Doctoral Dissertation Research: Local-level Social and Cultural Change in the Context of National Economic Shifts

博士论文研究：国民经济转型背景下的地方社会文化变迁

• 批准号: 1123578
• 负责人: Donald Robotham
• 金额: $ 1.99万
• 依托单位: CUNY Graduate School University Center
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-08-01 至 2013-01-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1123578&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Local; level

Doctoral student Chris Grove (The Graduate Center, City University of New York), with the guidance of Dr. Donald Robotham, will undertake ethnographic research on community-level social realignments in a context of national economic and political shifts. This micro-level perspective will allow the researcher to investigage the question of whether contemporary changes evident in national-level statistics actually comprise a departure from historical cultural frameworks and taken-for-granted understandings in ordinary people's lives.The research will be conducted in Elkhart, Indiana, which was chosen for two reasons. The first is that the city has witnessed significant economic change in recent years. The second, is that Elkhart residents can be expected to be particularly conscious of these changes because in 2009, their city was used as the site to announce a new national economic improvement program and thereby was the focus of considerable media attention. Thus if there are true cultural and social changes in the wake of economic transformation, they should be discernible in this "bellweather" city. Grove will conduct 15 months of on-site research. He will gather data with a combination of social science methods, including semi-structured and oral history interviews, participant observation, and archival research. He will locate and explore new formations across the political spectrum, while documenting life histories of participants to understand the appeal, demands, strategies and organization of these formations. This research is important because it will be one of the first social scientific studies to specify the social and cultural prameters of the much used concept of "crisis." Situated in what is often described as the United States heartland, findings from the research will contribute to understanding the complex interests, norms, and histories through which local people, in the United States and elsewhere, engage critical national change. Funding for this research also supports the education of a social scientist.

博士生克里斯格罗夫（研究生中心，纽约城市大学），与唐纳德Robotham博士的指导下，将进行民族志研究在国家经济和政治变化的背景下，社区层面的社会重组。这种微观层面的视角将使研究人员能够回避这样一个问题，即在国家一级统计数据中明显的当代变化是否实际上包括对历史文化框架的偏离和对普通人生活的理所当然的理解。研究将在印第安纳州的埃尔克哈特进行，这是出于两个原因选择的。首先，这座城市近年来见证了显着的经济变化。 第二，埃尔克哈特的居民可能会特别意识到这些变化，因为在2009年，他们的城市被用作宣布新的国家经济改善计划的地点，从而成为媒体关注的焦点。 因此，如果在经济转型之后发生了真正的文化和社会变化，那么在这个“领头羊”城市中，这些变化应该是显而易见的。 格罗夫将进行为期15个月的现场研究。他将结合社会科学方法收集数据，包括半结构化和口述历史访谈，参与者观察和档案研究。他将在政治光谱中寻找和探索新的形成，同时记录参与者的生活史，以了解这些形成的吸引力，需求，战略和组织。 这项研究很重要，因为它将是第一个社会科学研究，以具体说明社会和文化参数的广泛使用的概念“危机”。“位于通常被称为美国心脏地带的地方，研究结果将有助于理解美国和其他地方的当地人民参与关键国家变革的复杂利益，规范和历史。这项研究的资金也支持社会科学家的教育。