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Title: Tango 73: A Bus Rider’s Diary Rating: 2.6 out of 4 Reference: Director & producer, Gabriela Quirós.
Library of Congress subjects: Alameda-Contra Costa Transit District (Calif.) Bus lines--California--Alameda County Bus lines--California--Contra Costa County Commuters--California--Alameda County Sociology subjects: The body (in part) The city Community activism (in part) Disability (in part) Ethnographic methods Poverty/class in North America Women & the family Work in North America and Europe (in part) Reviews and Numerical Ratings 2 This fairly new video aptly illustrates that fact that not all urban dwellers are extremely wealthy, personal owners of transportation means, and willing or (cap)able drivers. It shows other social/psychological reasons why people prefer public transportation. In this regard, this video could be useful in the sociology curriculum but nothing special jumps out at me. Nevertheless there is a high level of social interaction between the bus driver and her passengers [which could be interesting]. Finally, the video shows how, during times of recessing, the poor, needy, and destitute are the first to suffer from scaled-down programmes and services - the needy suffer the most and the most drastic cuts. For 1st and 2nd year students. Jennifer Lewis-Phillips (undergraduate) 2 This video was dull and painful to sit through. It has potential as being useful for an introduction to ethnographic study as the narrator uses key terms like “gatekeeper” and begins to point out the ritual and rule to everyday actions. I only made it through 10 minutes of the video as it was so dull and slow and simple that I did not complete it. Good for VERY introductory ethnography. One additional note is that there are very racist statements made about bus passengers that are never addressed and just left in the dialogue. Tara Franz 3.5 Imaginative exploration of many social issues involved in public transit. Woven with first person narratives. Great for classroom use. Lecture topics: poverty, class analysis, work and labour, disability studies, neo-liberal economics, urban politics and culture, everyday life in the city. Mervyn Horgan & Paul Moore 2.5 Mostly useful for urban studies/planning or, perhaps, political science courses because it deals with the need for bus services in the working-class/poor community. Demonstrates issues but not in an explicitly sociological way, so the viewer would need to be providing the sociological analysis, which would be more of a challenge for students in the early years of our programme. Even though this is a simple video on a simple topic - the bus ride - you can see in it issues such as racial/immigrant/ethnic classification & stereotyping, e.g., the bus driver makes certain generalizations about passengers. Issues of gender/sexism come through, e.g., the female bus driver feels that male passenger don’t regard her as having authority, the issues of female passengers needing safe service late at night & being vulnerable. And also, issues of poverty & disability in access to public transportation come through, e.g., in the timing, route, responses of able-bodied passengers to a woman with a disability. Some parts are fun, especially how the narrator uses the concept of the tango poetically to depict what riders go through everyday - but maybe that’s better suited for an English class. For students at any level. Kisrene McKenzie (undergraduate) 3 In opening section, narrator contrasts her life
in Costa Rica & US interestingly. Diary/letter home format engaging.
Looks at lives of four other women - one driver & three riders (all
of them caregivers) - to bring forth several issues in an enjoyable
way. There’s a bad moment when bus driver makes some racist generalization,
and pace is overall slow. Kathy Bischoping
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