Adequate Description

It doesn’t sound that hard, right? Describe what is going on, in a given situation or setting. You could ask the people involved to tell you what is going on. But then, you need to consider that what they tell you may be edited in some way, perhaps to reflect better on the speaker, or on the social group. The usual ‘observer’s paradox.’ You change the thing (or process) you are observing by your observation.

Beginning to have conversations with INCEF’s staff about their work is a little like asking the participants in a game of cricket to tell you what they are doing while they are doing it. I have read about their work on their web site, watched all of the films they have produced, and read journal articles describing their work (much as I would need to read about cricket before ever trying to watch a game). But now I am here, asking them directly, “what do you do?” I stand a little to one side, in order to avoid getting smacked with a cricket ball, and try to figure out what is going on and how to describe it. To the participants, the answers to my questions may seem completely obvious: I am trying to hit the ball/catch the ball/throw the ball. On one level, the answers are obvious. But what does it mean to try to hit the ball? What does it mean to create educational documentary films about Ebola? I know if I ask the question that way, I will get nothing but puzzled looks and perhaps a shrug. I know, because I have tried it.

Why bother with description? Why not just dive straight into analysis? This temptation to produce on-the-spot analysis is a powerful one, and hard to resist. I must remind myself continually that I am here, doing this work, precisely because I don’t yet know “what is going on” here, and I need to establish that (as best I can) before I can do anything else. Most importantly, I don’t yet know what is going on here for the participants –for the INCEF staffers themselves. I have some preliminary hints and ideas, but I must not mistake those hints for adequate description. Ten days is nothing in this process. I am just getting to the beginning.