- Between weeks 8 and 12, each student should provide a weekly reflection (500 words) on the data you have collected to date.
- What data did you collect?
- I interviewed my father this past week, and, as a result, realized I needed to collect material on electrowinning / solvent extraction as it it the standard process which the mining company uses nowadays.
- What is your initial impression of the data?
- My father helped me out as he gave me good insight in to the social dynamics of the town, and how the work made individuals sick. But, he gave me a new idea. The town is still at risk as water is now being threatened through the expansion of the tailings dumps.
- How have the data you have collected this week changed/progressed your thinking about your research project?
- This used to be a historical paper, but now I think I can create a story which winds in to the current day. Specifically, how the local area has been poisoned and dispossessed, but now the landscape is still threatened as mining activity has not stopped.
- What challenges did you encounter while collecting the data?
- I don’t understand much of the data past a very basic level, so I don’t know if everything I have collected so far is what I need.
- What are your next steps?
- Once I find out whether or not these articles are okay, I will reach out to meet with Dean Bean and ask her if she would be willing to help me out through an article’s intricacies.
- 2-3 annotations.
- I am currently awaiting several documents from Bowdoin ILL on solvent extraction electrowinning. I do not know if they are going to be helpful, so I will not add the citations until later.
- What data did you collect?
Lopez’s Comments:
Carlos, I like the progress you made on your project over this week. It sounds like your father’s interview was very helpful, but you may want to interview others living in the Valley.
It sounds good to me that you will speak with Rachel Beane.
Lastly, I just thought of Rebecca Scott’s work: She is an environmental sociologist that worked with Tsing when she did her grad studies at UCSC. Her book on coal mining towns may be helpful to you, especially if her analytical approach mirrors closely to Tsing’s
https://sociology.missouri.edu/people/scott