compared to the ones that she provided me with. This really made me consider how discussing potentially controversial topics with strangers cannot be simply done out of the blue if the intent is to gauge true opinions. For the case of this project however, I believe that it is not a big deal.

Overall, I thought that the project was nice. Although stressful due to personal reasons, it did force me out of my comfort zone and to learn more about the locals. If I were to repeat this project, somethings I might change are the interview approaches, as the people that you meet may not always fall under the category you are looking for. Additionally, due to the nature of the topic, the questions could certainly have been worded better for better results, however given the time constraints that I was faced with, I think that the outcome was fine.

Ethnographic Vignette – Will

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1 pm on a sunny Wednesday afternoon, I made my way across the market stalls at Rosenhof in search for somebody to interview. The market was quite busy and there were plenty of people who seemed unrushed and relaxed, however due to my social anxiety, I still had trouble finding somebody to interview. After about an hour of aimlessly walking around and looking like a fool, I finally worked up the courage to ask a young lady who was standing alone, on her phone. Luckily, she was kind enough to spare a little of her time to answer my questions, and so the interview began. The dialogue of the interview is as follows (from the questions suggested in class, all responses with the permission of the interviewee, but summarized for grammatical purposes):

  1. What is your name?
    1. Valentina
  2. Where are you from?
    1. Switzerland, St. Gallen.
  3. What are the first 3 words that come to mind when you think of Switzerland?
    1. Beauty, Neutrality, and Cows.
  4. What is your idea of Swiss identity?
    1. We are educated, hard-working, and open-minded people who value organization, responsibility, and punctuality. We also have a sense of pride of being Swiss citizens, and we highly value improvement, as seen through our waste disposal methods and our charities.
  5. What would you consider are some typical Swiss customs?
    1. The festivals. There are many festivals symbolizing various traditions throughout Switzerland, such as the cow festivals and the carnival currently in Zurich. On top of the various cultural events in Switzerland, most Swiss tend to be reserved and conservative, but always polite and ready to help if needed.
  6. Do you think that these customs represent being Swiss?
    1. Yes, the personality traits are general stereotypes of Swiss people, which I embrace to be true and hold other Swiss citizens to the same standard.
  7. What customs do you think may be difficult to understand for foreigners?
    1. Many foreigners are surprised by how reserved we are, as we do not typically willingly interact with strangers unless approached, but I do not feel that we are that different from the rest of the world.
  8. What do you think foreigners think of Swiss people?
    1. The typical stereotypes are that we are all rich and bankers with our nice watches. But also, our punctuality and responsibility.
  9. Has this interview made you more aware of your identity?
    1. I guess so, I do not think about this stuff every day.

The conversation was edited and rephrased since it was not recorded due to the large amount of people, recording would not have worked.

Following our nice conversation, I thanked Valentina and abruptly left as I am not a typical fan of social interactions such as these. It also seemed as though Valentina was busy and had somewhere to be, as you know what they say – the Swiss are always punctual.

Discussion of Methods – Will

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The basic requirements of this assignment required interviewing a random person at Rosenhof Market in Zurich. As far as the interview content, the main questions were brainstormed and created in a collaborative environment during class. The brainstormed questions would then be taken as a list to be followed for a face-to-face interview with a Swiss person. The need for consistency among questions between all class members is important as guidelines for a structured interview as all respondents must be exposed to the same stimuli (Bernard 2011). It is noted however, that the questions were crafted with caution as to minimize as much personal awareness as possible so that the issue of people being inaccurate reporters of their own behavior would not be as prevalent a factor as expected. Additionally, this helps to increase the accuracy of the data collecting process. To achieve this, the questions are phrased in open-ended, opinionated forms so that the respondent would be obliged to speak their minds while pertaining to the close guidelines of each question. Essentially, the nature of most of the questions used were highly objective to the respondent.

Regarding the actual field practices, voice recording with a mobile device was the decided method of application, as it had the effect of becoming a background thought if social interactions were deep enough. That is, if the interview was taken seriously, both parties would seem to forget about the presence of the voice recorder. This theory was testing in class with around a 50% success rate.

Upon deciding on the interview methods, the final step was to simply execute. This will be discussed further within the self-reflection portion; however, I do want to note that although on paper the prescribed approaches seem practical, there are still quite a bit of flaws with them. This was a pressing challenge faced during the brainstorming section in class, but the constraint of time forced us to settle upon the current application. To highlight some of the flaws and issues faced upon during the brainstorming section, the main ones were:

  1. The directness of asking about “Swiss-ness,” as this is an umbrella term that has different meanings to everybody. As a result, it would seem inappropriate to simply ask it as a straightforward question.
  2. The nature of the interview itself, as some people may be Swiss, but do not identify strongly with Swiss beliefs or culture. Additionally, for people that also identify to other places, this interview concept may seem pointless to them.

Although these controversial factors lingered, given the time constraints in class, we settled for what was mentioned above.

Ethnographic vignette

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Wednesday, November 14, 2018. The day was grey, but it did not rain. I moved to Zurich main train station at 16.00 and reached it in few minutes. The station was crowded and noisy as I walked in and took the first pictures. The flux of people kept hurrying back and forth, up and down on all floors of the building. Deeper, people were waiting on the platforms for their train. Many -if alone- were using their phones, others were talking with their families, friends and partners. Some others were either just sitting on the public benches or standing while absorbed in their thoughts.

There I took other pictures of such situation. In the photos, we can majorly notice the people alone.

Other photos were taken in the other station of Richterswil. Here, these pictures testify a whole different environment. Right outside the train, one can notice that the platform ends next to the lake, only a small path divides the station perimeter from the water. This tiny path is seen used for a walk by local pedestrians.

 

 

 

 

 

The station lets the few passengers who got out of the train, walk down a stairway toward an underground tunnel that connects the lake-side platform to the rest of the village. The tunnel is short and well lighted; the natural light can easily reach the inside.

At the end of it, a semi-underground square let the travellers choose multiple directions. For those who need to reach the bus-stops in front of the station, there is a ramp decorated with bushes.

Once reached the front square, one can easily access the bus-stop, the other platform, few shops and the ticket office.

Once reached the other side, we notice that in a matter of few minutes the station became deserted, and we find ourselves alone appreciating that deafening silence.

By Alessandro Sirocchi

 

Self-Reflection

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I had many ideas I wanted to develop in my research, but at the end I opted for the one I liked the most. As I live in Richterswil, train rides to the city centre are a habit for me, so I decided to take pictures of the diversity of a very characteristic Swiss feature; train stations. The two ones I focused on are in Richterswil and in Zurich city centre. Similar hearts of two very different urban centres.

At the beginning of my research I wanted to take pictures of people getting off and on trains, but I was not confident enough to do that. Instead, I preferred to take photos of the station and how people used it. Although my focus was on the buildings, I could not exclude some people from the pictures as the number of travellers was overwhelming (that was the case in Zurich main station). There were times I did not feel comfortable, that is why I tried to hide my camera and avoid direct contact with people.

My research allowed me to appreciate things more outside the hassle of the city. In Zurich I could vividly notice that many were either in a hurry or stressed out, while the building did not make me feel protected. The artificially-lighted underground platforms looked constricting and oppressive to me, while in the village everybody seemed more relaxed as the station welcomed them with its beautiful view over the lake and the countryside. Although the village station was provided with underground tunnels too, those were not oppressive and claustrophobic as the ones in the main station, because the former always provided a view to the outside surface.

The village station became desert after few minutes, which made the scenery even more intense for me. I never stayed so long in the station, and I could realise that the solitude one can feel there is the very feature that makes it more characteristic than its bigger sibling in Zurich.

By Alessandro Sirocchi

Discussion and Application of Method

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Visual ethnography is a research method of data collection that combines the production knowledge with ethnographers’ experiences during their research on the field. The major difference with traditional ethnography lies in the importance of what is called “immaterial”, meaning behaviours and attitudes that only the camera can grasp. The immaterial becomes of importance as it puts the formal collection of data -through texts and notes- aside while grasping the lifestyles of cultures through the collection of images.

There is no standardised set of rules to establish whether an image is of ethnographic relevance. Therefore, whether a visual content can be valued as ethnographic is a matter of personal opinion, and of the contingency of an image with its context. In other words, if an image evokes meanings to somebody, that somebody might find that content of ethnographic interest.

Even though visual ethnography seems to rely more on the subjectivity of the researcher than on the objectivity of the data, it is not an unstructured research method. The main pillar of such ethnographic method is reflexivity. Reflexivity is intended as the mediation of the world of realities and research context through the eyes of the ethnographic researcher. In other words, the representation of the ethnographic knowledge through the perspective of the person who’s observing it. Therefore, what is important is not the mere research content itself, but the researcher’s interpretation of and relation to it.

My personal application of a visual ethnographic research took place in two locations, Zurich Main Bahnhof and Richterswil Bahnhof. These two similar, yet extremely divergent places provided me a great dualism between urban centrality and rural periphery. To minimise the attention on me, I used the phone’s camera and held it at a lower height than usual. My gaze focused on the urban architecture rather than on sole people. As a matter of facts, I wanted to focus on the differences between a big city’s and a small village’s train station.

The research took place on a cloudy late-afternoon and shortly it confirmed to be a harsh day for taking pictures. The light was not enough which it made difficult to take sharpened photos. The huge difference between the two station lies in the almost total absence of people and the outstanding peaceful environment of the smaller one.

By Alessandro Sirocchi

Self-reflection – Yulun Wu

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In the last three weeks, my topic has always been in a dynamic, evolving progress. Representing Switzerland by photos with my own reflections in limited time and places seem quite challenging since I consider everyday life in Switzerland as a holistic, overarching organic. During this period, I initially tried to portray some unknown, mysterious, or even uncanny aspect of Zurich, for instance, the so-called “needle park”. Furthermore, I endeavored to depict Zurich characterized by myriad tourists and international events, which indicates its core gene of multiple belongings. However, it was till I summarized the majority of pictures were taken to capture valuable and touching moments of daily routine, that I realized that what I cherished about Zurich, about Switzerland was intensely associated with its people.

I felt quite reluctant as I have to take photos of others at first without asking for their permission. I am literally not even the type like to post selfie or photos with others on an event. Therefore, trying to capture the natural interaction and relaxing atmosphere between my subjects, as well as rendering them perfectly apt to the background and its context were tricky for me. It is much more technical than I thought, capturing the specific moments while simultaneously concerning with the photographing with an aesthetic angle. The bad weather these days, subsequently, also attributes to the difficulty of this task.

Nevertheless, it turned out that I was increasingly enjoying the process of taking photos from an ethnographic aspect. Firstly, I appreciate more diversity and variant of my surroundings as well as the vivid interactions commonly observed in every culture. Secondly, unlike previously conducted systematic observation, which provides me with an overwhelming information flow, photo ethnography empowers me with much more detailed, 2-dimensional photos embedded with the combination of highlighted factors. When I wrote the ethnographic vignette, it brought me back to the time point, the environment, the scene I encountered at the very moment.