Hello,

I am Eliexel Beras, Economics major, He/Him.

• Have you ever used observation or reflection to understand a group or behavior? If so, what was that experience like, and what did you learn?

I believe observing during a long period of time is extremely important rather than forming an ignorant opinion at first glance. An example of when I used this observation is when I was interning at an office, it was actually quite a different work environment than what I was used to so observing and learning how everything was done was important in getting used to this new environment. With observing I learned to be a lot more comfortable in this new space.

• How do you currently observe and engage with the communities or cultures around you? Is there a particular group, space, or cultural practice that has caught your attention recently? What about it stood out to you?

A community that I am still learning about and observing is the college community around me. This is because it’s only my second semester here and I’m still trying to get used to how college operates. In CCNY there is also many cultures around, I enjoy learning more about these cultures through the events and classes that CCNY has to offer. An example of an event that helped me engage with the cultures in CCNY was the Hispanic heritage month event.

• What are you excited to explore in this course? Are there specific topics, projects, or aspects of ethnographic research that interest you?

I’m mostly excited to interview people of other cultures. This is because I enjoy interviews and learning more about other cultures that I may not be familiar with. I’m also excited for the visual social analysis because the visual narrative was pretty fun to complete when I was in English 110 last semester.