Engaging in ethnography allows you the unique opportunity to self reflect, evaluate, research and talk with others about their experiences. Ethnography is research that is based in human interaction and relationships. In this semester length project, you will be first assessing your own relationship to beauty, beauty regimes and scriipts that most impact you, and then developing questions that you will be asking of your friends and family members. You may choose to focus on one individual in addition to yourself, or you may interview and consult with several close friends or family members. The goal is to do research on your topic in addition to having discussions with others that eventually leads you to develop questions you can ask consistently of several other people. All tools are available for research—online resources, magazines, social media content, advertisements and academic sources that critique these popular culture sources. Your goal is to determine and locate the power sources inside the beauty scriipts and regimes you examine in depth. Fieldwork should allow you to explore behaviors, beauty regimens, feelings people have about these behaviors and the underlying reasons they engage in them and the costs of these (social, emotional, identity, and economic costs).
