Ethnography

I’m at Yanni’s Greek Diner on a Friday afternoon around noon. Its lunchtime and most people are arriving for the lunch time rush, yet it’s slightly more empty than usual. The cashier refuses to smile or make eye contact with myself or any of the customers who enter for that matter. There are hanging signs of Gyros, a famous Greek entrée, and across the wall is a neon lighted sign with the words “The Best All American Hamburgers”. Next to the cash register are plaques and articles declaring “Yanni’s Best” and then to the left of that is a sign made of wood stating “Life’s Short, Eat Gyros” and another above it suspended from the ceiling “Eat More Gyros”. In the background they have music playing through speakers; music such as the Beach Boys and Franky Valley and the Four Seasons. The theme of the diner seems to be an old 50’s diner with booths and cushioned stools at the bar. The walls have a mural of an old drive up diner with the same 50’s style theme. Waitresses on skates and the “All American” couple in the car. Photos of restored 50’s chevy trucks parked outside the restaurant also hang on the wall. By the bathroom hangs an art piece incorporating a photo of Audrey Hepburn from Breakfast at Tiffany’s and photo of Elvis above kids vending machines that hold candy and miniature toys for 50cents. The walls have so much stuff on them yet it doesn’t feel cluttered, instead it feels more entertaining. Above the bar is a flat screen TV mounted on the wall, they have HLN on; the news. Stories about the passing of Amy Winehouse, the Norway shooting, a Chihuahua that fought off convenient store burglars, but there is no sound so no one can really get the full understanding of what’s being talked about. The man in the booth in front of me sits alone, eating his lunch quietly but he seems more focused on his phone than his lunch. He chews with his mouth open and sips from his paper pepsi cup. Above the music and the sound of the grill cooking fresh burgers and Gyro meat are the voices of the waitress and cashier talking across the restaurant to one another, discussing some matter of T-shirts. A young couple walks in and the young man picks up the change the lady in front of him dropped and hands it back to her. The couple next to me is discussing football and the lockout, then their conversation changes to the story on the TV; the Norway shooting. Behind the young couple that just walked in walks in a couple of older ladies dressed in conservative attire but their shorts are bright pastels pink and purple. I can smell the burgers grilling and then the scent of hot peppers and klamata olives follows. The waitress is keeping busy, pre-bussing her tables and making sure the empty tables are ready for new customers. It’s a different kind of diner though; you order at the register and get your own drink from the soda machine; the waitress is really only there to make sure you have everything you need and to clean up. She is more of busser than a waitress. I realize another picture hanging on the wall, but this one is different from the rest. It’s a young woman with a Gyro in her hand but she has an 80’s hairstyle and 80’s style clothing. The mini fridge behind the counter that holds the dressings has an Amp Energy drink logo. As I walk out I hear the waitress/busser yell to me, “Have a nice day!”

            The atmosphere of the diner is what may be referred to as a bricolage, or a creation formed from a diverse range of available things, in this case cultural representations. The aspects of the 50’s and 80’s cultures as well as the American and Greek cultures that are available to us have been meshed together to create one place. This type of bricolage is a “core element of postmodern culture” (Barker 202) allowing the people who eat and/or work at the diner to blur the traditional cultural lines. Although some, such as Baudrillard, see postmodern culture as ‘depthless’ or ‘superficial’ I don’t believe all of it to be this way and the diner is a perfect example of the positive coming from this post modern era. It allows us to experience more than just our own traditional cultural values and interests. We get to enjoy the cuisine of another place, get a feel for what it may have been like to eat at a diner in the 50’s, all while still being comforted with the familiar.

            The people within the diner also give us something to analyze; both the customers and the workers display different cultures, or ways of life. For Raymond Williams, by way of Chris Barker’s book Cultural Studies: Theory & Practice, he refers to culture as “a whole way of life” (42) which when I hear this I think it to include the ways we eat, speak, and how we act in public vs. private places. The gentleman eating alone displayed his “culture” by eating with his mouth open and being on his phone while eating. This can be attributed to the new fast pace American way of life where we have thrown manners out the door and take our work everywhere we go, including when eating. The two older ladies who walked in dressed conservatively display a more traditional American culture because they speak quietly among themselves and are dressed in more of a conservative manner; unlike the female employees who are speaking loudly and across the diner. Obviously, the female employees have adopted a different culture where it is ok to make your conversation public and interrupt the customers dining experience with it as well. I would normally believe that our identity, or the way that we act, would be much more pleasant in a public place; and that what Stuart Hall refers to as the sociological subject and postmodern subject would play a role in how these people acted. Instead they do not seem to really follow any of the social norms that would accompany the expected attitudes of someone in a public diner. This leads me to wonder how these persons have formed their identities.

           Works Cited

Barker, Chris. Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice. Sage Publications, Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore, Washington DC, 2008.

Love and Jerry Maguire

One movie I often heard I just had to see was Jerry Maguire. Not being a fan of Tom Cruise it took me awhile to actually sit down and watch it but when I did I realized why everyone was so interested in it. It wasn’t your average romantic comedy where girl likes one guy but in the end falls for the jerk. Instead it seemed to show the difficulty of being the outsider; the one who thinks differently from everyone else. When Tom Cruise’s character Jerry writes a “mission statement” so far from what his firm is used to doing they fire him. To me while watching the movie and the way the characters interacted, love seemed to be defined by how much one could provide for the other. There was no emotional affection, no giving without the expectation of receiving something in return. The “love” between the characters was more superficial and selfish. For example, the relationship between Jerry and his girlfriend, played by Kelly Preston, was all about their career and the amount of money they made. So when she heard about his mission statement she wanted him to recant what he had said. For those of you who have not seen the movie his mission statement was about doing more for the client and building a stronger and more personal relationship with them as opposed to getting as many clients as possible and treating them like pawns in a chess game. Her reaction made Jerry realize that there was something wrong with their relationship, something was missing. Still he didn’t seem sure of what it was. Being the outside viewer it’s obvious that love and money was the correlation that seemed to make love possible with the characters of this film. The more money you made the more love you received. A great example of this was after Jerry got fired and was trying desperately to keep his clients; but one of his co-workers snaked all of them but one. He of course received all the attention and applause from the rest of the office while everyone seemed to stare Jerry down.

            Unfortunately, Jerry’s attempt to do the right thing and be a better person seemed to backfire temporarily. As the movie progressed and Jerry was forced to move forward with his mission statement alone with only the help of one accountant from his previous firm and his one last client he seems to learn what love really is and what really makes love possible. Through his client and his family and his accountant and her son Jerry begins to realize that love is not selfish or a means of profit. Instead, love is an emotional affection between people where we give and give and give and don’t expect to receive anything in return. Both his client’s wife, played by Regina King, and his accountant, played by Renee Zellweger, continually shows true love. Regina King’s character just wants what makes her husband happy and to make sure he gets what he deserves and has been promised. She seems to push Jerry towards a more honest way of business. Then there is his accountant who stands by his side and leaves her job at the firm, which provides her with more pay and benefits, to help Jerry keep to his mission statement because she believes in him and believes in what he said. All in all the film Jerry Maguire seems to show two different kinds of “love”, a selfish and profitable love and the unselfish and unconditional love.

What is the Politics of Culture?

What is culture? Is it how we dress or act? Or is it what we like? Many would agree that our culture includes these things and more.  It’s also believed that culture is a political means of domination and to others a means of resistance to that domination. But what does that really mean? Does it mean that our American culture, for example, was set up in order to keep our class structure in line? Keep the upper class as upper class and the lower class as lower class with little to no wiggle room? I can see how many may think that and see that our American culture was built on a foundation of some political agenda; but I like to believe that there is more good in this world than meets the eye. So to me culture is who we as people decide to be. Sure there are influences everywhere, both negative and positive, but we as individuals ultimately decide which cultural values we adopt. We all have the ability to make our own choices and think for ourselves. A fashion statement is made when we wear whatever it is we chose to wear that morning with confidence, not just because the skinny “pretty” model wore it in the fashion magazine you found in line at the grocery store. Now don’t get me wrong I do know that often times that is the case; most people do chose to wear what someone in some magazine says looks good but my point is it is our choice to believe them and agree. More often than not when I look at those fashion magazines I see ridiculous outfits for outrageously ridiculous prices that I would not be caught dead wearing.

In America we get to see all different types of “culture” because we are just one big melting pot of religions, ethnicities, classes, and races. We can’t say that America has just ONE culture because we don’t. We have cultures that derive from the different classes: lower, middle, and upper. For example, many would say that graffiti art came from the “cultures from below”, meaning our lower and lower middle class citizens. But that seems to have such a negative connotation for a wonderful type of art that can express so much about the ways of life and struggles of the “common” people. Then we have shopping malls filled with shops like Burberry and Nordstrom that only those in the upper class can afford; I’d group this into the “culture from above”. Yet this makes it seem like it’s better than graffiti art and I must say I don’t believe that is the case. Our status within the class structure is based off of the amount of money we make not the type of person we are. Our social and/or economic status is not what makes us who we are, instead our life experiences and the choices we make, make us who we are. I don’t believe that there is some “Man” who decides how to make who into what he believes they should be. We as individuals choose what our “culture” or way of life is going to be. It is our choice whether we play into the politics behind it or not.