Showing posts with label ethics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ethics. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 06, 2009

Writing continues, and how I use quotes

I may not be dead, but I have fallen into a pit of writing, conferences, and research work here at uni. Probably about time, though, lol.

For anyone who was curious, I've completed my second chapter (barring some minor edits). This chapter is about my methodologies - what types of data collection methods I've used and what - and a general introduction to the vidding community online - about how many people, some demographics, and that sort of thing. I also address issues like privacy, consent, confidentiality, and things like that.

I've now moved on to third chapter, which I've tentatively titled "The Practice of Vidding". It is sort of a background information chapter for my readers who may not be familiar with vidding, and covers the 30-odd year history from slides to digital, and then gives a summary of how current digital vids are made (as I've mentioned before, I am focusing on contemporary, digital vidding for my dissertation).

I already have, and probably will continue to, be sending out some emails in the near future to various vidders I've met or interviewed, and also some I haven't, asking for permission to quote sources outside the range of personal interviews or focus groups (which is covered by the consent form you would have signed). This may include things like individual's Livejournal posts, or comments in someone else's LJ. I will be quoting from general posts to communities without tacit permission, because a larger/more public audience is assumed for these. However, I will request permission to quote by email for any comments in any LJ, and personal LJs. And I will ask permission for each quote, and not just assume a blanket permission to take words wherever I please (unless the vidder indicates this is okay).

I am planning to include a DVD of several vids along with my dissertation for the examiners / my supervisors. I am going to be sending out consent forms which need to be signed by the vidder in order to include it here. You can check out the consent form here if you are curious: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dfn5rwh3_114cbkv3pfd. It usually comes with the participant information sheet, which looks like this:
http://docs.google.com/View?id=dfn5rwh3_7gdktk2d6

Of course, if you receive a request to quote or for vid use, you can always refuse me with no hard feelings. I'm not here to expose anyone or disrupt anything.

Unfortunately, I don't think I'll be able to run a final focus group as I may have desired. I have some tight deadlines coming up and really need to get on those. My apologies to everyone who volunteered! However, if there is anyone out there who would like to read portions of my thesis as it is written, please let me know. I am looking for some vidder/vid-watcher feedback. :-)

Sunday, July 12, 2009

Eroticism, Sex, and Consent in the Field

I'm currently reading the fascinating collection "Taboo: Sex, Identity, and Erotic Subjectivity in Anthropological Fieldwork", edited by Don Kulick and Margaret Willson (London & New York: Routledge, 1995). Despite the fact that I only did anthropology for my undergraduate degree, I find the methodological, ethical, and subjective issues of this particular field endlessly interesting (nerd that I am). The collection of essays deals with issues of eroticism, sex, and sexuality in fieldwork, a topic that most fieldworkers are silent on. There is an unspoken rule that sex while in the field is unethical, and it is assumed that all anthropologists are somehow celibate while performing their fieldwork. I find this book very confronting in that it acknowledges the possibilities, risks, and even benefits of sexual desire for one's fieldwork. Most of all, the honesty and candid accounts of various ethnographers' experiences is touching and brings up a lot of issues that I think should be addressed in more anthropology training in universities.

Consider this passage from Ralph Bolton's chapter, speaking as a gay man who frequently had sex with his participants while researching the gay community and the AIDS epidemic in Brussels:

"I cannot imagine doing fieldwork without sex, perhaps from a feeling that life is too short and one must enjoy it while one can. We don't get younger. Perhaps it's because I came out late and am 'catching up'. In truth, it's probably because I enjoy sex too much to remain voluntarily abstinent. It is most definitely not a sacrifice I would make for my profession. But the question of identity is implicated as well. In the hierarchy of components of my personal identity, gayness ranks higher than ethnicity, nationality, and profession. And that aspect of my being is expressed and celebrated through sex." (pg. 149)

This passage just floored me. What a brave statement to make, first of all. I commend Bolton for so openly stating such things. The role of the body, of emotion, of sex, and indeed of love is one that hardly ever enters ethnographic discourse, and certainly not in such frank terms. The scandal of Malinowski revealing his sexual desires in the field in his "Diary in the Strict Sense of the Term" shocked and scandalized the anthropological discipline. Despite all the recent hubbub on self-reflexivity and auto-ethnography, the silence remains.

And as someone who always struggles with issues of consent and ethics (even though my research has never been with high-risk communities), I find this also deeply unsettling. Obviously Bolton's partners were all consenting adults, and likely also educated Westerners, but obtaining data through pillow talk seems questionable.

Later in the chapter, Bolton details the ethical concerns in performing this type of research. Regarding consent, he explains that he did not obtain signed consent from any participants (partially out of concern for their privacy), and did not hide that he was researching when asked. But would these men have consented to sex if they knew in advance that Bolton was studying them? Would it have affected their decision in some way?

Or am I placing my own subjectivity onto this? Bolton seems unworried for the consequences, and I am neither gay nor male, and certainly cannot claim knowledge of the role of sex in the gay male community. Bolton states that he engaged in sex for personal and not professional reasons, but if he stood to gain professionally from the encounters I believe he should have obtained consent in advance. "...The purpose of informed consent is to prevent hard to the individual, or if harm could occur, then to obtain permission and acceptance of that risk by those who would incur it. In my judgment, no risk was involved in the Belgian fieldwork." (155) I find this statement problematic for many reasons: if someone slept with me and then started quizzing me as an anthropologist, I would feel at risk. I wonder how Bolton's participants felt. I agree with Marshall's review of his work, when she called it "passive deception", even though Bolton himself does not.

Bolton also points to the necessity of participating in sex in order to fully be a member of the gay community, and of course participant observation is the cornerstone of anthropological methodology. You learn by doing. My own participants have insisted that I make a vid myself in order to fully understand their practices, to be "in" I need to become a vidder myself. Could Bolton have achieved his research goals while abstaining? I doubt it.

I can just imagine the reaction from the UOW ethics committee if I even thought about suggested a project like this!

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

VividCon Fieldwork

I'm gearing up to prep for my fieldwork at VividCon, and I want to talk a bit about what I'm planning to do there because I think it's important to be transparent about your research methods.

Methods

Here is a short rundown of the methods I plan to use while there.

- Participant Observation: this is a classic anthropology method which essentially involves me being a convention attendee - attending vid shows, listening to panels, etc. - and making notes on what is going on.
- Short Interviews: The formal term for "asking questions". I might ask someone what they think about fair use, or using YouTube, or the vid they just saw. Very straightforward.
- Extended / Formal Interviews: I would like to sit down with some people individually and go through a list of questions on your vidding practices, the vidding community, copyright and fair use issues, and issues around fandom in general.
- Roundtable: The ConCom has asked me to give a roundtable presentation on my research, where I will be outlining my approach, theories, and research thus far so that people can give me feedback and ask questions.
- Focus Group: If people are interested, I would like to get 4 or 5 people together to talk with me in a focus group, which is similar to an extended interview but tends to deal with more complex questions and lets all the group members discuss it together with me.

Ethical Concerns - Consent, Confidentiality, and the Right to Decline

My University requires that each participant read this participant information sheet and sign a consent form like this one before particpating so that everyone is fully informed. All must be over the age of 18. You need to sign your real name on the consent form, but after that I will assign you a random pseudonym and obscure your personal details so that you remain fully anonymous unless you choose to be identified by name or by a particular nickname (like your vidder name or LJ handle). I know some people are concerned about copyright suits, and I will do my utmost to protect your identity. The consent forms will be kept locked a file cabinet in my office and destroyed after the end of the project. You may refuse to answer any questions, and may cease participating at any time with no hard feelings. :-)

Research Guidelines

I have been in touch with the ConCom, and they have provided me with several guidelines to follow for your protection and mine. They are as follows:
- Consent forms will be required from all participants.
- Interviews will mostly be arranged in advance but you can also approach me and ask for one at the event.
- I will be introduced at the beginning of the con so that people know who I am and can approach me or avoid me if they are not interested. Please do not feel shy about telling me you do not want to participate - I completely understand and I will not be offended.
- I will be interviewing away from the main con space where there is some privacy.
- I will not make any recordings or take any photos during the convention. I would like to audio-record my extended interviews, but these will happen away from the main con space and I will ask each person individually for permission.
- I am going to be handing out a flyer at the con with details on my work and how to contact me.


For more information, please don't hesitate to contact me. You can email me at fanthropology@gmail.com or leave a comment at this post or at my LJ. You can also contact the ConCom and they will be able to pass your concerns on to me anonymously. If you haven't yet, please fill out my survey over at Survey Monkey.

I'm really excited to get to attend this great vidding event and meeting some of my vidder heroes!

Sunday, June 08, 2008

the joys of the lit review

okay, so i know it's been quite a while since i last posted and for that i apologize. i'm going to try and post once a week or similar from now on.

some updates on my progress:

i won't be attending vividcon in chicago in august, unfortunately. i'm rather upset i won't be able to go, but dems da breaks. so instead, i've registered to go to vidukon in england, coming up in october. i've never been to europe, so i'm really excited about it. the only fun part now is convincing my uni to give me some financial support.

my ethics application has been submitted, as well - it's been about three weeks now, but i don't think the committee have met since i gave it over... fingers crossed, everyone! many of the laws regarding media appropriation and the like are extremely strict here in oz, so i'm a bit worried about what the committee will think of my proposal. i'm using some pretty strict methods to keep the identity of my participants confidential, and i hope that will do the trick for them. but you know copyright law - it can be a sticky, scary mess sometimes.

i did a scary and massive review of feminist literature in regards to film over the past month, as well. it was all rather daunting, but i managed to slog through it and i think i've finally come up with something that's relatively cogent for the vidders. i couldn't find a single theorist or group of theorists which i found to apply to the vidding community and their practices, because let's face it - it is a hugely diverse group with a thousand different perspectives.

and then i realized - that's almost like the academics, isn't it? pick up a recent feminist media/film reader, and each chapter will have a completely different way of reading the same text. for example, sherrie inness's collection entitled "action chicks" offers interpretations ranging from Herbst's view that the lara croft is simply a spectacle created for male consumption, while Brown states that these types of heroines are transgressive as they embody both male and female attributes, and Tung argues that the powerful black female is not offered the same opportunity to be progressive as the powerful white female because it invokes an ideology of savagery instead...

and these different viewpoints reminded me of those of many of the vids i have watched over the past few months. consider luminosity & sisabet's women's work to absolute destiny's i enjoy being a girl to giandujakiss's origin stories to LC's jack.... all these vids are about people watching a show and having something to say about its portrayal of women (whether commending or condeming it). and i think it's really similar to what the academics are saying. it's a struggle over the meaning of the text.

i'm not going to get too far into this (unless anyone would like me to elaborate) because i don't want to bog this post down with theory or anything, so i'll leave that thought there for now.

i have also found some interesting work on film music theory that i am really excited to apply to vidding. if different people can watch the same show and get completely different meanings out it, then we get into a bit of a pickle regarding if a text has any inherent meaning at all, and that sort of postmodern debate. so this applies to the vids as well - if a television text doesn't have an inherent, intended, clearly understood meaning, how can a vid?

i did ponder this, and one answer i came up with was this:

a television show is made by a massive cast and crew, and even different episodes are written by different people. take a show like lost or heroes - could you sit one of the creators or writers down and ask them what their show "means"? it would be a tough question to answer, i think. and the other members of the crew could give really different answers.

a vid, on the other hand, is usually made by a single person (or small group of people). and if you want to know what a vidder had in mind when they were creating, just read their notes or commentary that accompany it. should give you a pretty clear idea, no? also, there is much more contact between the vidders and their audience than there is in terms of mainstream TV texts and their viewers. if i wanted to know what a vidder thought about their vid, i could just leave a comment on their LJ or email them. but i can't just call up eric kripke and ask what was up with season three of SPN (no matter how much i wish i could, lol).

but it turns out the answer to this question (the question of how to interpret meaning in a text) was staring me in the face the whole time.

it's the music! it's in the MUSIC!

duh.

how obvious, am i right? i realized with a massive slap to the face the other day that up to this point i had been ignoring the absolutely VITAL ingredient of the music.

lightbulbs went off. i grabbed some film music theory work... and there it is! suture theory. thank you, claudia gorbman & jostein gripsurd!

while a text may have a multitude of potential meanings floating around, the music in film acts as a suture, restricting the possible interpretations down to a more limited number. suturing the text to the emotional or psychological response intended by the creator.

BOOYAH.

i'm still in the beginning stages of developing this idea, of course, but i think it's a really positive step forward for me. a framework is beginning to appear, and that makes me really, really excited.

feel free to comment, debunk, admire, or laugh at me in the comments if you think i'm way off. at this point, i'm still trapped behind a pile of dry theorists in their ivory tower, and i have to wait until my ethics approval comes down from TPTB to actually test this with some vidders. but here's hoping!

Friday, April 11, 2008

An ethical quagmire

I had a meeting with another professor in my Faculty today, who took a look at my ethics application and helped me through it. She helped me quite a bit, I must say - pointing out things I never would have thought of, because I've never technically done internet-based research before.

But I must say I think I've gotten myself in a bit of a pickle with this whole thesis topic, just because of the things you never think of, you know? I'm specially referring to the issues of copyright infringement in regards to vidding. I'm worried now that my ethics form will scare away any potential vidders whose vids I'd like to use as examples, because of the consent form they'll have to sign. Of course, this could be said of any consent form - they do detail worst-case scenarios, and the potential risks are minimal at best, but the fact that they could potentially happen is what scares me, because the last thing I want to do is bring down the law-man on my participants.

Perhaps the sky just seems black right now; this is what the professor told me. And she's studying sex tourism online, so she would know about ethics approvals from hell to be sure. I must say, I'm going to do my damndest to make sure this whole thing works out for all of us. These are our people, as my friends and I say all the time. These are our people.

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

online ethics

see below for some various methods of collecting consent online gleaned from AoIR list:

second life - online digital notecards.

VOIP - email before scheduled interview, and agreed to contents of letter verbally, which is recorded along with the interview. advises against reading consent form aloud as too time-consuming and difficult for interviewee to follow.

mail survey: cover letter and consent form sent out. if a respondent returned the questionnaire, it represented their consent to participate. also an online version where consent form popped up after respondent logged in, and must click to indicate their consent before able to answer any questions.

IM interviews: send out informed consent form with information sheet, and respondents emailed back to say they had read, understood, and agreed to participate.

Skype: emailed consent form - faxed back or scanned & emailed. read a short statement at beginning of interview instead of entire form.