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Researcher: Cultural relations a strength here
Published 6/11/2009 in Local News
By SHAJIA AHMAD
Garden City's inter-ethnic relations is one of its strengths, a graduate student who has spent years studying the area's history and demographics said.
Molly DesBaillets, a student of anthropology at the University of Kansas, has been studying the effects of municipal government on social capital — the networks and connections between people and groups — for several years, and first presented some of her preliminary research to locals in 2007.
Now, having completed her master's degree, DesBaillets is returning to the area Saturday to discuss Garden City's cultural pluralism with local residents, in efforts to strengthen inter-ethnic ties, she said.
DesBaillets said anthropologists agree that social networks have value because they enable people to acquire resources. But in places where ethnic diversity is high, many social scientists assume the social fabric of communities is weaker, she said.
Famed political scientist Robert Putnam argued in his controversial 2000 book, "Bowling Alone," that America has undergone an unprecedented collapse in civic, social and political life since the mid 20th century, with serious negative consequences. In Garden City, however, the graduate student argues the opposite is the case.
"Garden City has a tremendous network to meet the needs of its newcomers," she said. "Putnam used survey analysis and was looking for very specific organizations like the VFW and (parent-teacher organizations) to make his conclusions — he didn't take things like work at (United Methodist Mexican-American Ministries) or volunteering for Big Brothers Big Sisters into consideration."
The student, who began her extensive studies in 2005, collected data during visits to Garden City when she lived with area residents and attended community gatherings.
To improve the area's social capital, the anthropologist said she has three recommendations to make to local officials and community leaders: the creation of a cultural community center, expanding the role of the city's Cultural Relations Board to include inter-ethnic community programs, and re-evaluating the municipal structure of the city, one she said does not yet reflect the city's populous ethnic and racial communities in its decision-making positions.
Paula Flores, chairwoman of the Cultural Relations Board, disagrees about the last point, she said. In addition to taking part in the sponsorship of several annual programs including the Mexican Fiesta and the Vietnamese Tet celebrations, the board also serves to hear the concerns of all its residents, regardless of race or color, she said.
"City commissioners can only do as much as is presented to them, and active participation from all citizens — not just minorities — is encouraged," Flores said. "We're also willing to hear suggestions on how to get that information out to communities we don't hear from as often."
Flores admitted that the board she has chaired since early this year and has been a member of for nearly two years is probably not as visible as it may have been during its commencement back in 1990, when the committee was created to respond to the needs of thousands of working immigrants who moved to Finney County to work at two new meat-packing plants in the early 1980s.
Flores, a Sunflower Electric Power Corp. extension services administrator, mentioned that citizens have expressed interest in a cultural community center in previous years.
"That would be a great idea," she said. "It would be a central place where anybody could go and really get a glimpse of just how diverse we really are."
The U.S. Census Bureau announced last month that Finney County is one of five counties nationwide to have become minority-majority counties in 2008.
The bureau defines the category, which already represents about 10 percent of counties nationwide, as one where more than half of residents identify themselves as being of a group other than single-race, non-Hispanic whites.
DesBaillets, now a doctoral candidate, said she'll continue to study Garden City's inter-ethnic relations in some fashion but is unsure what road her work will take. She is eager, however, to hear reaction and gain feedback on her work and recommendations. The Finney County Historical Museum, 403 S. Fourth St., will be hosting a program at 10 a.m. Saturday for individuals to do just that. A Spanish-speaking interpreter will be present during the program.
Along the academic journey, DesBaillets said she's been surprised how much locals feel like they have a stake in her research.
"When I've studied people in other locations, they've been pretty blasé about it all," she said. "But in Garden City, people I interviewed or observed were already interested in the same questions I was asking, without my even being there."
Do you think Garden City has strong inter-ethnic relations? What could be done to improve social capital? Talk about it at SWKTalk.com.
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