Response to Presentations

After watching all of the presentations, I am struck by the sheer amount of new information I have learned, thank you all for producing such interesting material. It is obvious that all of us have fallen head first into research on our topic, and I found myself feeling inspired after watching these engaging presentations. 

Hannah 

Keeping with your performance in class this semester, you eloquently narrated your presentation, flowing from one point to the next almost seamlessly. You were able to effectively draw the audience’s attention to the theoretical and real-life aspects of your topic, without creating a divide, but by incorporating these two aspects almost simultaneously. I found your source base especially creative and thought provoking. In particular the slides covering the art experience “Virtually Present, Physically Invisible” stood out to me. This installation, and the short video you included about it, literally gave me goosebumps, and were fantastic additions to your presentation. I think my reaction to this part of the presentation attests to the power that non-academic sources can have in communicating the lived experience of groups such as refugee’s to readers. Beyond explanation, you have done a really nice job of showing your audience how perceptions of refugees do not match the lived experience Anyways, I really enjoyed listening to your presentation, thanks for the contribution! 

Carmen 

Hi Carmen, thanks for your presentation, as someone who knows very little about Chilean history or politics in general, it was great to get an overview of significant political and economic developments in the last thirty years or so. You did a nice job of explaining how the Mapuche people have been negatively affected by neoliberal policies during the period of democratization and since then. In addition I like your decision to include non-human aspects into your research, in the form of Spirit Politics. I look forward to reading about how these movements shape Chilean society and specifically how they have the potential to re-shape political goals in order to meet the demands of the Mapuche people. One aspect I was a little unclear on was how exactly you plan to carry out a transnational history. In your original proposal, the transnational aspect of your project was linked to the international presence of the catholic church, now the transnational aspect is less clear. You point out that the Mapuche people are located in one region and are almost universally opposed to the state, however it would be great if you could clarify exactly how you will categorize the Mapuche. Are they an autonomous group looking to be a state (?), a sub-state group looking for political change (?) or something else all together? I think you have a really good start here but to cement the transnational aspect in your essay you might benefit from some clarification. Thank you again for the informative presentation, I look forward to reading your essay and learning even more! 

Karen 

I really enjoyed your presentation, it was just fantastic. Your extensive research and resulting knowledge on the topic is crystal clear. Your presentation was incredibly well thought out and coherent in its organization and elucidation. I really liked how you organized your slides so that the audience was easily able to point out the similarities and differences in the Jute industry in Bengal and in Dundee even before your neat summary at the end of the presentation. I also thought that your inclusion of other historical events outside of your immediate research area, such as your comments on the different causes of migration into Dundee, to be a nice touch. It might be interesting to look at other transnational factors which could contribute to the degree of poverty in these two areas that your analysis focuses on. This might allow you to compare the Bengal and Dundee in relation to regional differences in addition to local ones. However this is just a thought, your research looks really great so far and I understand this investigation may be beyond the scope of what you are focusing on. Thank you Karen, it was really nice to learn a bit more about Dundee, and super interesting to hear about the city’s connections to Bengal which I had no idea existed before this semester! 

Thank you all again for providing such great presentations for me to watch, and for a great semester 🙂