Beginnings

Departure for India in T-Minus 3 Days and as I have had numerous questions and alternatively been threatened by my father about a blog, so here it is. Isn't it lovely? So empty and bare, a clean sheet. Hopefully, it will not remain that way. I remain optimistic. Those who know me: less so.

To begin, I suppose I should describe what I'll be doing. I am traveling to Visakhapatnam, India, with the BYU Study Abroad program. We will be taking a language course in Telugu (the local dialect) and a culture course, however the majority of our credits are spent on our project. While the program is not dedicated to Anthropology, it is geared to be friendly towards Anthropology projects. Which is what I'll be doing. What is my project about you ask?

In India concepts about marriage and the family are changing rapidly as they evolve and draw from a long national tradition and new Western influences. There is a vibrant cinema culture  and it functions as an integral part of social life, shaping and constraining ideas and attitudes across several dimensions.  This study will address the connection between film and the changing perceptions about gender relations within the family. By conducting ethnographic interviews and through participant observation the project will illuminate the connections between the two and speak to the growing scholastic interest in mediated subjectivities.

That is the summary of my project from my IRB proposal. An IRB proposal is too boring to spend time describing, but if you are particularly interested feel free to ask me all about the bureaucratic banalities involved with getting an Anthropology project approved. In summary, I'll be talking to people about film, in a roundabout way of get them talk about family and about family, in a roundabout way of getting them to talk about film. Savvy? No? Well, I tried.