Course Description

This course will introduce students to contemporary ethnographic works produced by Chicanas/os. We will look at how Chicana/o Studies uses ethnographic writing, film production, photography, and performance, as a way to describe the everyday lives and experiences of Chicana/o and Latina/o communities in the United States and across different borders. We will focus on what makes Chicana/o ethnography unique to other forms of ethnographic writings. What methodological tools are used by Chicana/o ethnographers? What are the politics in conducting ethnographic research? And, where do Chicana/o ethnographers position themselves as researchers and as active observing participants? The course will not only map a genealogy of Chicana/o ethnography but also read contemporary ethnographies on such topics as Trans-border social movements, community formation, the US/Mexico Borderlands, Labor and Migration, racism and racialization, folklore, and Chicana/o cultural production.

Creative Discovery Course Grant Experience

Students in the course created Digna Rabia, a digital journal in Chicana/o/x Studies with links to visual ethnographies that utilized Artivive, an augmented reality app, podcasts that students made, and oral histories that they wrote.