11th Feb 2008 2:00pm-4:00pm
Conference Room, CRD
Please disturb - Research-in-progress: Methods, contexts, strategies and output
The 'Research in Progress' seminar series, run by The Faculty of Arts' Research Student Division, was intended as a forum for discussions on issues of research practice. The seminars took place fortnightly on Mondays throughout spring and summer terms 2008.
The series was a medium for peer-discussion, support and critical engagement in order to continue building a supportive, constructive research community amongst research students and interested MA students across the Faculty.
The sessions emphasised round-table discussions centred on various methodological approaches and featured a presentation by experts in the fields. The speakers were invited to provide examples of their own research, for instance archival material, interview extracts or visual data to provide practical examples of 'real-world' research to open up for group discussion and analysis. Each talk (circa 40 minutes) was followed by discussion in which participants were encouraged to contextualise the issues in relation to their own work and engage with the interpretative process. Speakers were encouraged to suggest texts that participants could read as preparation to sessions.
The parameters of the topics were relatively broad and pragmatic but what the sessions entailed, and what the discussions focussed on, was up to the speaker and participants.
Subject areas included:
List of sessions, spring/summer term 2008
11 February: 'Archives and Research: Accidents and System'
14.00 - 16.00 Dr. Lesley Whitworth, Design History Archives, University of Brighton
This informal workshop style session drew on the case of the University of Brighton Faculty of Arts' Design Archives and the experience of its curatorial team to address some of the misconceptions and tensions associated with the archival research arena. It considered best practice, norms and conventions, and methodological issues, as well as the part played by serendipity and mischance in carrying through any such piece of primary research. Its aim was to encourage relaxed, thoughtful engagements with archival spaces in the future, and happy, well-crafted relationships with their guardians.
25 February: 'Semiology'
14.00 - 16.00 Dr. Teresa Stoppani, University of Greenwich,
Architectural Association
14 March: 'Objects as Data'
14.00 - 16.00 The biography of an object: Recording histories, contexts, meanings and locality
Prof. Lou Taylor, School of Historical and Critical Studies
14 April: 'The Interview: Who to Ask and How to Ask it?'
11.00 - 13.00 Conducting interviews and oral histories
Linda Sandino, Senior Research Fellow, Camberwell College of Arts
21 April: 'Analysing data: "Now What Do I Do With It?"'
14.00 - 16.00 Approaches to analysis of qualitative data
Dr. Belinda Wheaton, Chelsea School
6 May: 'Ethnographic Research'
14.00 - 16.00 Diaries, field notes, recordings
Dr. Mark Erickson, School of Applied Social Science
19 May: 'Material Meanings: The Self and the Object'
14.00 - 16.00 Subjectivities research and critical response
Dr. Carol Tulloch, Senior Researcher, V&A
2 June: 'Ethics of Research'
14.00 - 16.00 Dr. Bob Brecher,
School of Historical and Critical Studies
