The final project for our Peopling of New York City course was quite a memorable experience for all of the members of my group. The five of us, Abraham, Asad, Mitch, Robin, and I, were very much inexperienced and unpracticed in the field of ethnography prior to this course. Therefore, we were apprehensive while picking our location to conduct our study. Other than Robin’s suggestion of Chinatown, nobody seemed to have an opinion. I recommended Brighton Beach to my group because it was a location that I thought I was familiar with. My family made quarterly trips to the Sheepshead Bay and Brighton Beach areas to purchase Russian food in preparation for birthday celebrations. I was excited to introduce these favorite foods to my group members. However, I was also nervous to introduce my culture to my peers. On the contrary, my group had no objections to the idea and were actually enthusiastic about the location, so we selected Brighton Beach. With an acquainted setting in mind, I felt a bit more comfortable with the project.
I was surprised by how compelling and absorbing ethnographic research can be. I acted as a pseudo-leader for my group because of my previous experience with Brighton Beach and the only one with the ability to speak the Russian language (somewhat fluently). Although I had frequently purchased food items from the area, I had never actively used my five senses to observe Brighton Beach or actually engage the community members in any sort of intellectual conversation. It did not help that I was one of the shyer public speakers in my group. Despite of the setbacks related to the cold weather and greenness in the matters of ethnographic research, my group and I persevered during our first trip to Brighton. We attempted several interviews which did not end up happening because either we were too afraid or the people simply walked away from the approaching five dudes, huddled together in a unit, wearing mostly dark clothes. Finally, we were brave enough to approach one of the natives. A lady walking by herself on the beach answered our questions. Not surprisingly, through the interview we found out that she was not a Brighton Beach resident. We also realized that we had not properly prepared ourselves for the encounter in terms of informative questions. We decided that it was not our day for interviewing and moved onto studying of the commercial side of Brighton Beach where we purchased our food. Our feast on Russian delicacies was ruined again by the cold weather. Nevertheless, overall, our group had an entertaining time roaming around in Brighton Beach. We experienced the beauty of New York City as a melting pot of cultures and ethnicities. The convenience of the subway system allows us to hop on one of twenty-two subway lines and dive into a sea of different ethnicities and their traditions, food and language for the cheap price of two dollars and seventy-five cents.
Our second trip to Brighton was much more successful than the previous one. The warmer, sunnier weather encouraged us to conduct two interviews with Brighton Beach residents: a vendor and a fiddler. The fiddler interview was accomplished as a group effort, each of us providing a question for the interviewee. Subsequently, I performed a one-on-one interview with a vendor of home cooked food items, entirely in Russian. It was interesting to learn from people who spent much time in the area, about perspectives regarding Brighton Beach. We learned from the lady vendor that she came from the Russian city of Stavropol and how she enjoys selling her home-cooked food to the always cheerful citizens of Brighton. It was a very pleasant and informative interaction of getting to know another person. It did not feel like she was a complete stranger anymore, but more like a friend. I did not perceive that my identity or beliefs acted as a barrier to conducting accurate research. However, I may have experienced a slight bias in my assessment of the community, looking for the respectable aspects of local society rather than the bad because of my own Russian heritage. Another positive result of the interview was that I found myself more comfortable speaking to strangers without thinking of it being overly intrusive. Prior to this occurrence, I would certainly avoid communicating with random people by all means. I’m still not one hundred percent sure that I would do so on a mere whim, but at least I will not be as nervous for a future assignment.
One final aspect of our ethnographic research that I found to be of particular significance was in regards to one of my sources for the annotated bibliography. For the historical research portion of the project, I read an article titled “A Sea Change for Brighton Beach,” by Douglas Feiden. This article describes the devastation that the Brighton Beach community went through as a result of Super Storm Sandy in the fall of 2012. The location of Brighton Beach made it a perfect target for a hurricane that literally ravaged the area. As a result, I expected to see extensive damage or even ruins or repairs in place of the towns markets or homes located on the shore. The extent of ruin that we saw was a just a temporarily closed off shark exhibit at the Coney Island Aquarium. This reality depicted how the Brighton Beach community is resilient in nature. The citizens band together in their time of need to help one another and to resurrect their community from the damages caused by hurricane in the record fast time.
After this project, I would be excited to visit parts of the city that represent the cultures of my group members, so that I can try new foods and experience different traditions. Furthermore, I got to learn on a more personal level, about my Russian heritage. This project reinforced the pride that I have for my identity as a Russian American. I am looking forward to sharing my culture that has over a thousand years of history, with others.
