Last night our group met, because we now meet every Monday night (this week at 7:00, every week in the future at 9:00). We discussed what we had each done up to this point, which, to be clear, has been minimal for all of us. Zach is stoked about Tandoor ovens and Youtube videos about making them as well as videos on street food and other meals in Kashgar. The rest of our research seems to be rather hard to progress with. Delaney and I were talking about how there seemed to be some stuff to read, but that nothing felt valuable or felt like progress. There are very few books about the history of Kashgar, let alone food or culinary practices in Kashgar; the research on Kashgar I have done in various databases is also fairly limited and feels like context rather than the content we hope to have in our project. I have had slightly better luck zooming out to Xinjiang and hoping to find specifics about Kashgar within. My next step is going to be expanding my search to google and not just databases. I am hoping to sift through websites and any other results that might pop up form google searches either today or tomorrow (9/21). Ideally I would like to be spending at least 30 minutes to an hour every day on research for the Tongue team and I am hoping to attempt to accomplish that minimum this week as a trial run and see how successful I am. As a reminder to myself and a statement that might help keep me accountable for fulfilling this: I need to create a more thorough and upgraded timeline for my group as “timekeeper”.
The largest part of our meeting centered on how we were going to make a narrative out of our separate parts of the whole Tongue Team project. This led us to the question of how we wanted our portion of the map to look like and how it will travel from point to point. I was envisioning a picture of our meal as our main point and then have the ability to click on each aspect of the table in order to bring you to the background of each component of the meal. I don’t know, technologically, if that is possible, so we also discussed how the traditions of the order of what got served or eaten first might help us with how the digital map travels from point to point. We discussed a lot of ways in which we could turn our project and all its facets into a map for the final project. It was really fun to think of that creative aspect of the project and to look ahead at what it might look like when it’s all said and done.
Monday Meeting Debrief: How to Create a Linear Narrative with Many Different Elements
Last night, I met with my group in the library to set up a basic plan of attack for the next few weeks. We talked about how setting up specific data finding/creation deadlines to make our group progress schedule a bit more specific. As per Eric’s advice, I recommended adding deadlines for having all of the images, all videos, all text completed, etc. as we anticipated that data entry will take longer to finish than groups might think at this point.
In our administrator meeting yesterday morning, we discussed that each team will only be allowed to use one single StoryMap to present the work of their entire team, rather than creating multiple maps for different sections of the project. I think this will be particularly daunting for my team since we don’t necessarily have one singular storyline, but one meal that traces out in multiple lines in different directions since they are tracing different ingredients and elements of the meal backwards through time. We made a lot of progress in imagining how our StoryMap will actually end up by drawing out different formations while brainstorming. The best idea that we came up with was to create a center point with the image of the entire meal and take each element, in order of their consumption throughout a typical meal period (starting with drink, first course, second course, etc) and then zooming out to the beginning of the history of that element and tracing it back to the table and overall meal. By tracing inward rather than outward, each element will end at the center and refocus on the larger picture of the entire meal. We will then proceed to trace the next element from the outer-most point inwards and so on. This will make the phases of the project seem almost like flashbacks that lead the reader to the final meal.
We talked about how we will maintain a narrative within this format. We had originally envisioned telling the story from the first person perspective, allowing one person to witness where the ingredient came from and they got it to the table. We also brainstormed telling the narrative in the first person as the ingredient itself. We came upon a final solution of telling the story in the second person perspective, allowing the audience to be the center of the narrative and having them be the person bring the ingredients to the table. This will create a narrative that seems almost like a “choose your own adventure” novel, but structured to be a directed story rather than a number of audience choices.
I was worried that the limited format of StoryMap would limit our narrative abilities, but I think that we have come to a very good agreement and new arrangement for our information. At this point, my team is feeling anxious to learn about the StoryMap tool and is eagerly counting down to our next Tech Lab.
The Process: 1
Process posts will, believe it or not, reflect on the process our group is through in researching our topic and completing this project. After getting together today to research and brainstorm, I’m feeling much more confident about our current path. We’ve highlighted personal responsibilities, our research outlines and have even managed to schedule a weekly meeting time (incredible, given our various schedules).
Though we primarily researched on our own during the hour, we also bounced ideas off one another regarding how we’ll be presenting the final product as a narrative. Unfortunately, as of right now, we don’t have much knowledge of the story map program we’ll be using for the final piece and what its capabilities are. Our goal however, is to write our research out as a story, following specific people’s lives in Kashgar. We’re thinking about placing the audience around a dinner table and zooming out to different aspects of the meal from there. We even drew up a fantastic diagram of what this could look like which I tried to attach, but upon previewing it, could not see it clearly.
Given these posts are meant to include some reflection on research, I’ll be attempting to throw in a piece of information or quote I found interesting with each post. Here’s an appetizing description of a popular Kashgar snack according to the website Chinatouronline.com.
Lungs and Intestines. “A traditional snack and Uyghur favorite, Lung and Intestine poured with Flour and Rice is made of the lungs and intestines of sheep. The lung poured with flour is soft and the intestines are tasty, causing tourists at home and abroad to praise its special flavor.”
Anna's Monday Meeting
This morning I met with the other Silk Worms, Eric, Zhihong, and Tierney to chat about administrative functions of our website and how our role in creating the technology-based aspects of the larger project will evolve. After this meeting, I have a much better understanding of what my role is within the larger project.
I feel that a lot of the actual administrative work on the current website that involves organizing pages, categorizing blog posts, etc. is pretty straightforward. I don’t think there will be any struggle on my part keeping up with those functions since I’ve done similar jobs on more simplistic websites before. I think that a good bit of the website design (on a very basic level) comes easily to people who have worked with computers in the past—even casually to browse the internet—so I don’t worry about our students being able to do things like create pages and blog posts. I think my biggest worry about the website management basics for both myself and other members of the class will be making sure that citations are done correctly. Our students are proficient in creating citations in a research capacity, but I expect complications from the new necessity to cite photos, videos, and other multimedia elements.
Other conversation that occurred during this meeting explained about how our larger map will incorporate elements of all of the team projects, in a color-coded diagram on top of a larger map. We will be creating this homepage map with Google MyMap, which Tierney showed us. From the basic introduction, I think this seems like a really useful tool and I could see myself using it to create tools for other programs, possibly for Guilford’s incoming student orientation or even surprise scavenger hunts for friends. Google MyMap is one of the tools we are learning that I think will become extremely helpful as a practical skill. I like that we are using this alternate tool rather than StoryMap to create the larger homepage map. I think this tool adds the flexibility that we need to create a non-chronological, non-linear display of four different projects simultaneously.
I think I understand the importance of our role much better now. This meeting clarified that we are not just doing busy work and data entry—transferring what our students create into map points in a different program—but synthesizing what our groups do into a summary and transferring that information into a cohesive, four-project map.
A New Journey for A New Heart
Hello everyone. I haven’t really blogged before, so I’m not quite sure how to begin, but I’ll give it a shot. I’m a member of the Heart Team, although, like Emily, I was previously a member of the Earth Team. My team transfer initially left me a bit out of the loop. The Heart Team already had a general idea of their focus when I joined, but my new group members and our Silkworm Elena were kind enough to get me up to speed. We eventually decided, based on the collective interests of all Heart teammates, to chart a dual course combining elements of music and dance with religion and ritual. Our newly-established focus led us to examine the cultures of the steppe, where we discovered Mongolian horse culture and the horsehead fiddle. Our topic is temporally broad at the moment, stretching as far into the past as the invention of the iconic instrument and as close to the present as the Mongolian metal scene, but I’m confident that we can create something great out of the wealth of information we stand to uncover.
I serve as the facilitator for the Heart Team. I took on the role when group members noticed that even in my first meeting with the team, I was listening to everyone and offering solutions to potential conflicts in an effort to help guide the brainstorming process. My role also involves keeping group members up to date on the research process and organizing meetings and discussions as they become necessary throughout the process. I haven’t had to perform these duties just yet, but I’m prepared to help keep things on track whenever the need arises. In terms of research, my focus is primarily on the role of music in religious ritual. I also hope to look into how music might be involved in medical practices, if I can find resources on the subject. I’m planning to focus on steppe practices of Shamanism first, and branch out if I can’t find enough information on that topic, or if I come across anything else that I find particularly interesting.
I’ve never conducted a project like this before. From the looks of it, neither have most people in this (completely new) class. I have some limited experience with programming within the relatively specialized setting of a physics laboratory (and maybe a little dabbling with Python), but I don’t consider myself very technologically proficient when it comes to creating digital content. Most of my code has been written for machines (or bewildered humans who aren’t quite sure why hypothetical rockets are hitting the center of Andromeda at the speed of light), so I’ll have to learn a new design mentality alongside any new coding skills I acquire. That said, I have used programming languages before so I hope the thought process isn’t too foreign to me should I need to pick up coding again. Web design on the other hand is an entirely new experience for me, and while it feels relatively intuitive at this early stage, I’m sure the project will find ways to challenge me that I haven’t even begun to think of just yet.
It might also be prudent to mention that I don’t have much of a background in history or religious studies. Although I greatly enjoyed the one religious studies class I’ve taken here at Guilford (Eric’s Tibetan and Himalyan religions comes highly recommended, just be prepared for a challenge), as a lab science double major (Biology and Chemistry), I haven’t had much space in my schedule to take any others. That said, religion and spirituality have always interested me. I don’t consider myself religious or particularly spiritual (I don’t have any adamant convictions one way or the other), but I enjoy learning about and considering all sorts of spiritual and philosophical traditions. I bring this up because I realize that in this endeavor, enthusiasm may be no substitute for genuine depth of knowledge and experience. I expect to learn a whole host of new terms, ideas, modes of thought, customs, rituals, worldviews, and much more. I also expect to have to ask for help somewhere along the way. There will likely come a point where I’m researching a topic that requires insights that others may possess. In this case, I plan to bring up the issue with my teammates and see if our combined capabilities can’t take care of it.
In a similar vein, I don’t have much musical experience. Long ago in ages gone past, my teenage self purchased a guitar to practice with for the summer and more or less forgot about it around a month later. Aside from that non-expertise, I don’t really have any musical background to speak of. Nevertheless, I’m excited to look into musical traditions in the hope that I might learn more as I progress. If our musical research becomes too technical for my limited expertise, I’ll focus more on the ritual side of things and leave the more advanced details to those with the skills to handle them. I’m also looking forward to listening to many different musical pieces as the project progresses, and potentially broadening my taste in music as well.
As I’ve already repeated more than enough times, I haven’t really done anything like this before. I’ve tended to do well with writing-focused research projects in the past, so I’m fairly confident as far as the research side of things is concerned. I do sometimes have issues with time management and sometimes find myself submitting assignments just past the deadline (look at the time this post was created), but I’m aware that I’ll have keep such tendencies in check for the benefit of the group. That said, I also do my best work when I’m given ample time to produce it. As a result, I’ll have to keep constant track of deadlines and make sure to set aside enough time for each stage of the project if I want to succeed. Though it will likely test many of my current skills and a few I haven’t learned yet, I’m looking forward to working with the Heart Team on this exciting endeavor.
First Blog Post: Team Earth and Plants in the Oasis Cities
I was initially placed in the Heart group, which was a sound placement considering that my main passion is music and art in general. I would have enjoyed studying musical instruments on the silk roads, but decided otherwise. The study of plants and their relationships with human society (mainly agriculture and religion) fascinates me deeply. I think that plants are beautiful and incredibly complex. Plants are, on the surface, quite alien to us, yet they’ve become chemically intertwined with human physiology. In order to pursue this interest in an academic setting for the first time, I switched to Team Earth. We initially brainstormed ideas of agriculture, irrigation, oasis cities, and the cultural significance of different herbs and crops. After some deliberation, we focused in on the Taklamakan Desert. Oasis cities were a key aspect of the trade routes that ran along the northern and southern borders of the desert; they allowed merchants to only traverse the desert in the small increments between towns. Those cities had to develop technology to control their environment in order to grow food and maintain the agrarian lifestyle. Of course, only certain crops were able to grow in the harsh environment that accompanies even the fringes of a desert. We plan on researching the diffusion of technological innovations such as irrigation systems and growing methods, the specific crops that were used, and perhaps the spread of different seeds or plants along the silk roads.
Our group has not yet decided on a specific place or time yet. We have the region and subject down, but there are so many options within each. Eric mentioned Samarkand, and Kashgar is a possibility as well. I suppose the time period will be limited by the amount of information we can find. Ideally, we would research different developments over a longer time period, but it may be too difficult. I think that narrowing our focus will be really hard, and will require a good deal of broad, preliminary research.
My individual focus will be on the specific plants used by humans in oasis cities. Whether a plant’s native, where it came from, its nutritional components, it’s prevalence in agriculture, etc. Beyond that, we don’t quite have assigned technical roles, it’s difficult to decide that this early in the project. I like to write, I like to research when I enjoy the subject. I’m pretty good with technology.
That ties into my main anxiety in this project, which really just boils down to time passing us by. It’s easy for me to say now that we can start narrowing things down once we really start researching, but weeks can fly by so easily. The only answer to that fear is to be proactive. I’m working on it. Within discerning our subject of research, my fear is a lack of information about agriculture and of historical documentation in this region. Solving my first problem will solve this one, because once I dive into the sources I found I will know where the information is. I have high expectations for this compilation of knowledge that we are about to create, I’m excited to see where it takes us. It is also exciting that on the trip to China we will travel along the Taklamakan desert and I will finally see what was once only a distant reality during months of research. The sheer amount of information that I will have to dig through this semester overwhelms me, and currently I’m not sure where to start, but I can’t wait to learn it all.
I’d say my work to date is mediocre. I’ve done enough to get by so far, but I haven’t yet thrown myself into the work. I hope that I can deeply dedicate myself to this project whilst battling through my other classes. I found a lot of sources for our project proposal, but I haven’t had time to delve into them yet. I think our group will work well together, we all seem to be on the same page and we have all contributed what we’ve needed to.
Pho and Focus
Greetings readers,
I hope you’re well!
Tonight has been one of fulfillment, of both stomachs and aspirations. Over pho and other East Asian dishes in local Greensboro joint, the Tongue group bonded and had a chance to converse about life without pressure of impending assignments.
At the outset of this project, I was honestly dubious about the results, and would never have imagined it to have gone as well as it has. Being objectively categorized into groups by interests sounded like a common-sense approach to delineate topics, but when I was categorized into the Tongue group I wasn’t sure that I meshed incredibly well with the other members. Instead of being a random amalgamation of oral-related interests (languages, food, social stratification and roles, etc) it seemed that it was a group of three vehemently excited by cuisine and one only mildly. Within this broad interest, we had group members interested in the rise and falls of empires, the role of women along the Silk Road, and linguistic diffusion. I wasn’t quite sure how we could come to a proposal all members were satisfied with.
Therefore our group was initially very malleable: all our fixations were orbiting around “tongue” aspects, but no one could pin down a topic that equally incorporated everyone. After reviewing a timeline of nomads in class and being urged to looking into spices by a professor, we loosely decided upon researching spices and the Xiongnu people. However we soon realized that there were very little sources about either of these (spices had substantially more, but not from the timeline we had honed in on), and it seemed like we were just spinning our proverbial wheels. To start over, two members met with Eric and crafted the idea of focusing on the Kashgar region and following a meal.
Within following a meal from the Kashgar region, our team split into four focuses to make a more adequate attempt at gleaning a speck of knowledge on the topic. Christopher is focused mainly on foodstuffs (yoghurt, meat, vegetables), Zachary on beverages (grain, yoghurt, milk wine), Billie on preparation and consumption (utensils, ovens, dishware), and I of the cultural role (etiquette, types of meal settings, cultural diffusion). More specifically, I’m focusing on the customs and traditions behind dining, serving, and consuming.
I’ll admit that I was a mite disappointed when we shifted from a language-focused topic to one of cuisine, but I soon realized it was a blessing in disguise. I love linguistics, but dealing with translations and mapping of tongues that I’m not even remotely familiar with within the confines of this course would have been impossible. Additionally, it’s much more interesting to foray into an entirely new topic than adding to one with a sustained bank of knowledge. I’m actually very intrigued by the cultural concepts behind food, and how food can translate culture in the stead of a shared language. I’ve always found “exotic” food interesting to the palate and the mind, but the way it originated never sparked in my mind as an area of research. While I’m excited to journey into a new area, I’m a little frightened by my lack of expertise. Everyone else in my group can name food documentaries, dishes, and restaurants off the top of their heads, and I sit there enthralled but reeling. I just hope in my unfamiliarity I don’t drag them behind. We had hoped to dine at Apple China tonight but consumed pho instead, I engulfing myself in a cloud of culinary cultural awareness I didn’t know existed outside of cooking shows.
Anxiety-wise, I’m nervous about research and reception. I’m grateful that my topic is probably the farthest removed from the food itself, but am still unsure of how to find sources. I’ve done many collegiate research papers and projects before and can list numerous sources by rote, but absolutely nothing about food. I’m hoping that I can find guidance in the librarians, the professors, and my group members, but I want to be able to stand as an independent entity, not burdening them. Obviously in the time since writing emerged in Asia there must be enough combined sources, but I’m afraid I won’t access them. As for reception, I’m not quite sure of the effect this project will have. Eric urged us to avoid being daunted by this task, because it will only be “a drop in many oceans”, if that, but I still want our project to be original and significant. Through synthesis of established sources I’m not sure how many radical new ideas will emerge.
At the outset I believed that our group was a thrown together group of individuals, but ended up discovering that Zach, Billie, and Chris had all closely bonded freshman year. This naturally made me feel like an outlier, and wonder how the dynamic would progress. In the beginning I think our issue is that we were too polite with each other: no one dared to say no, or shoot down an idea. A contained version of this is fine when brainstorming, but we ended up in a place where we had a myriad of ideas and couldn’t sacrifice any of them. I think we, or at least I, also felt slightly confused working together because none of us were sure what the actual specific outcome of the class was supposed to be. We had meetings to brainstorm and seemingly got nowhere because we couldn’t decide what to hone in on. However after nailing down the topic of Kashgar cuisine we seem to be doing well. Continuing research on dishes to solidify our plan, but slightly coasting, working towards our next deadline. We’ve spent our time tossing around the ideas of tofu raps and food documentaries and interactive website karaoke. I think once we recognized each other as people other than project partners productivity flourished.
Thus far, I would honestly say that my efforts have been more minimal than they should be, at least in comparison to other members in my group. They’re regularly watching food documentaries and seeking additional context, and I feel like I never have much to add. I’ve completed all the required assignments and pulled my weight in suggested research, but haven’t done much additional research. It’s not for lack of interest; I have a dozen documentaries in my queue. Nor for lack of will. More lack of time in a busy schedule. Between four classes, three clubs, three jobs, and applications, I don’t have much free time to explore my own fancies. I think I’m on-par with the expectations of the course, but not actively engaging enough to satisfy my own curiosities or aspirations.
Overall, I’m very excited for the course and trust in team ingenuity. Thank you for reading.
Regards,
-Delaney
Be Still My Beating Heart, An Initial Blogpost
When we first began the discernment process I was admittedly a little frustrated. As a seasoned (possibly even a slightly jaded) senior at Guilford, I am at the point in my academic career where I have figured out the exact formula for group projects. The catch is that this silk road endeavor simply doesn’t fit into my meticulously sculpted mold due to its experimental, multi-faceted shape. I think the most difficult thing for our group (once we all fell into our respective places regarding broad topical interests) was the sheer breadth of possibilities for our research. Our lack of prior knowledge on the silk road and its endless intricacies made us feel a little bit helpless, like we were flailing around in a stormy sea of JSTOR links, and reminded me of something that one of my favorite theatre professors, Marc Williams, always says about directing exercises: “Limitations are freeing.”
However, once we met outside of the classroom setting in a library alcove and began bouncing ideas off of each other’s bewildered brains, I became immediately inspired: while limitations can certainly be freeing in the sense that a thesis should be pointed in a specific direction and prompts can spark new stories in creative writing, we were actually able to choose our own limitations, to set our own parameters. This is such a cool opportunity because we are picking subjects that legitimately matter to us. We knew that we were interested in everything from music, shamanism, animals, and the steppe regions. Within just a few meetings we came up with the following goal statement: our goal is to determine how the movement, spread, and dispersion of musical traditions in the Mongolian Steppe are related to regional religious and ritual practices. If we do find that they are related, we plan to examine how growth and change in one area might have affected the evolution of the other. One instrument that may have been particularly impactful is the horsehead fiddle, traditionally played in Mongolia and often made at least in part from the animal it emulates. We aim to investigate how the use of the horsehead fiddle is connected to Mongolian horse culture, riding, and ritual. We also suspect that music, dance, and spiritually significant instruments play important roles in the shamanic traditions of the region. In light of this, we may also cover some shamanic practices that relate to our overarching focus on music in the Steppe. Overall, we hope to determine how musical and religious traditions intersect within Steppe culture, and how the exchange of ideas throughout the Silk Roads may have influenced them or helped them spread to other regions.
I am so lucky to have experienced the initial discomfort that I mentioned previously, because I think that it is expanding my previously narrow views of what roles students and teachers should and shouldn’t take in the classroom. We are claiming our own academic autonomies in ways that I don’t think any of us expected coming into the course, and it’s honestly awesome. Intuitive, self-motivated research is such an important skill, and I know that it will serve me far beyond this course. The technological aspects will also serve me farther on down the line, although I am currently feeling very comfortable with WordPress because I have used systems similar to it before. I am also learning about what it means to legitimately trust my peers with important project tasks: Jilly volunteered to upload the final version of the proposal for our team, and it was actually a relief to release my typical inclinations towards micromanagement. I think that this project is already helping me become a better (and more pleasant) team player.
My individual role is technically reporter, which means that I will be articulating our progress to the class. Serving as the vehicle for our syncretism will be good for me because I often approach my personal research in a fairly haphazard fashion: one thing will interest me, and then while I’m delving into sources on that thing I’ll find something else… and so on and so forth until my research becomes a black hole. It will be really nice to be forced to report in an articulate fashion exactly what we have been working on. In addition to reporting our findings, I also have a specialized area of research within the more broad parameters, due to my particular interest in shamanism. Rituals across the entire span of the Silk Road employed various types of music, and I will be researching the introduction of different musical movements and the impact that those changes had on the performative qualities of Shamanism. I am particularly interested in the implementation of horses and horse imagery in rituals, which our group has included in the proposal through the idea of the horse head fiddle.
This is a very busy semester for me, as I am conducting my senior thesis for my Theatre major this fall. While I am beyond excited about all the things that I am learning in this course (my research on the silk road and shamanism currently serves as a sort of break from the madness of the semester), I have not allotted nearly enough time to this project so far. I have only skimmed one of the books that I checked out from the library last week, and I still need to devote a good chunk of time to doing preliminary research online. I am proud of my team’s excitement and our ability to listen compassionately and intelligently to one another, but I am aware that I could be bringing more to our meetings. I plan on doing more research outside of group meetings so that I can focus more on cohesion and that syncretism that I was so excited about when we are all together.
Overall, I think that The Heart team is off to a smooth start, and that we will continue to thump regularly along for the rest of the project. I look forward to updating you all with our findings as the semester progresses.
1st reflective blog post
As a member of the tongue Group I have been quite pumped. Initially our group was centered around cultural interactions as well as the rise and fall of civilization, a fascinating topic but quite open ended. As our group progressed we all shared our interests with the rest of the group. We all had different specific interests but it seemed that we all shared a common interest in food. This is how we discerned our topic from the other options. Within the topic of food is many project options. As a group we decided that focusing on the culture of sitting down for a meal would be the best course of action. The way in which we came to this conclusion was through having a conversation on our passions and what got us excited within the realm of the Silk Road. I hope that as a group we are able to pick a meal that comprehensively shows the culture of the people from Kashgar and explains some of their customs. One of the things I am most looking forward to is discovering the journey of Islam onto this area of the world and what sort of food customs might follow. Some foreseen obstacles are lack of historical cookbooks, culinary sources that tie present food to historical food, and an overall familiarity with this region of China and all the accolades that come with that. Our current research methods are that we are all researching an individual aspect of Uyghur cuisine and that eventually our research will culminate on tieing all our information together.My personal thoughts are that this is a wonderful idea for a group project, the real work will be finding a dish that represents such a vast culinary horrizion. To the west we have “middle eastern” food; some typical dishes would be lamb kebabs, rice biryani, samosas, Naan and other dishes of the sort. To the east there is noodles, stir frys, dumplings and many more culinary dreams. With all of these culinary options I feel slightly dazed and confused about how to make sense of this. Which foods should my group represent? What dishes are more Uyghur? How do we know? These are all questions that I am asking at this early stage of group work.
As a team we were initially recommended to check out the maritime trade routes and the role of spices,while this is an interesting topic the group was not sold on the idea. We went around in a circle and then started talking about our interests. Chris started us off by speaking on his interest in the rise and fall of civilization, particularly their collapse. I then spoke on my passion for all things food related. This note definitely struck up some similar feelings in Billie who then shared with the group her passions. Billie seemed primarily interested in the culinary interactions between cultures and how they took place, from a merchant traveling or perhaps through a translator? This area of inquiry has yet to go answered by the group. Lastly, Delaney spoke on her interests too. She spoke on social stratification and in what form did it exist in the cultures we will be studying.
After the class period had ended we all decided to meet in the library to have a quick meeting and help define our area of study. So Chris, Billie, Delaney, and I all met in the library. Upon arrival we all warmly welcomed each other and began to spitball ideas. Relatively quickly we settled on the concept of a meal. The reason why we chose this concept is because of all the facets of a meal. With the dishes that are made, there is a style of presentation, typically there are food cultures and customs as well as typical setting for certain foods and this comprehensive view of a meal excites us. After narrowing down our topic to a meal we discussed what region and culture and time period we would like to explore. Although we all had interest in the past we decided to start with the present due to the need for sources. We also figured that tracking back in time would be lots easier that trying to track forward in time. Next we chose Kashgar as our point of interest, this was due to Kashgar having a central location on the silk road as well as its regional significance as the capital of the Uyghur state in China, Xinjiang. The culture of the Uyghur people will also be a fascinating part of our group research. I say this due to the little amount of preliminary knowledge I have on the Uyghur people. I know that they are of Muslim faith and of Turkic ethnicity. Both of these tidbits on the Uyghur culture provide valuable insight into how they stand out culturally in China . Being either or Turkic and Muslim in China makes you a minority but both is a double whammy! This sort of distance from the Han make for an interesting dynamic that I am excited to learn about.
Some things I look forward to the most in this project are research on earthen ovens and honey drinks! Both of which pertained to the main topic of a meal in Kashgar, yet both have their own place in history as well as my heart. First the earthen oven; equivocal to a tandoori oven in India; the earthen ovens of Kashgar serve the same role. As a household’s main source of culinary heat and helps develop the Char taste equated with certain dishes know to be prepared in these ovens. Not only does there use and role in the kitchen fascinate me; but the actually logistics of how these ovens are built also calls to me. Hopefully our group will be able to build one in conjunction with the rest of our project. In conclusion the Tongue Group is looking good! We are very excited at this stage of the class and hope to build off this momentum and bring together something really special.
Initial Reflection-Elise Tangedal
One thing that definitely helped speed up the decision-making process were the interest sheets we filled out and the preliminary groups that Eric and Zhihong created. That way, since we all had similar interests, we could begin to narrow down a topic within those interests, rather than having to go through all the options the Silk Road can offer. All of us were interested in the rights of women and other marginalized people.We also had an interest in the effects of religion on women, along with the impact of women on spirituality, education, and health. We then tried to further narrow this topic down through discussion of specific areas or groups we were interested in, like nomads and pastoral societies or Afro-Eurasian sites. We also tried to find a certain time period, or ways of comparison, like historical versus contemporary, as points to use to focus our narrative. Eventually, we focused on a more recent period of time, the 18th and 20th centuries, in order to get the most information about the topics that we found most interesting. We also chose the Arabian Sea area, and chose to look at the effects Islam had on topics such as health, femininity, queer identities (if there are sources available), standards of beauty, and race. In order to get to a more narrow and specific topic, we used some of the strategies that had been discussed in class. In summary, to get to our topic we found common or related personal interests and then narrowed the topic to focus on those things.
My role in this group is as the facilitator as well as the harmonizer. I am comfortable not only with being a leader, but also with communicating with others, which will be necessary for setting up meeting times. I also think I am suited for being a harmonizer because I am often calm and nonbiased, and so I can help others through any problems.
The subtopic I will be focusing on for this project is health, which I am pretty excited about. I have almost never done a project on physical health (I am normally more focused on a mental health perspective), so I am looking forward to learning more about a topic I’ve barely even thought about before. It’s not one I would have necessarily chosen for myself, but the more I’ve thought about it, the more it seems to fit. I like learning about different ways of looking at and solving problems, and am also wondering what similarities I’ll find. Since it is a topic I know next to nothing about, I’m wondering if it will open up new areas of interests I had never thought about before. So even though it is not the topic I would have pictured myself doing, I am not disappointed.
I think my biggest anxieties are about the making of an online map and the amount of work ahead of us.I have very little experience with technology, so I am worried that the map will present many challenges and technical difficulties. I am also worried about the amount of information we are going to be collecting: since we are tackling a few different topics, it may be difficult to synthesize into a cohesive narrative. I do have hope that our topic will come together though: a lot of the subtopics can be related to each other. Teiji’s topic of race and beauty standards relates well to Nathan’s possible topic of femininity, since all those topics emphasize physical perspectives on women. My topic of health and Jamie’s topic of education also go well together, since the standard of education could be correlated with the quality of health care women receive. Perception of women can also play into all of our topics, since negative perceptions of women could lead to inferior education and less care when it comes to women’s health. But even though our subtopics have all of this similarities and connections, an overabundance or a lack of information would still disrupt cohesiveness. So, another thing I am slightly worried about is being able to find enough information about certain topics, such as queer identities.
So far, I feel our team dynamic has been incredibly positive, and we haven’t had to deal with any issues in that regard, at least from my perspective. We have been very respectful and supportive of each other’s ideas, as well as trying our best to find solutions and make revisions in order to better support our interest. One good example of this was Teiji doing her best to help Nathan get a chance to research his preferred topic, by asking a lot of questions about possible ways it could be done. The group has also been flexible, having the ability to support the plan even if their original ideas didn’t make it. I, for example, originally wanted to study nomadic cultures. But as the plan solidified, more team members wanted to study the more Arabic areas of the Silk Road. I went with it, and I am now very excited for and interested in our current place of research, even though it wasn’t what I originally wanted.
One thing I am interested in trying to find for research is sources from within the area itself. A lot of times, with these areas along the Silk Road, we see a European perspective rather than the viewpoint of the inhabitants. I hope that these sources are not scarce and that we get a chance to fully experience these perspectives.
I think that I have done a lot of good work in class when it comes to brainstorming and coming up with ideas, and helping to narrow the topic. I also have gotten a lot of information from the assigned readings in the class. One thing I do need to start doing, however, is some outside research on my own time. Now that we have our overarching area and our subtopics decided, I need to start getting some information about my individual topic. Also, as facilitator, I need to find a time for our group to meet and work.