Literature and Ethnography

I love turning from ethnography to literature, then back to ethnography. Thinking about culture helps me understand fiction and reading poems helps me see differences between cultures more clearly. As I sit down each semester to find new poems and stories to teach, I always think of “Finding Poems for my Students” by Mohja Kahf (complete poem below):

O my students,

I scour the world of words

to bring you poems like the rocks

my girls dig up in riverbanks

and come running to show me

because the notches in them

say something true, something

that an ancient Wisdom

wanted us to see.

I run to you, pockets full of poems…

One day,…

may the poem be for you

the one phone number in the universe

you were looking for

There is a pure joy in opening a new book of poems to see what is inside, to read how someone found a new way to describe the sky, a bird, a feeling, a person or even poetry itself. And sometimes a poem opens a door for understanding and I want to use it in a culture, not literature, class. For example in excerpt from “Four in the Morning” by Wislawa Szymborska (complete poem below) :

The hour swept clean to the crowing of cocks.

The hour when earth betrays us.

The hour when wind blows from extinguished stars.

The hour of and-what-if-nothing-remains-after-us.

The hollow hour.

Blank, empty.

The very pit of all other hours.

No one feels good at four in the morning.

If ants feel good at four in the morning

–three cheers for the ants. And let five o’clock come

if we’re to go on living.

The words “The hollow hour./ Blank, empty.” struck me as odd, so I had to reflect and unpack until I could express what surprised me. In Oman, “Four in the Morning” is a dark time, but not “hollow” or “blank” or “empty” – it is the time of anticipation, the time before the first call to prayer. The dangerous time on the Arabian Peninsula is midday, under the killing sun. The “empty” time is in early afternoon, when lunch is finished, stores are closed and everyone is relaxing.

I do a lot of talking with students about metaphors in literature classes, e.g. the moon is positive in Arabian culture, with no connotations of werewolves or danger. In culture studies classes, we talk about time relativity, e.g. if you say that you “ate dinner late,” what time does that mean? In some cultures, a “late” dinner means 8pm, in others it means 2am.

We look at examples such as:

It took a long time to get to work.
She left work early.
She did her shopping quickly.
She had a short visit with her sister.

to see the different ways to interpret the phrases. Is a “short visit” 30 minutes or 2 days? In both literature and culture classes my students and I talk about how everything changes when you change locations. In the States, on a rainy day, you stay inside or use an umbrella; on rainy days here, people sit outside and have a picnic, saving unbrellas for sunny days.

When Szymborska writes that 4am is “The very pit of all other hours” she’s opening a window into her culture that allows us to see what she sees, but also allows us to be able to articulate something we knew, but never expressed, about our own cultures.

“Finding Poems for my Students,” Mohja Kahf

O my students,

I scour the world of words

to bring you poems like the rocks

my girls dig up in riverbanks

and come running to show me

because the notches in them

say something true, something

that an ancient Wisdom

wanted us to see.

I run to you, pockets full of poems.

I select: This poem will help you pass a test.

Here is one that is no help at all,

but is beautiful; take it, take it.

O my scroungers after merely passing grades,

I bring you poems I have hiked high

and far to find, knowing

they will mostly end up like the rocks

my daughters find, tossed in drawers

with old batteries, mislaid keys,

scraps bearing the addresses

of people whose names

you no longer recognize or need.

Your current glazed-eye indifference

doesn’t bother me. One day,

when you are either cleaning house

or moving (and sooner or later

everyone must do one or the other),

you will shake the drawer and the poem

will fall out. And may the poem be for you

the one phone number in the universe

you were looking for, and may it be

for you the mislaid key

to your greatest need.

On that day,

you will read.

“Four in the Morning” by Wislawa Szymborska:

The hour from night to day.

The hour from side to side.

The hour for those past thirty.