Reference no: EM133636300
Case: Making and Finding Meaning through Obituaries
The goal of this challenge is to analyze a dataset of obituaries for their symbols and cultural meanings.
An obituary is a common genre of text found around the world. Obituaries provide readers a narrative about the deceased. While they sometimes offer details about the person's death, they typically focus on the life of the individual, highlighting things personality traits. Finally, obituaries give us personal histories, including the families left behind, careers and accomplishments, interests and hobbies, and education.
However, obituaries frequently do more than just give us an account of a person's life. Scholars have argued that obituaries mirror the needs of a society; they are used to help us express and fulfill these needs. For example, they allow writers to praise the departed, reinforce their social status, and acknowledge their importance to society. These narratives often reveal the things we are most proud of, which reflect our values and expectations of a life well-lived. They are therefore key texts to give us a window into culture and well-being.
In this assignment, we are asking you to look for symbols and patterns within a set of obituaries. Our ultimate goal is to try to uncover and make sense of some of the meanings that come from these patterns of symbols.
Directions:
Find 4-6 obituaries (your dataset) to analyze. (Please avoid obituaries of people you might know. This exercise should help flex your researcher muscles, so objectivity, as much as is possible, is important). Many obituaries are simple and short. You are looking for more lengthy, descriptive obituaries. You can find obituaries through newspapers and funeral home websites. Here are some local sites to get you started:
Print the obituaries or cut and paste them into a document you can highlight and make notes in.
Review the list of symbols in the below table. Now, scan the obituaries and highlight any instance that you see of the below symbols in the obituary dataset.
Note: Feel free to identify symbols that are not on the below table. This is meant to be a guide, not an all-inclusive list.
After identifying these symbols across your "dataset," review the questions about their patterns. Determine whether you think there may be a pattern related to the symbols you observed.
do the following:
Begin with a list of your "data set" which includes the websites of the obituaries you are using for this assignment.
Describe 3 symbols you found in the majority of your obituaries.
do a paragraph about each one, reflecting on the patterns and meanings (described in the chart below)
Reflect on your obituary from part 1. Did your obituary contain any of the symbols discussed below? Why or why not?
What was easy and/or difficult about this assignment? Did you find it difficult to remain objective?