On the topic of fieldwork...

It's kind of hard to say exactly what the difference is between homework and fieldwork. Some of it depends on one's personal definition of what each term means to them. I don't think that 'home' and 'field' need to be taken absolutely literally. Fieldwork can be homework, and homework can be fieldwork. In a way they are exactly the same thing, but in another the are different and refer to very specific things. In terms of this class, homework is the reading we do outside of class from The Oral History Reader or other sources, and fieldwork is the actual interviews we have conducted as a class at the CCC and the Meeting Place and in small groups. I think of homework as the study or practice, and fieldwork as the action the hands-on experience. I was apprehensive about this project at first because I didn't know what to expect. Many of the readings were wordy and dull and hard to learn from. Also my first attempts at interviewing did not go so well, but once Ben and I came up with a concrete research topic and found relevant people to interview the process went very smoothly. Our informants did not have to be pushed and prodded for information because they willingly told us all we wanted to know and more. Sometimes homework can only be an introduction. Sometimes the only way to really learn anything is through doing.