Download Final Report Available

CIP ESSENTIALS GRANT:
FINAL REPORT
BRIDGING ANTHROPOLOGY AND ART:
ETHNOFICTION AS VISUAL LITERACY
Faculty Mentors:
Sam Pack, Associate Professor of Anthropology
Claudia Esslinger, Professor of Studio Art
Our proposal was intended to increase visual literacy across the disciplines of
anthropology and art such that students from Professor Pack’s “Methods in Cultural
Anthropology” seminar and Professor Esslinger’s “Digital Imaging” seminar would
learn from one other by collaborating on an end-of-the-semester project titled
“Reinterpreting Narratives.” The anthropology students conducted and transcribed
numerous ethnographic interviews with residents of Knox County. Along with their
collaborators in studio art, the students attempted to “reinterpret” these narratives
visually while still endeavoring to retain the ethnographic integrity. The challenge
was to create images that poetically amplified or illuminated the text without
directly illustrating it.
PROJECT DESCRIPTIONS
Nakedness vs. Nudity (Anthropology: Sam Ebert; Art: Emily Torrey and Garrison
Block
Sam wanted to explore the differences in perceptions of “nakedness” and “nudity” of
the female body by interviewing dancers at The Foxhole, a strip club located in New
Castle. Emily and Garrison accompanied him there on several occasions to talk to
the dancers and learn more about their lives. Considering the “sensitive” nature of
the topic, the students were forbidden to record any audio or video footage. Instead,
they took what they learned and constructed their own artistic interpretations.
Utilizing symbolic images, Emily illuminated a poem of a dancer to her mother while
Garrison channeled the voice of a dancer who was a mother herself.
Kenyon’s Sexual Assault Policy (Anthropology: Sara Feola and Kelsey Kiser; Art:
Katie Poinsatte and Lizzy Leonard)
Motivated by a highly publicized case of alleged sexual assault involving one of their
close friends, Sara and Kelsey wished to examine Kenyon’s sexual assault policy in
detail, particularly with regard to the “chain of command” involved when reporting
such incidents. What they uncovered, to their consternation, was an institutional
climate in which victims did not feel supported, and even actively discouraged, in
pursuing charges against their alleged offenders. Lizzy employed landscape shots
with drawn lines over it and text from the interviews to express her outrage while
Katie wrote her own stream of consciousness “rant” with symbolic images of roses
burning.
High School Basketball in Rural America (Anthropology: Joey Cordle, Jackson
Janezich, and Bob Selbe; Art: Tony Caltado and Audrey Nation)
Joey, Jackson, and Bob were interested in the roles that high school athletics, and
basketball in particular, played in rural communities such as Mount Vernon. Tony
and Audrey listened to the audio interviews with coaches and former players, which
they found difficult to work with. However, Audrey did use scenery of the local
landscape interspersed with drawings over it of basketball elements along with
audio from the interviews. Tony hails from a rural town and came to Kenyon to play
football, so his own life embodies this experience. As a result, he reflected on his
own relationship to the military as a story in his own voice, using small toy soldiers
and sand forts as imagery.
Knox County Orchestra (Anthropology: Ethan Primason; Art: Greta Greising and
Charlotte Mitchell)
Ethan also wanted to address the urban/rural divide by focusing on the “town vs.
gown” relationships between residents of Knox County and Kenyon students in the
Knox County orchestra. Unfortunately, Greta and Charlotte determined most of the
footage that Ethan recorded of the rehearsals to be unusable so they shot their own
footage, along with a few inserts interspersed with audio from the musical pieces.
Their visual narrative considered the nature of music as a whole and how it affects
the brain as well as how the visual elements of instruments are connected to nature.
Dungeons and Dragons (Anthropology: Jaime Cohen; Art: Peter Birren and Zeslie
Zablan)
As a devoted participant of the fantasy role-playing game, “Dungeons and Dragons,”
Jaime had long encountered misperceptions of D&D adherents by non-players. So
she assembled a survey gauging perceived personality traits, both positive and
negative, associated with players and disseminated it to the Kenyon student body.
To her grateful surprise, over 300 students responded. Along with footage of active
games and interviews with current players, Peter implemented images of mirrors in
a magical way while Zeslie appropriated sounds of whispers and laughing to convey
the dynamic nature of the interactions among players.
DIFFICULTIES ENCOUNTERED:
Final approval for this proposal was not granted until almost the mid-way point of
the spring semester. Given the timing, the anthropology students had already not
only selected topics for their respective ethnographic projects but were also actively
engaged in research. Many of the studio art students understandably expressed
reluctance, and even resentment, at not having any input into the topics of their
“Reinterpreting Narratives” projects. One unnamed student in the digital imaging
seminar reportedly referred to herself and her classmates derisively as “hired guns.”
Not surprisingly, the students in both classes did not collaborate as fully as we
would have liked. While certain collaborations worked better than others (ie
“Dungeons and Dragons”), the majority seemed perfunctory. In one instance
involving Emily Saxe in anthropology and Sean Hutton and Claire Gaglione in studio
art, the students mutually agreed to go their separate ways after struggling to find
common ground in the material.
PRESCRIPTIONS FOR THE FUTURE
In future iterations, it is imperative for students in both classes to decide on the
subjects of their visual narratives together so that the spirit of collaboration is
established at the very beginning. An earlier start in the semester would also be
beneficial in a number of other ways, such as developing familiarity and rapport
among the students and more effective communication and planning between the
professors. That said, this was conceived and intended as a pilot project; in that
capacity, it was a resounding success. We look forward to continuing the progress
that we have made in this project in future courses after we return to Kenyon from
our respective sabbaticals.