Unequal Childhoods - Annette Lareau [197]
Ms. McAllister was surprised to see me reappear in their lives after several years. They had wondered what had happened to me and “the book.” Of all the people portrayed in Unequal Childhoods, she seemed the most excited to discover that the book had been published and that they were in it. She was visibly pleased. She seemed excited and proud that there was a book about her family. She held her copy and, flipping the pages in awe, said, “I’m going to show it to my sisters.”
I hung out at the house for a while and played with the kids while she read. She thought parts were hilarious, including the section about my walking through their neighborhood and people thinking I was a dope dealer or a welfare person, as well as the section about the family reunion when Greg, one of the research assistants, had trouble spotting me. Ms. McAllister had quipped, “She the only white person here and you can’t find her?” The quote and the memory it evoked made her laugh out loud. She pronounced her verdict on the book: “I don’t have no problem with it.”
A bit later, in a much more somber tone, Ms. McAllister said, “So we communicate without words.” She seemed to be pondering the idea that her family was being evaluated during the study observations. I nodded and said, “At least that is the way it seemed compared to other families.” While reading more, she said, clearly surprised, “You wrote down my words with the kids?” I nodded. I told her that I was worried it might bother her and that some of the families were fine with the book, but some were bothered by it. She dismissed this thought. She said, “I know my family is crazy.”
ENDURING CHALLENGES
In reassessing the book for the second edition, I have concluded that relatively small changes in wording or emphasis could have made the text more accurate and less hurtful to family members. For example, weight is always a sensitive issue. Rather than describing Melanie Handlon as “chubby,” which is evocative but also evaluative, I should have used more neutral language. I could have noted that according to weight tables for children her age and height, she would have been considered overweight. In recounting the Driver family’s response to Wendy’s catechism question, I should have been clearer that her parents and brother listened to her carefully when she asked them if they knew what a mortal sin was (such attention is a form of acknowledgment) but did not transform her question into a teachable moment. The original text makes it seem, as Wendy angrily pointed out, as if her family members had ignored her. In the case of the Yanellis, it is likely that Ms. Yanelli was buying the lottery ticket for Billy’s dad and not for herself; I should have kept track of that detail. Thus, there are some issues that could have been handled differently. Overall, though, most families seemed to feel that the book resonated with their experiences. Accuracy was not the crux of the problem. The problem was how the families felt about the way they were portrayed.
“Traumatic for Both Sides”
Michael Burawoy correctly notes that a revisit by an ethnographer to a research site to learn the reaction of the study participants (what he terms a “valedictory revisit”) is rare and often traumatic:
When the ethnographer returns to the participants, armed with the results of the study, whether in draft or published form [t]he purpose is . . . to ascertain the participants’ responses to the reported research. . . . This is the moment of judgment, when previous relations are reassessed, theory is put to the test, and accounts are reevaluated. It can be traumatic for both sides, and for this reason it is all too rare.24
As Burawoy suggests, it is not uncommon for some study participants to be surprised and very unhappy when they read a researcher’s written portrayal of them.25 When I recruited the families for the original study, I told them I would be writing a book. At the very beginning of the study, when they were signing consent forms, for example, family members often asked if they would be getting