{"id":686,"date":"2013-09-20T03:27:04","date_gmt":"2013-09-20T03:27:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beta.dminlgp.com\/?p=686"},"modified":"2014-08-13T22:18:08","modified_gmt":"2014-08-13T22:18:08","slug":"smells-sights-and-sounds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/smells-sights-and-sounds\/","title":{"rendered":"Smells, Sights and Sounds …"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have a confession.\u00a0 This book had me before I reached the end of the first page in the Introduction.\u00a0 Three simple words: place, memory, and imagination did it for me.\u00a0 If sensory ethnography includes these things then I am \u201cin.\u201d\u00a0 When we think about senses we think of the five senses we grew up learning about (maybe in a health or science class?).\u00a0 Some of us may even have had our senses explained through a song in a Sunday School classroom years earlier.\u00a0 Did anyone ever sing, \u201cBe careful little eyes what you see; be careful little ears what you hear?\u201d\u00a0 Maybe it is a good thing that I do not remember the rest of the words!\u00a0 But rather than wrap place, memory and imagination around our senses, Pink peeks into the linkages so that we might approach research and discovery invested in awareness of and practice in perception, meanings and values, and categories utilizing sensory practices.\u00a0 Utilizing sensory ethnography opens the door for new ways of knowing.[1]<\/a>\u00a0 It provides another vantage point from which to recognize and understand what is before us.<\/p>\n

The highlight of reading (and digesting) Pink\u2019s writing comes when she applies theories to practice.\u00a0 I did not expect to be reading about the home \u201cas an environment that is constituted, experienced, understood, evaluated and maintained through all the senses.\u201d[2]<\/a>\u00a0 But it absolutely is.<\/p>\n

As she was writing about the British and Spanish research participants I was thinking about what I learned from my mother and how I thought that changing the sheets on the bed and ironing was always done on Saturdays. Traditions surrounding holidays and special occasions all had a particular rhythm and expectation.\u00a0 I recognized how these subtle habits of home involved the senses.\u00a0 I also confess that there was one particular smell that I thoroughly enjoyed; it brought anticipation until I realized what it meant.\u00a0 I recall falls days coming home from swim practice, approaching the back door when I would catch the scent of fried onions, which meant only one thing, liver and onions for dinner.\u00a0 Let\u2019s just say my now-adult children have never ever had liver for dinner.\u00a0 Some memories that were not so wonderful still provide a sense of place.<\/p>\n

Throughout the book I found that I was relating to sensory ethnography through two distinctions.\u00a0 One was my own personal experience and the other involved my imagination, more precisely my imagination (and wonder) concerning sensory ethnography and the Church.\u00a0 When Pink wrote, \u201cIt is in these types<\/em> of place that most often become the locations for and subjects\/objects of ethnography as researches strive to understand how people\u2019s lives are lived out and felt and they inhabit and move through, for instance, the home, a city or a hospital.\u201d[3]<\/a> On the book\u2019s margin I wrote, \u201cWhat is the relationship to church as place?\u00a0 How do we understand how people\u2019s lives are lived and felt, how do they move through and interact with their church space?\u201d<\/p>\n

Reflecting on young adults leaving the church I found myself wondering what might we discover if we were considered embodied knowledge, what would we find?\u00a0 How is knowledge transferred?\u00a0 How is it passed on?\u00a0 Referring to the work of Tim Ingold, it is not a formula that conveys knowledge, but in paying attention, engaging in perception and action.\u00a0 We learn by doing, through practice.\u00a0 When we do something alongside another the potential exists that it will become our experience.[4]<\/a><\/p>\n

As I consider possible areas for research I wonder what would our churches tell us?\u00a0 What memories are embedded in ritual and practice that we may have ignored?\u00a0 How might we utilize memory and imagination?[5]<\/a>\u00a0 How might we help them remember?\u00a0 What is it they need to be reminded of?\u00a0 Rather than think of imagination as something pretend, Pink sees imagination as an integral aspect of our everyday individual lives and our ways of being in the world. Imagination may draw from the past experience of one person and the present experience of another, these experiences may merge together.[6]<\/a>\u00a0 How does the Church embody imagination?<\/p>\n

If sensory ethnography is part of \u201can approach to understanding other people\u2019s experiences, values, identities and ways of life,\u201d[7]<\/a> then it is necessary for us to develop strategies to reflect upon our role, sensory subjectivity <\/em>as well as understand how our relationship with those we are researching may flux and change, sensory inter-subjectivity<\/em>.[8]<\/a>\u00a0 Even in developing strategies we have to be aware that Sensory Ethnography is more reflective and we need to be adaptable and flexible in our approach.\u00a0 Pink included section titles with words like \u201cBeing There,\u201d \u201cIntentionally Joining Others,\u201d \u201cEating Together,\u201d and \u201cWalking with Others\u201d[9]<\/a> in her chapter on \u201cRe-sensing Participant Observation.\u201d\u00a0 It might be a slight stretch but as I read Pink I continued to think about Paul\u2019s references to the Church as the Body of Christ.\u00a0 These words may be tools for ethnography but they are also words of spiritual praxis.<\/p>\n

A few years ago there was a movie out which replayed the same action again and again, each time from another point of view.\u00a0 It was redundant, even boring at times, because any fresh insights seemed inconsequential. However, bit-by-bit the pieces \u2013 the sounds, the smells, and the actions of those in the crowd all were significant in realizing the full story.\u00a0 One person\u2019s viewpoint was just that; it provided limited knowledge.\u00a0 Utilizing sensory ethnography we have an opportunity to not allow what I see to dominate, but to engage my senses, connect with my emotions and to turn to those participating to give their voice opportunity to speak, to respond, to connect with their senses.\u00a0 I wonder what we will learn from one another and with one another.<\/p>\n

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[1]<\/a> Sarah Pink, Doing Sensory Ethnography. <\/em>\u00a0(London: Sage Publications, 2009), 10.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[2] Ibid., 13<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[3] Ibid., 31. Types <\/em>of places referenced include home-place, workplace and visiting place (Casey, 1996:44)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[4]<\/a> \u00a0Ibid., 35.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[5]<\/a> \u00a0Ibid., 38.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[6] Ibid., 39, 40.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[7]<\/a> Ibid., 45<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[8] Ibid., 53.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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[9] Ibid., 65, 72, 73 & 76.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have a confession.\u00a0 This book had me before I reached the end of the first page in the Introduction.\u00a0 Three simple words: place, memory, and imagination did it for me.\u00a0 If sensory ethnography includes these things then I am \u201cin.\u201d\u00a0 When we think about senses we think of the five senses we grew up […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[264],"class_list":["post-686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-pink-se","cohort-lgp4"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=686"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2017,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/686\/revisions\/2017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}