I wanted to respond to this post as a sort of meta-meta-analysis. I found Rachel Lim’s review of the selected tracks to be fascinating. Rachel and I approached the initial curation assignment very differently, as she selected songs based on a couple of rules she established (one song from each continent and four to represent human emotions), while I leaned into the personal and just selected based on what songs I liked the most.
Rachel’s analysis is multi-faceted. She approached the most and least selected songs and drew conclusions. Both she and I arrived at a similar limitation to the assignment – it becomes challenging to analyze these selections because of a lack of understanding of the reasoning for the selections. This sentiment was echoed across many responses: Duncan, Seb, Carol, Carlo, Abdulehad, Shannon, Matt, April, Lucy, Lachelle, Warren, Robyn, Jonathan, Joti, Katy, Kris, Steve, Tina, and Steph all mentioned the missing qualitative data or context as limitations in their analysis (that list got out of hand).
Rachel directly addresses the assumptions that can be made about our cohort and selections in a very direct way:
“Assumptions can be made that most participants are English-speaking residents from English-speaking countries with bachelor’s degrees involved in education, suggesting a familiarity with Western culture and possibly considering diversity and popularity in their selections.”
(Lim, 2024)
I wonder about the inclusion of diversity and popularity in that snippet. What is it about English speaking residents from English speaking countries with education backgrounds that would suggest a consideration of diversity and popularity? I think there’s a space to explore in that relationship. Anecdotally a lot of fellow MET students I’ve been in group projects so far have come from very different work backgrounds so I’d be interested to see if most do have bachelor’s degrees in education. My own background is tech (work) and art (school) which may be why that leapt out at me.
References
Lim, R. (2024). Task 9: Network assignment using golden records curation quiz data. Rachel’s Learning Journey. https://blogs.ubc.ca/metrlim/2024/07/25/task-9-network-assignment-using-golden-records-curation-quiz-data/