ANTHMETHGRP1-24-25-RAEESA-BHANJI

[Last modified: December, 2 2024 09:09 PM]

The example my group was given for this practical element was about a student who wanted to conduct fieldwork on women domestic abuse survivors in Pakistan. The student had already previously worked at the refuge where they intended to recruit participants.

There are a few reasons why our group did not think this project would get ethical approval. Most evidently, the power dynamic between the student and their potential participants is a challenging one to navigate, as the women who are staying at this refuge are in a vulnerable position and rely on the student and the other refuge staff for their safety. It would be next to impossible to guarantee willing consent in a situation like this.

Secondly, the risk to benefit ratio isn’t clearly articulated in the example. What is this student hoping to raise awareness about with regard to domestic abuse survivors? Because there is potential risk to participants – either by having their identity and whereabouts disclosed or by re-traumatizing them – there needs to be clear reasoning for why that risk should be undertaken.

The example mentions that, having worked at the refuge, the student planned to use interviews from before getting ethical approval. This was another flag our group raised that would likely be grounds for denying the ethical review of the fieldwork. The only interview that this student could use before getting written consent is the interview that was published in the media. With that said, it would be best practice for the student to re-establish consent with the participant in that interview, as consent should not be considered irrevocable even if the material is public domain.

We suggested a few possible alternatives that the student could consider in order to make their fieldwork less ethically risky. First, the student could consider interviewing workers at the refuge, or other advocates within the community. These people would be less at risk of harm by being interviewed, and there would not be such a clear power imbalance. If the student felt strongly that they wanted to interview survivors, it would be better to consider interviewing women who were no longer at the refuge. In that case, it would still be important for the student to ensure that someone was available to psychologically support those interviews in order to avoid causing any undue harm to participants.

Though there were many areas where we felt this project was ethically risky, there are ways in which the student could still pursue the themes of women domestic abuse survivors in Pakistan while maintaining good ethical boundaries.

[Last modified: November, 25 2024 11:38 AM]

Theatre of the Oppressed is an interesting research technique to help uncover people’s beliefs without directly asking them. Why did they assume a certain gender or status of an actor? What cultural norms did they act out in a conflict? It also has the benefit of being an embodied practice, which gives you additional information that an interview alone could not.

The collaborative nature of the exercise also takes the researcher out of the outsider role and into the activity with participants, which can help diminish the power dynamics that exist in a conventional interviewer/participant relationship. In this practice, the researcher is as much a participant as everyone else.

Ideally data would be collected by video to preserve as much of the spect-actors original wording and physicality as possible. On the other hand, the presence of a camera might make participants nervous and discourage full participation. Having someone present to take notes could be an option, but that would still disrupt the exercise. Ultimately it will depend on the context and who your participants are. There would need to be a balance of gathering as much firsthand data as possible while maintaining an open, trusting space for participation.

There are a number of ethical considerations in using Theatre of the Oppressed as a research method. One is that the situation being acted out might be distressing for participants. Secondly, not everyone might feel comfortable participating, which means that the data collected would be largely from people who felt comfortable speaking in front of a crowd. Another consideration might be how involved the researcher is in the activity, and whether their participation would impact the way participants engage with the activity. Lastly, depending on where you’re conducting your research, language might be a barrier. Though language is still a consideration in interviews, participating in an improvised activity would require a better grasp of the language your participants speak.

I think this could be an interesting research technique for my pilot project, especially as it relates to gender power structures. I think this could be an interesting way to discover more subconscious attitudes about gender roles, sexuality, and power that might not come out in an interview. The benefit of doing an activity like Theatre of the Oppressed is that it allows you to address sensitive topics without having to ask directly about them. I think it would be important to pair the activity with a semi-stuctured or unstructured interview to also get participant’s own reflections on the activity, which would provide another interesting data point.

[Last modified: November, 15 2024 03:58 PM]

“How do I always pick the busiest time to come to Waitrose? Or is it always like this?” I think to myself as I awkwardly try to get around a group of students exiting the store. This Waitrose has become a frequent stop for me, yet I still find myself moving through the space without any real direction. Everyone in this Waitrose seems like they would rather be literally anywhere else.

I circle the same aisles over and over, trying to understand why cheesecake and pasta salad occupy the same shelf. Some products I’m used to seeing back home simply don’t exist in this Waitrose, but I scan the shelves nonetheless, as if though on the fourth scan rice vinegar will suddenly appear. Weaving through the aisles exhausts me.

I never quite know where to stand when I’m surveying the shelves. No matter what, I feel like I’m in someone’s way. I spend longer than I would like looking at each item. The brands are unfamiliar, and the order is seemingly random. I worry that if I stand in the aisle for too long, it’ll become evident I’m not from here. I try to keep my arms close to me and keep my body contained so as not to be more in the way than I already am.

The giveaway always seems to be the dance patrons do to get around each other in an aisle. Back home, that dance feels rehearsed and predictable, but here it seems like I never get the steps right. Another shopper and I step to the same side, so I faintly whisper “sorry” as if to acknowledge that it must’ve been me who made the misstep.

The end of my grocery trip isn’t usually marked by finding every item I need so much as it is my resolve to continue looking wearing off. I always forget to grab a basket when I come in, so once my arms are precariously filled with items that barely make up a meal I make my way to the self checkout.

Self checkout is the final test to prove to everyone in this Waitrose that I know what I’m doing. Being the most efficient at self checkout is the goal. You have to scan the checkout kiosks as you move up the line so that as soon as one frees up, you’re right there. Remember to put your items on the right side – no, the left – until you scan them. Waitrose card, pay, reorganise the items in your arms again. The end is nearly in sight. I feel my shoulders relax as I exit the store.

[Last modified: November, 5 2024 03:07 AM]

Since my project is related to women online, and more specifically women in content that elicits strong reactions from viewers, it feels as though there is an inherent political dimension to my pilot research project. Whether or not mukbangs are perceived as sexual, mukbangs subvert the societal expectation that women should not overly indulge in food. Mukbangs being perceived as either disgusting or sexual reflects the puritanical idea that women’s pleasure is either revolting or fetishized.

Mukbangs are mainly created by East Asian creators, which makes sense since mukbangs originated in Korea. Now that mukbangs are more widespread on platforms like Instagram and YouTube, there is something worth exploring as it pertains to the racial dynamics between creators and viewers. At this point I don’t have any assumptions about what this dynamic could be, however my own positionality might lead me to explore how racial fetishization could be an aspect of mukbangs.

I’ve chosen to put equal weight in speaking to both creators and viewers in order to ensure that the content creators, who are primarily women, are given the opportunity to speak about how they perceive their own content. It’s important that content creators are reflected as having agency in the creation and distribution of their content, as opposed to passive actors who are creating content within a vacuum outside of existing social structures.

My own positionality as a woman of colour makes it easier for me to investigate the ways in which mukbangs are still exemplary of existing social standards placed on women. As someone who is not against online sex work or online fetish content, I believe that I’m in a position to research this topic without placing judgement on the content itself.

It’s possible that my research may, under the wrong circumstances, lead people to feel the need to censor mukbang content from Instagram or YouTube. I think it will be important to speak with viewers who may have other motivations for engaging with mukbang content, for example people who watch it while eating to feel a sense of companionship.

[Last modified: October, 28 2024 11:58 AM]

A classic London day: damp, grey, and not quite cold. If you sit outside long enough, the damp eventually seeps into your skin, somehow cooling you from the inside out. Despite that, every bench in Gordon Square was occupied. Mostly by people alone, looking at their phones, or occasionally taking a nap. Unlike everywhere else in the city, there’s almost no noise. It’s hard to tell if everyone is whispering or if the greenery has muffled the sound. There are no dogs in the park, but there is wildlife in the trees and on the pathway. Beside me, three people are quietly feeding a growing pack of birds. Mostly made up of pigeons, they moved like a tide getting progressively closer and then retreating once they had grabbed enough crumbs. A few crows made up the back of the crowd, and a singular squirrel staked out the perimeter from a tree. I was surprised to see anyone feeding birds at all. This is the first time since moving to London that I’ve seen anyone interact with local wildlife, so it felt especially surprising to see three young people midday on Friday feeding birds. More than that, they weren’t just passively feeding the birds while talking or scrolling on their phones. They seemed to be sitting in complete silence other than to sometimes point at the group of birds and say something. If the front of the crowd was taking too much of the rations, the people would deliberately throw food towards the back.

Though I had taken bullet form notes, the words I had jotted down helped set the scene and place me back in the context of the field. I do wish I had taken more detailed physical descriptions of the people around me, especially the people who I focused my narrative on. I think I had been so focused on jotting down “the action” that I neglected to notice some details.

On the other hand, it didn’t detract from my narrative that I didn’t know what colour sweater one of the people was wearing. In this instance, I felt pretty confident on what my narrative would be from this observation so I tailored my notes accordingly. In a larger research undertaking, I might not know what the throughline is between multiple rounds of observation and interviews, so in that case it may be helpful to take notes on things that seem irrelevant at the time.

It was interesting taking notes by hand as I very rarely do that in other parts of my life. I didn’t necessarily feel that taking notes by hand helped my memory when looking back at my notes, but I do feel that taking notes by hand helped observation feel like a more embodied practice. I felt that I noticed more, especially with regard to my own physical experience, when writing by hand.

[Last modified: October, 18 2024 04:58 PM]

Through engaging in field work as it relates to mukbangs, I have to consider both the creator and the viewer. In both cases, there are aspects of my socio-cultural identity that may impact how I view their responses, and how interlocutors may view me.

In some ways I feel that I can relate to creators more than I can relate to viewers. The vast majority of mukbang creators are women being viewed through the male gaze – an experience I feel familiar with even though the context is different. Though all of the mukbang creators I came across are people of colour, they appear to mainly be Korean or Japanese. As a south Asian woman I can relate to the experience of being exoticized and the power dynamic that comes with that, but I would never assume that I understand the full scope of their experience being east Asian content creators. When interviewing creators, it will be important not to assume that they view their experience of the male gaze online the same way I view my own.

On the other hand, I have never been a content creator or been in a position to make income off of content creation. I have also never been in a position to need to make income off of content creation. There is nothing to suggest that any of these creators are creating mukbang content out of necessity, but I believe it is still important to acknowledge the possibility that there may be a difference in privilege between myself and my interlocutors.

As previously mentioned, my experience of watching a mukbang was not necessarily a pleasant one, nor one that I would seek out. From my digital field work so far, the majority of viewers who publicly comment on mukbang content tend to feel similarly to me. This inherently creates a feeling of ‘othering’ for those who do enjoy mukbang content, and a power dynamic between myself and my interlocutors. I think it will be important to give interlocutors the option for anonymity if that will allow them to feel more willing to share. On the other hand, even though I don’t enjoy mukbang content, I feel that kink content has a place in this world, and not everyone has to enjoy everything. A lack of judgement when it comes to kink and kink-adjacent content will help shift my position away from being an unwelcome interloper.

Lastly, because a large part of my fieldwork is occurring on Instagram and TikTok, which are both platforms where I have existing accounts, my “algorithmic positionality” is probably worth considering when it comes to the content that I will be pushed. I think some of this can be avoided by creating new accounts for research purposes, but I will likely still be limited in some way by the algorithm over time. If possible, I would like to have interlocutors share their explore pages with me so that I can see if there is other types of mukbang content that I’m not seeing in my own feed.

[Last modified: October, 11 2024 06:44 PM]

Scrolling the first page of Instagram results under the hashtag #mukbang, I noticed a few things straight away. Each thumbnail has a similar construction: there is a content creator – generally Asian women, but sometimes an Asian man or Black woman – seated behind a large platter of food. Their expression is either one of enthusiasm mixed with surprise, or the moment where the creator is straining to fit a large bite into their mouth. There is something about these thumbnails that feels a bit salacious, but it’s obscure enough that I wonder if I’m reading into things.

Pictured: @darlingmvks account, an aggregator of mukbang content from various creators 

What’s striking isn’t just the volume of food in each video, but that all of the content creators are average weight, if not thin. Thinness in relation to food content isn’t specific to the #mukbang genre, there are plenty of creators like Nara Smith who have a platform around food but fit the definition of thin by any standard. Where #mukbangs diverge from other food content is in the actual consumption of the food. Though the creator will sometimes react to the food they’re eating with expressions of joy or approval, the videos don’t feel like food reviews. The focus seems to be on the act of consumption. Part of the genre seems to be taking the biggest bite possible, so much so that discomfort is sometimes visible.

  

Pictured: @mirimisu (pictured twice in image 1 and 2) and @oishimuks in the signature mukbang bite

As much a part of the #mukbang genre as the visual element is the auditory. Mukbangs fall into the category of ASMR (autonomous sensory meridian response), which is a genre of content that gives viewers a pleasant, sometimes described as tingling, sensation in response to the stimuli. Mukbangs frequently feature the same type of food – noodles, cheese, sauces, or fried chicken – which make a specific type of sound. My experience of #mukbang audio was not pleasant nor tingling, but instead created an immediate sense of discomfort. The sound is distinct – wet, slurping, visceral – and, like the thumbnails, the audio has echoes of something lascivious.

Audio Examples:

Instagram video from @darlingmvks

Instagram video from @kyamuks  

As with a lot of my work, I had decided to do my observation from a coffee shop. As soon as I opened the first video, I felt acutely aware of the people around me. Could they see what I was watching? If so, did they recognize the telltale signs of a mukbang? Were they horrified that I was doing this in public?

My own emotional experience of these videos suggests that there is something about this genre of video that feels scandalous. Scrolling through the comments to see how other viewers felt, most of the comments were disgust or confusion. Some of the comments praised the food, but very few comments were obviously sexual in nature.

As I continue to observe these online spaces, there is a racial element that needs to be explored. How does race and exoticization contribute to how these videos are perceived? I’m curious if there are other platforms like Reddit or TikTok where users’ comments are more blatantly sexual. If not, is the real appeal of mukbangs more akin to a horror movie than pornography, in that our disgust keeps us watching?

[Last modified: October, 4 2024 11:13 PM]

Topic: What does it mean to post content online that can be perceived as sexual by some, but isn’t explicit? Fetish content, such as mukbangs, feet pics, and ASMR, exist on mainstream social platforms in a liminal space where their content doesn’t violate community guidelines, but their perceived implications might. Because this content can be easily accessed due to the obscured nature of its meaning, it is often discovered by people both inside and outside the fetish community.

For my pilot project, I’d like to explore how these digital fetish communities are able to use language, fantasy, and relationship-building to exist within the confines of mainstream social media sites. How does their presence on mainstream social media contribute to our perceptions of sexuality, power, and desire?

Questions

1. How do the perceptions of this content differ between creators and viewers?
2. How do creators of fetish content digitally signify themselves to their intentional viewers?
3. What kind of visual cues are used in their content, and are there any themes?
4. What kind of language do creators and commenters use in order to avoid censorship, but still be discoverable?
5. How do creators use the digital world to help create fantasy? How does the “out in the open” nature of their content contribute to or detract from that fantasy?
6. How does consuming this content impact what other content viewers see, or what other kinds of content could lead to discovering fetish content?
7. How much contact do creators have with their viewers? How does this change the nature of how their content is viewed?

Methods

Digital Participant Observation: A large part of this project will include analysing content by fetish creators for the imagery and language they use to communicate with their audience. I will also be looking at viewers’ comments, and public interactions between creators and viewers to understand what, if any, rules they follow to communicate within a public platform.

Interviews: I would interview a content creator to better understand their own perceptions of their content, how they plan their shoots, and whether they feel viewers respond better to some content than others. I would also be interested to know whether or not they communicate directly with their viewers, and why they may or may not do so.

I would also interview a viewer of fetish content to better understand their perception of the content and its creators. I would also ask viewers to share how they first found this content, and whether it was searched or discovered. Lastly, I would ask viewers to share their ‘Explore’ pages with me to understand what type of content they are being pushed in addition to fetish content.

Textual Analysis: In addition to analysing comments related to fetish content, I will also be reviewing hashtags associated with fetish content and common search terms that may lead someone to find fetish content.

Themes: sexuality, social media, censorship, language, algorithms

Potential Findings

One potential finding that could impact my overall findings for this project is that fetish content viewers may not be willing to identify themselves and be interviewed. If so, my findings related to viewers will be limited to publicly available profiles and comments.

Beyond that, I anticipate finding that content creators and viewers perceive their content similarly and, in turn, use the same language and recurring visual themes in order to communicate within their group. I also anticipate that creators will use direct communication with their viewers in order to build a fantasy, and that increased direct communication with viewers will increase the sexual perception of the content (for example, requests to eat a specific food).

Lastly, I anticipate that the algorithm will push similar or adjacent fetish content to viewers that share similar language or visual themes, as opposed to similar topics (for example, mukbang viewers won’t necessarily see cooking videos).

[Last modified: October, 1 2024 05:15 PM]

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