Carla Jones' Pandemic Diaries Featured in Colorado Arts & Science Magazine
叠测听Kenna Bruner听鈥⑻齈ublished:听June 22, 2020
Anthropology students at 精品SM在线影片 explore how we feel a pandemic
As graduate students in Professor Carla Jones鈥 advanced anthropology seminar worked through challenging course materials in the spring of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic inevitably wove itself into their discussions.
Jones鈥 class focused on affect theory, a diverse field which analyzes feelings as both personal and public. Affect theory asks how feelings are produced, shared and circulated intimately and interpersonally, making it possible to talk about feelings between people, with other creatures, or the mood of a community or a nation.
While students worked through these questions, they also began to personally experience a mix of the feelings that were topics in the class: fear, anger, grief, humor, love. 听
For a lot of the students in the class, it was a wonderful opportunity for us to help each other make sense of what we鈥檙e going through by doing a dive into the particular themes we were starting to see emerging鈥"
鈥淪o much about what we are experiencing feels anxious, uncertain, stressful,鈥 Jones said. 鈥淲e found ourselves saying it was therapeutic to try and make sense of this moment with the tools affect theory had provided us. For a lot of the students in the class, it was a wonderful opportunity for us to help each other make sense of what we鈥檙e going through by doing a dive into the particular themes we were starting to see emerging.鈥
Students felt strongly about creating a historical archive where they could document these feelings and categorize themes they saw emerging during the coronavirus pandemic. Watching this unfold, Jones decided for their final assignment to give students a choice of writing a review of the field or analyzing one of these themes.听
Jones mentioned her students鈥 essays to Carole McGranahan, an anthropology professor at the 精品SM在线影片 who also edits the online supplement to听American Ethnologist, a journal put out by the听American Ethnological Society听and one of the premier journals of the discipline.
鈥淎s soon as Carole heard we were doing this, she thought they would be appropriate for the journal鈥檚 website,鈥 Jones said. 鈥淐arole was instrumental in getting the students鈥 work out in the world.听 So, it鈥檚 thanks to her.鈥
Four of the students who had their essays posted on the 鈥淧andemic Diaries: Affect and Crisis鈥 webpage wrote about what the experience meant to them.听