Chapter 8 was very helpful for me because it talked a lot about what I need to do, and I feel like it met a lot of my emotions head-on. I’m scared to write this project. Straight-up scared. I feel like all this stuff I’ve been writing about, I’ve been writing poorly, and I feel like there is too much information out there for me to even start to scratch the surface of. I wanted to go deeper, I wanted to do more interviews, and most importantly I want to tell these stories right. I feel like my writing is sloppy and rushed because I’ve had to write so much, and I don’t want that to happen for my final project. I want it to be beautiful!! I almost started laughing when I read the part about ethnographers having too much information because that’s exactly how I feel and yet I didn’t do near as much research as I feel you want from us. I have so much to do and organize and I don’t even know where to start. As I said, I’m scared to start. I have a good idea of what I want and yet I’m scared that once I start writing it’ll just mess up and not turn out like I want it to. It’s a horrible feeling.
Outline
Intro – first person blurb
Cowhill coffee and Jerald Thomas “Hip vibe, I dig it”
Antiques and the pictures on the wall, clocks
Timeless – Joanna’s quote
Songwriter’s night – Jerald and Brad – using the middle space, increasing business
Insert – blurb on joke – character of Cowhill “Spotlight?”
Mention quote on the mirror
Literacy
How Cowhill draws in the community
How songwriters affect each other à sponsors of literacy, influences
The songwriting process
Creativity with each other
Core groups, “click”
How the audience interacts with the performers
Beneficial relationship
Blurb on my own experience
Rachel’s blurb about her observations of the crowd
The performers
Emotional connections
Heartfelt genre
Helping each other, encouraging growth
Conclusion – small town atmosphere – Jerald’s comment on loving to see the square and watch, keep it nice. Preserving a good thing while growing in literacy – Heartfelt and timeless.
Annotated Table of Contents
TITLE PAGE
1. Hand-drawn map of Cowhill
2. Thoughts on Cowhill – talks about what I want out of my project.
3. My first collection of data on random pieces of paper – names, email addresses, phone numbers…
4. First set of fieldnotes
5. Expanded fieldnotes
6. Collage of all the clocks at Cowhill, plus a picture of a funny mouse trap joke on the wall. “They have all the time in the world!”
7. Second set of field notes.
8. Expanded fieldnotes
9. 3rd set – VERY extensive.
10. Another page of information for future interviews
11. Expanded field notes
12. Lists of interview questions: version 1 and 2
13. First interview: Jerald Thomas – permission sheet and fieldnotes
14. Later field notes from listening to the interview again.
15. Second interview: Brad Davis – permission sheet and fieldnotes
16. Later field notes from listening to the interview again.
17. Third Interview: Mary K Croft – permission sheet and field notes
18: Expanded Fieldnotes
19: Fourth Interview: Paula Bahamon – permission sheet and fieldnotes
20. Expanded fieldnotes
21. Other students’ responses to Cowhill (open mic night) – Rachel, Breanna, Andrew, Ashley
22. Collection of my one-page analyses
23. Expanded fieldnotes – my own personal experience at Cowhill (add more from after the performance)
24. List of Codes
25. Printed off blips from all my research journals that tie into my project… notes for final project.
ONE PAGE ANALYSIS
I think my project is finally coming together. I have conducted four very successful interviews (though I wished I could have done more), have taken field notes at all of the songwriters’ nights held since I began my project, and have even become emotionally attached to the project itself. I feel a connection to Cowhill and the performers there because I know the internal struggle of producing songs and then getting up the guts to perform them. I think that my project will be beneficial to those who believe in themselves and want to share their talents. I do not have 20 codes, but I have gone through my research, coding and recoding and I think I have filled in the holes that were missing from my codes before. I now have 11 codes and I believe that is sufficient for my personal project.
I’ve outlined my project and I think I am ready to begin writing it. I’m nervous, as I said, to get things done right but I believe my project is good and is worth something, at least to me. I even performed at Cowhill last week in order to get an insider’s perspective, and I think it was beneficial to me for the writing of my project. I was able to experience the audience’s reactions from the performer’s point of view and I think that has better prepared me to write this project because now I have seen the audience from the stage and from the second story viewing area. I also have the reactions of fellow classmates dealing with Cowhill, and the open mic night, and I think those will be great contributors to my project as well.
I think this is going to be an awesome project and that it might even create more publicity for Cowhill. It has a great atmosphere and is set in small town, quiet, “good-for-writing” Commerce, and I think that is significant for the community to realize. People have come to love this place and all it has to offer, and people are making the best of what they have and encouraging each other to do better. It’s an awesome event and I believe that Cowhill songwriter’s night in itself is a sponsor of literacy because it gains as well as gives. “Sponsors, as I have come to think of them, are any agents, local or distant, concrete or abstract, who enable, support, teach, model, as well as recruit, regulate, suppress or withhold literacy – and gain advantage by it in some way.” – Debra Brandt.
