Zachary Blair

I received an honorable mention at the University of Illinois at Chicago's 2017 Image of Research competition for the following photograph I took at the Pulse memorial in Orlando, Florida. After the mass shooting at the Pulse Nightclub last year, I began a research endeavor to document and contextualize the event itself, as well as understand the variety of ways people interpret and experience tragedy, grief, mourning, and solidarity in Orlando, Florida. This research project

For years, I have wanted to write an article about the relationship between Gayness, Art Deco, and Disney. While there are a few connections I have discovered, they never fully solidified and my research has always led me to various dead ends. However, apparently I'm not the only one who has thought somewhere along these lines (read this). Think about Miami's South Beach, The Tower of Terror, Grauman's Chinese Theatre, apparently Tulsa, Oklahoma, and of course, Boystown. Geog

Writing has never been a problem for me. I have always loved writing. But writing an ethnography has been such a huge challenge. There are no rules to writing an ethnography, so you are never taught "how to write an ethnography" - at least I never was. Journalistic writing - pretty clear. There is a structure, a style, guidelines, and an established norm. Creative writing - fun. Essay writing - beginning, middle, and end. Writing ethnography, unlike anything else I have ever