Reading, Writing & Research Methods
Reading, Writing, and Research Methodologies 2015-16
Handbook description: "The Reading, Writing, and Research Methodologies Seminar is tailored towards (further) developing research methods within the first year of this master. By establishing a solid foundation of research skills, it will eventually prepare students for their Graduate research in the second year. Through reading core theoretical texts, they will establish a common vocabulary and set of references to work from. They will learn the practice of classic ‘essayistic methodologies’, including close reading, annotation, description and notation, students learn to survey a body of literature, filter what is relevant to their research and create comparative pieces of analysis. The seminar helps students to establish methodical drafting processes for their texts, where they can develop ideas further and structure their use of notes and references. The course takes as axiomatic that the perceived division between ‘practice’ and ‘theory’ is essentially an illusion."
Curriculum:
The seminar over the two trimesters will involve:
(a.) Identifying the object of your research: description and analysis of your work
(b.) Contextualizing your work through description and reflection on contemporary and historical practices.
(c.) Identify research material key to your practice.
(d.) Synopsis and annotation of key texts
(e.) Writing machines: creating methods for group and individual writing.
Throughout, there will be an emphasis on working collectively, whether in a larger discussion group or in smaller reading and writing groups.
Outcome:
The specific outcome for the RW&RM seminar of 2015-2016 will be a 1500 word text which reflects on your own method and situates your work in relation to a broader artistic and cultural context. The various texts produced within the RW&RM seminar will serve as source material for your text on method. In common with all modules on the course RW&RM serves to support the other elements of the course (Self-directed Research, Issues in Art & Theory, Practice-Group Critiques &c.). Therefore, the text on method will inform your Self-Evaluation at the end of the third trimester and provide the basis for your Graduate Project Proposal that you will produce in the fourth trimester.
Basic style sheet
Titles and works = italics
Essays = Title in Caps
Notation = Harvard System (writer, page number) = (Smith, 26)
URL = make link
TRIMESTER ONE
1-10-15
WhoWhatWhy # 1
Eo Jess Adam Nicholas Dan T Tor Erika Angelica Ash's WhatHowWhy
Oct 29
Exquisite corpse 29-10-15:
Monumental tooth
licking fluffy milkshake
and tacky tears
Icy black hole
Whistles pink monument
Swirly shark
Whipped the sticky sunset
And keys of well being
Pock-marked cock
Drinking juicy molecule
And Rushton’s Steve
Mortified star
Painted chalky roads and sad sex
Ungrateful speaker yells
Weeping many chairs
Flea-bitten shoe twisting gravel
Gleaming Australian accent
Explicit sock folding softly and vegan omelette
Sweet computer set
Flowery gravel
and my lovers
destroyed
follow twinkle cold and colourful trap
Depressed toothpicks descend
Soft shyness
Laundry line
Frequent bell
Slow
Pleasingly bumblebee and axolotl
29-10-15 = Random questions to works of art
upload questions and to, and answers from, your work here
Tor - question to thing in box
Jess - Tell me about your dance/ the trouble I had
29-10-15 = What am I doing and what do I want?
What am I doing and what do I want?
12-11-15
Morning:
Recap
Notetaking
Uncreative writing
Afternoon
Writing machines
26-11-15
AM:
Subjects:
Material Metaphors (from Hayles'Wriiting Machines)
Ong now and then
Method: note taking
Late AM and afternoon: writing machines
Viktor's pseudo gothic title generator
Outcome of the machines here:
10-12-2015
Work in context
We will write notes together on this pad:
http://piratepad.net/246s5BWyKv
28-1-16
At the N C.A.C
10:00 = Steve outlines the project=
What is the N C.A.C and what are we doing there? The curator's brief
11:00 = into groups of two
11:00 = prepare interview 1
11:10 = conduct interview 1 (20 minutes max)
11:20 = prepare interview 2
11:30 = conduct interview 2 (20 minutes max)
12:00= transcribe your interview
LUNCH
14:00 = edit your partner's text
UPLOAD TEXT HERE>
Interview with Nicholas by Tor
Aggressively Fun Connie meets Angelica
Connie interviewed by Angelica
16:00 review in group
11-2-2016
10:15 Discuss the difference between a passive and active voice.
10:30
Reading: Politics and the English Language (1948) by George Orwell.
In context Orwell vs. modernism: 1984, BASIC English and Otto Neurath
Politics and the English Language is an old text, but today we will use Orwell as a writing machine
Orwell writes:
" A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus:
1. What am I trying to say?
2. What words will express it?
3. What image or idiom will make it clearer?
4. Is this image fresh enough to have an effect?
And he will probably ask himself two more:
1. Could I put it more shortly?
2. Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly?" (p.3)
Orwell later proposes the following rules:
"1. Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything barbarous." (p.5)
From 11:00
Experiment:
(a) edit the text you wrote last week using the active voice.
(b) apply Orwell's constraints to the interview text you made during the last session (you can also apply to other texts, of course). Keep both versions for comparison.
(c) option: you can choose to swap texts.
Connie interviewed by Angelica
3 March
Today we will bring together a number of the methods we've been playing with.
The aim of the RW&RM is to write a 1500 text on method, this will be part of your self-evaluation seminar later in the year. key elements of this texts will be description of work and discussion of motivation.With each session you have been gathering material which can be used as a resource. Today we will revisit two methods we have previously used in order to update the descriptions and analysis of current and recent work..
a.) 10:00-11:30 description of (most recent) work: what,
how and
why? (150 words)
If you are up to date with this (you may have a description of recent work in the interview you made in the last session)
b.) 11:30-12:30
Current work
1 What are you working on now?
2 What are you thinking of making?
3 How do you plan to make it?
4 Why do you want to make it?
5 Relation to previous practice
5 Relation to a larger context
6 References
Lunch 13:00-14:00
14:00-15-30
c) This afternoon run the above text through the 'orwell editing filter':
"1. Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything barbarous."
Orwell, politics and the English Language 1948 (p.5)
15:30- 16:30
UPLOAD TEXT HERE:
Get someone else to edit your text (cut and paste a version for them to work into, make comments &c.)
16:30
Meet as group to recap
ALSO - Steve note: I have been working on individual texts with some of you. Today I would like to work together with you on a text of your choosing (or maybe in groups of two, if you would find that more useful.) The aim is to read and reflect on your text, praise the positive elements and suggest changes.
I have recently worked with about half of you and have yet to see:
Viktor
Dan
Anni
Erika
Let's allow for three one hour sessions between 11:00 and 16:00
Note:
Remember these editing tips (including “Sarah Tripp's top tips” - please add your own useful tips):
identify the reader;
use active mode of address;
make three drafts with a specific outcome for each draft (these may correspond to text editing, copy editing and proof reading stages);
print each draft out;
read aloud (this helps with punctuation);
get second reader to give feedback on second and final draft
This isn't the only way to write and edit, but try it at least once and see what works for you.
In the next session we will gather the material together to work on a first draft on the text on method.
NEXT SESSION
If you are advanced with the above, you may want to start this exercise.
March 17
Print out everything you have written for this seminar and physically cut and paste a 'very rough draft' of a text on method.
You can use this outline as a guide:
Outline for the text (this is a guide rather than a prescription)
General note on mode of address. Write as if to someone not familiar with your work.
Title
Abstract: what is this document? what do you want the reader to get from this text? (50-100 words
Introduction: Give outline of the text and make the points you want to get across clear.
Current Practice (resource: here you can use the descriptions made in the last session)
Relation to previous practice
How does your current work connect to previous projects you have done? (resource: here you can use the descriptions made in the first sessions)
Relation to a larger context
Outline practices or ideas that go beyond the scope of your personal work. Write briefly about other projects or theoretical material which share an affinity with your project. It is simply about showing an awareness of a broader context, which you will later build upon in your project proposal and writing component in the second year (you may have covered some of this in your interview)
Research strands
Consider the possibilities open to you and where you would take your work in the near future.
General note= consider the role of images and links to video (if you want your proposal to take the form of a wiki/web page)
Reading and editing sessions with Steve. Individual or groups of two
Please add names
11:00
12:00
15:00