(Re)placing the Terengganu Peranakan Chinese as “Mek Awang”: Making Chinatown and Heritagising the Peranakan Identities in Kuala Terengganu

2021 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
Hong Chuang Loo ◽  
Giok Hun Pue ◽  
Puay Liu Ong
Keyword(s):  
Participant Observation ◽  
Heritage Tourism ◽  
Brand Name ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
National Heritage ◽  
Cultural Terms ◽  
Ethnic Category ◽  
Simple Change ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Depth Interviews

In 2017, the Terengganu Chinese Peranakan Association (TCPA) withdrew its participation in the 4th Annual Terengganu Peranakan Festival (TPF) organised by the Terengganu Chinese Chamber of Commerce and Industry (TCCCI) because of a dispute over the combined term “Mek Awang”. To TCPA members, Mek Awang is a derogatory term, which the Malays used to refer to someone as being “soft”, effeminate, or a cross-dresser. However, TCCCI has appropriated the term Mek Awang and used it as a brand name to promote the festival, and to highlight the “uniqueness” of the Terengganu Peranakan Chinese community. This case is an example of how local cultural terms or practices have been readapted to suit tourism interests. Tourism is often accused of reinventing culture for capital ventures. Consequently, many academics and social critics have come to regard official national heritage sites and heritage tourism with scepticism and disdain. Combining ethnographic data from our in-depth interviews with the Terengganu Peranakan Chinese and our participant observation during the festival, we argue that the dispute over Mek Awang is not only a simple change in reference, but is also an indication of a deeper contemporary global process that affects ethnic minorities and their identities. We conclude that various attempts to commodify the peranakan experiences and culture in Terengganu as well as the intention to place the peranakan as a marketable heritage in Chinatown can be interpreted as attempts to replace a heterogeneous community with a homogeneous, uniform, genetic and identifiable ethnic category with a Peranakan1 (with capital “P”) identity.

Preferences for Heritage Tourism Development Using a Choice Modeling Approach

2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (6) ◽  
pp. 747-759 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason Draper ◽  
Chi-OK OH ◽  
Rich Harrill
Keyword(s):  
South Carolina ◽  
Heritage Tourism ◽  
Political Support ◽  
Choice Modeling ◽  
The South ◽  
Cultural Experience ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
National Heritage ◽  
Tourism Attractions ◽  
Development And Management

Development and management of heritage tourism attractions pose several challenges, such as lack of financial resources and political support. heritage sites and attractions often include numerous attributes (e.g., education, guided tours, shopping for local products) that can be provided at various levels of involvement and interest. however, the financial constraints of heritage tourism sites inhibit the ability to improve programs and services. The purpose of this study is to identify and compare the preferences of consumers and ambassadors (i.e., local tourism and community leaders) for improving management programs and services of the South Carolina National heritage Corridor using a choice modeling method. Both groups were generally in favor of developing more opportunities for local shopping, education/interpretation, and enhancing the cultural experience when visiting the South Carolina National heritage Corridor. however, ambassadors were more in favor of developing education/interpretation and the cultural experience compared to consumers. As agencies develop programs and services designed to increase visitation, preference information from different constituent groups are valuable to effectively decide what programs and services to develop.

A Language of Their Own: An Interactionist Approach to Human-Horse Communication

2004 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 299-316 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keri Brandt
Keyword(s):  
Participant Observation ◽  
The Body ◽  
Shared Meaning ◽  
Verbal Language ◽  
Language System ◽  
Research Challenges ◽  
Privileged Status ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Interactionist Approach

AbstractThis paper explores the process of human-horse communication using ethnographic data of in-depth interviews and participant observation. Guided by symbolic interactionism, the paper argues that humans and horses co-create a language system by way of the body to facilitate the creation of shared meaning. This research challenges the privileged status of verbal language and suggests that non-verbal communication and language systems of the body have their own unique complexities. This investigation of humanhorse communication offers new possibilities to understand the subjective and intersubjective world of non-verbal language using beings—human and nonhuman alike.

‘Come Night-time, It’s a War Zone’: Women’s Experiences of Homelessness, Risk and Public Space

2020 ◽  
Vol 60 (5) ◽  
pp. 1136-1154 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helena Menih
Keyword(s):  
Public Space ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Night Time ◽  
Cultural Discourses ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
War Zone ◽  
Field Notes ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Depth Interviews

Abstract This paper explores constructions of ‘risk’ in the lives of women experiencing homelessness in Brisbane, Australia. Drawing on ethnographic data, including in-depth interviews, informal conversations and participant observation field notes, two main themes emerged: the narratives or risk; women navigating risk on the streets by employing transiency, invisibility and squatting. The analysis indicates that women consider the ways in which risk calculations are spatially and temporally located and argues that risk is embedded in social and cultural discourses of gender. Women experiencing homelessness face particular risks due to gendered spatiality and have to manage their spatialized selves to avoid everyday risks on the streets.

Safeguarding National Heritage through Conservation of Oral History Collections at Bulawayo National Archives, Zimbabwe

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vimbayi Natalie Nhenga-Mugarisanwa ◽  
Peterson Dewah
Keyword(s):  
Oral History ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Case Study Research ◽  
Storage Conditions ◽  
Annual Reports ◽  
Conservation Unit ◽  
National Heritage ◽  
National Archives ◽  
Digital Formats ◽  
Depth Interviews

 Oral history collections are vital assets that represent national heritage. While transcribed collections are kept in a proper archival repository at the Bulawayo National Archives, the audio-visual collections are kept unprocessed and unprotected in unsuitable housing such as cardboard boxes within the Principal Archivist’s office. Storage conditions are not conducive and therefore, unbearable. The study, therefore, explored issues relating to how national heritage contained in oral history collections can be protected through conservation at the institution. In this regard, the study opted to employ the qualitative research methodology, using the case study research design. The informants were purposively sampled, while data were collected through questionnaires, in-depth interviews, and document analysis. Questionnaires were administered to the chosen respondents through hand delivery. Researchers conducted in-depth interviews that lasted between 20–30 minutes. The Director’s Annual Reports from 1990 to 2016 were analysed for the study. The findings of the study indicated that the Bulawayo National Archives captures and stores oral history in paper, cassettes, magnetic tape, and digital formats, and according to various subject areas; which include chieftaincy, minority groups, land question, religion and liberation wars. However, the institution does not have a conservation unit nor an Oral Historian in charge of the collections. In this regard, we recommend that the institution sets up a conservation unit to protect oral history collections, and facilitate the restoration of the already damaged and deteriorated oral history collections. 

Do we form or deform? Qualitative Investigation in Public Hospitals of Madrid

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
María Jesús Gómez Camuñas ◽  
Purificación González Villanueva
Keyword(s):  
Participant Observation ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Public Hospitals ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Business Growth ◽  
Small Hospital ◽  
Student Learn ◽  
Depth Interviews

<div><i>Background</i>: the creative capacities and the knowledge of the employees are components of the intellectual capital of the company; hence, their training is a key activity to achieve the objectives and business growth. <i>Objective</i>: To understand the meaning of learning in the hospital from the experiences of its participants through the inquiry of meanings. <i>Method</i>: Qualitative design with an ethnographic approach, which forms part of a wider research, on organizational culture; carried out mainly in 2 public hospitals of the Community of Madrid. The data has been collected for thirteen months. A total of 23 in-depth interviews and 69 field sessions have been conducted through the participant observation technique. <i>Results</i>: the worker and the student learn from what they see and hear. The great hospital offers an unregulated education, dependent on the professional, emphasizing that they learn everything. Some transmit the best and others, even the humiliating ones, use them for dirty jobs, focusing on the task and nullifying the possibility of thinking. They show a reluctant attitude to teach the newcomer, even if they do, they do not have to oppose their practice. In short, a learning in the variability, which produces a rupture between theory and practice; staying with what most convinces them, including negligence, which affects the patient's safety. In the small hospital, it is a teaching based on a practice based on scientific evidence and personalized attention, on knowing the other. Clearly taught from the reception, to treat with caring patience and co-responsibility in the care. The protagonists of both scenarios agree that teaching and helping new people establish lasting and important personal relationships to feel happy and want to be in that service or hospital. <i>Conclusion</i>: There are substantial differences related to the size of the center, as to what and how the student and the novel professional are formed. At the same time that the meaning of value that these health organizations transmit to their workers is inferred through the training, one orienting to the task and the other to the person, either patient, professional or pupil and therefore seeking the common benefit.</div>

Informalitas Dalam Formalitas: Sebuah Kajian Budaya Organisasi Perusahaan Keluarga

2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 200
Author(s):  
Hardiyanti Munsi ◽  
Ahmad Ismail
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Values ◽  
Family Business ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
National Level ◽  
Ideal Types ◽  
The Family ◽  
Formal Organizations ◽  
Religious Aspects ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Big Men

This article intends to identify and to describe the unique structure and the managing style that owns primordial characteristics, that is giving significance to kinship, religion, and local Bugis cultural values, which made up the cultural system of PT. Hadji Kalla family business. Theoritically, this research was inspired from Weberian perspective on the ideal types of bureaucracy, that observes organizations (in this case is the family business) as one of the socio-cultural phenomena which is neutral and value-free, that is place aside its subjective aspects. The research was conducted in two locations, the head office and one of the branch offices using qualitative approach that relies on participant observation, in-depth interviews, and literature studies. The results of the research shows that the family business of PT. Hadji Kalla that has advanced into national level still prioritizes kinship, ethnicity, and religious aspects in the daily activities of the company. The value even take parts in providing the company’s colour to the urban societies in various districts where the company stands. This means that although the society has undergone transformations, it doesn’t mean that the primordial value, and the elements that exist outside of businesses (such as kinship, big men, religion, cultural values, and interest) do not influence the activities that are held in formal organizations. Therefore, the interventions of subjective aspects will always appear, followed with the application of the modern management system that is implemented by PT. Hadji Kalla company.

Adopting a mojo mindset: Training newspaper reporters in mobile journalism

Journalism ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 146488492199628
Author(s):  
Anja Salzmann ◽  
Frode Guribye ◽  
Astrid Gynnild
Keyword(s):  
Thematic Analysis ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Publishing House ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Specific Training ◽  
New Production ◽  
Visual Storytelling ◽  
Training Course ◽  
News Organizations ◽  
Depth Interviews

Due to the visual turn in journalism and the emergence of mobile journalism, many newspaper journalists have had to change the way they work and learn to use new tools. To face these changes, traditional news organizations apply different strategies to increase staff competencies in using new production tools and creating innovative content in new formats. In this paper, we investigate how a specific training arrangement was experienced by a group of 40 print editors and journalists in a German regional publishing house. The journalists were introduced to audio-visual storytelling and reporting with smartphones in a 2-week training course. The training arrangements were studied using participant observation and in-depth interviews, followed by a thematic analysis of the data. The study indicates that for print journalists and editors, the transition from the print to the mojo mindset depends on three dimensions: (i) mastering mojo skills, (ii) adopting visual thinking and (iii) integrating ethical and legal awareness.

scholarly journals Social entrepreneurship and social enterprise phenomenon: toward a collective approach to social innovation in Tunisia

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bechir Fridhi
Keyword(s):  
Social Entrepreneurship ◽  
Social Innovation ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Social Entrepreneurs ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
Entrepreneurial Action ◽  
Collective Construction ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Real Challenge ◽  
Collective Dimension

AbstractThis article aims to understand the extent to which social entrepreneurship (SE) contributes to the construction of a collective dimension linked to social innovation (SI). We aim to propose new ideas that can deliver insights into the SE phenomenon. This research is also distinct from entrepreneurial ecosystems as its development already requires some successful entrepreneurial action and to do it, the structuring and consolidation of an entrepreneurial ecosystem constitutes a real challenge for the development of SI.This work has been based on a participant observation of eight major events dedicated to social entrepreneurship or the shared economy. In-depth interviews with Tunisian social entrepreneurs were also conducted in order to enrich our corpus. The results show the necessary cooperation of social entrepreneurs for a sustainable and responsible social innovation. Indeed, the analysis emphasizes that the viability and sustainability of a social innovation rests essentially on a collective construction, beyond common social values.

scholarly journals Intersection of the Religious and the Secular: The Cemetery Festival in Latvia

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 69
Author(s):  
Anita Stasulane
Keyword(s):  
Participant Observation ◽  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
Main Research ◽  
Religious Ritual ◽  
Secular Society ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Ritual Practices ◽  
Research Tools

This article addresses the commemoration of the deceased by examining a peculiar Latvian religious tradition—the cemetery festival. Latvian society is moving down the path to secularization. Participation in religious ritual practices could be expected to decrease in a predominately secular society. Nevertheless, the tradition of the cemetery festival practiced in Latvia shows that the relationship between the religious and the secular is much more complex than simply being in opposition to each other. The analysis is based on data obtained by undertaking fieldwork at cemeteries in Latvia. Participant observation and qualitative in-depth interviews were the main research tools used in the fieldwork. Through an analysis of the fieldwork data, this article explains, first, how honoring of the deceased currently takes place in Latvia; second, the factors which have determined the preservation of the cemetery festival tradition despite the forced secularization of the Soviet period and the general secularization encountered today; third, the relationship between religious and secular activities and their transformation at the cemetery festival.

scholarly journals Collective Identity Supporting Sustainability Transformations in Ecovillage Communities

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (15) ◽  
pp. 8148
Author(s):  
Ciska Ulug ◽  
Lummina Horlings ◽  
Elen-Maarja Trell
Keyword(s):  
Interpersonal Relationships ◽  
Collective Identity ◽  
The United States ◽  
Community Life ◽  
Collective Identities ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Mainstream Society ◽  
Sustainability Principles ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Scholarly Attention

Ecovillages are collective projects that attempt to integrate sustainability principles into daily community life, while also striving to be demonstration projects for mainstream society. As spaces of experimentation, they can provide valuable insights into sustainability transformations. Through shared values and interpersonal connections, ecovillages possess collective identities, which provide a platform for enacting their ideals. However, many ecovillage residents question how to best enhance their role as models, resource centers, and pieces of a greater movement toward sustainability transformations, while simultaneously preserving their unique community and identity. In relation to the above, this paper addresses the questions: What can collective identity in ecovillage communities teach us about the objective and subjective dimensions of sustainability transformations? Furthermore, how can the perspective of collective identity highlight challenges for ecovillages for initiating sustainability transformations? Sustainability transformations encompass objective (behaviors) and subjective (values) dimensions; however, the interactions between these spheres deserve more scholarly attention. Using ethnographic data and in-depth interviews from three ecovillages in the United States, this paper reveals the value in collective identity for underscoring belonging and interpersonal relationships in sustainability transformations. Furthermore, the collective identity perspective exposes paradoxes and frictions between ecovillages and the societal structures and systems they are embedded within.

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