Graduate Research Seminar 2014/2015: Difference between revisions

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THESIS SEMINAR

Thesis outlines below

Key dates

13 January Janice and Steve review draft outlines

21 January - outline for thesis deadline

18 Febuary 1st Chapter

18 March 1st Draft

30 April Thesis to tutors for read through and feedback 18 May Feedback from tutors

1 June thesis final deadline'

13-01-2015

Thesis Outline Max Thesis outline (draft)

Elleke File:Thesis outlineeh.pdf First chapter BLACK FLAG finished:

BLACK FLAG

Lídia - thesis outline

8-01-2015

MORNING

11:00 = Brief intro to the thesis writing process (see also below).

11:05 = Janice Mc Nab will give presentation

12:05

Break

12:20 = Steve will go through the thesis guidelines. The stages of the process will be outlined (thesis outline, first chapter, first draft, second draft, final).

13:00 = lunch 14:00 = brief, informal introduction of who you are and what you do (five minutes each)

16:00 = Write draft outline of thesis and compile bibliography. During the afternoon Janice will spend a little more time getting to know you individually.

Part 2: 2015

• Regular sessions in small reading groups and individual tuition sessions in which we plan, review progress of your thesis and set achievable aims for the next session. Timetable to spend at least one working day a week on your thesis over the next two trimesters.

• Make a reading and writing timetable. Stick to it.

General notes for this year

1) THE MOST USEFUL RESOURCE YOU HAVE IS THE WORK YOU HAVE DONE SO FAR, your notes and essays you wrote last year, the essay on method you did at the end of the third trimester, the various drafts for your proposal and the proposal itself, provide you with a starting point for your thesis. The thesis needs to be a reflection of your practice so it will emerge from the written work you have done already. Therefore, for this seminar please come prepared and gather together all the written work you did last year. Also bring along the research material you have been using, books, articles, pdfs &c. If you have a large bibliography bring along the texts / books you consider most important.

2) Communication - Think of the reader. It is not safe to assume they have knowledge of what you are writing about. Even if they do have knowledge this needs to be contextualized. Generally people appreciate clarity.

3) Description - Remember to describe the texts you are citing (synopsis of relevant arguments) and the things you are discussing (your own work, the work of others).

4) Citation - give appropriate acknowledgment of the text/work you are citing. Do not leave it to the end of the process to place citations, as your texts grow more complex and longer this becomes a tedious task so give citations as you go. Use the Harvard method.

5) Notation - always take notes and log your sources. The alphabet code is an excellent memory storage system - use it.

6) Identify and eliminate bad habits as you go - this saves time. Examples: its/it's / i/I

7) Bibliography

n) stop wiki sloppiness - this is the page through which we communicate so always make a link to the latest version on this page

(Text from handbook)

NOTES ON WRITING A THESIS

The written thesis is a crucial part of any Master Project and needs to be carefully planned from the start. What follows are some notes to guide you in the construction of your thesis, according to a chosen format. Make use of the guidance available in other informational documents – including the PZI Programme Handbook and the PZI Proposal Guide.

I. THESIS AIMS

The main purpose of the thesis is to articulate in writing issues, questions and ideas that inform or shape your practice.

Think of the thesis, regardless of what form it takes, as a parallel activity to the body of work you are developing for your graduation – a parallel text supported by images. The thesis can combine different kinds of discourse, each of which may have different, yet overlapping, functions (see examples under “Thesis Formats” below). With your writing tutor, you will establish which form of writing is most appropriate for your practice, develop a relationship between writing and practice, and learn to consider your writing as an integral part of your practice, as a medium of reflection and production.

II. THESIS Formats

The written thesis is produced in parallel to a Graduate project. It is meant to demonstrate your ability to articulate aesthetic and critical issues that emerge from your practice, as well as historical and theoretical contexts that you are responding to and are aiming to shape. The horizon of the written thesis, like the Graduate project you exhibit as a requirement for graduation, is that it is suitable for publication (i.e. to be read by professionals, peers, and a broader public). The role of the written thesis in relation to exhibited Graduate Project may vary:

1) It can take the form of a report on practice and research. Here, "research" has an open definition, but one that you must be able to articulate clearly. It will be presented alongside a body of work that is directly addressed in the report.

2) It can take the form of an analytical essay exploring related artistic, theoretical, historical and critical issues and practices that inform your practice, without necessarily referring to your work directly. The essay will, however, be evaluated against the exhibited body of work, and you will be asked to articulate in the Project Proposal and in the final assessment how your written thesis informs the aesthetic, theoretical and technical choices in your body of work.

3) The presentation of a text as a body of work is possible, but requires close consultation with your advising tutors and your writing tutors. With this option, you will have to establish whether your Graduate Project and thesis are one and the same, or whether they form two distinct components. The form that your text may take is more open, but you are required to demonstrate research, as well as critical and theoretical mastery of the concepts that inform the choice of form.

4) A combination of options 1), 2) or 3) is also possible, in which case the text as body of work is distinct from the part that constitutes a report or an analytical essay. In this case, the roles of the different textual materials comprising your thesis should be clearly articulated in your Project Proposal.

Examples of what the different formats could include, are:

• a descriptive account of developing ideas, processes and products, along with an analytical critique of your work and its formative processes • a narrative that traces a web of relationships – contextualizing your work in relation to other practitioners, practices and artworks, situating your work within relevant theoretical, philosophical, aesthetic and other fields of knowledge • an in-depth reflection on an artistic, literary, historical, critical or other practice which is inspirational to your own • a more creative or poetic discourse that that may be analogous to, or have structural affinities with, your body of work – shedding light on the themes, methods and visual signs that you have been exploring • a series of diagrams, tables and visualizations charting the progress of ideas and forms using textual alongside other material • a piece of artistic writing experimenting with formats of creative writing, authorship or publishing

III. THESIS REQUIREMENTS

The thesis presented as part requirement for the award of the Master of Media Design and Communication degree is normally equivalent to not fewer than 7,000 words and not more than 8,000 words. In the case that you choose to combine your Graduate Project and thesis, meaning your entire Graduate Project is text-based, the number of words appropriate to your writing will have to be determined with the Course Director, your advising tutors and your writing tutor.

With the report on practice and research (option 1) you are required:

• to provide an analytical account of the development of your work (thinking processes as well as material processes) in relation to the aims and objectives identified in your Project Proposal • to locate your work in relation to appropriate contexts (for example: relevant theories, ideas, historical and/or contemporary art and design practices) • to evaluate critically your body of work as a whole, against clearly formulated criteria

With the analytical essay (option 2) the requirements are very similar:

• to provide an analytical account of the development of artistic practice, theoretical, historical or cultural phenomena (thinking processes as well as material processes) in relation to the aims and objectives identified in your Graduate Project Proposal • to create appropriate contexts for your practice (for example by writing about relevant theories, ideas, historical or contemporary art and design practices) • to evaluate critically your body of work as a whole, against clearly formulated criteria

With the text as a body of work (option 3) the requirements are again somewhat similar:

• to demonstrate, by way of your artistic or experimental writing, an analytical approach to the development of artistic practice, theoretical, historical or cultural phenomena (thinking processes as well as material processes) in relation to the aims and objectives identified in your Project Proposal • to create appropriate contexts for your practice (for example by supplementing your work with an experimental form of writing which develops relevant theories, ideas, historical or contemporary art and design practices) • to evaluate critically your body of work as a whole, against clearly formulated criteria

However, you will need to provide a preface or appendix if your approach does not perform the above.

First Trimester (Fall 2014) EMO and Project Proposal

This trimester will be concerned with

a) Making an entry into the EMO and

b) Writing a project proposal.

This seminar is parallel to your classes with Aymeric every second Monday. See: http://pzwart3.wdka.hro.nl/wiki/Graduate_Seminar_2014-2015

In this class, over the next month, there will be an emphasis on writing the Media Object entry.

On the 17/11 you will begin your proposal writing in earnest and the work you have been doing with Aymeric on your final project and proposal will Segway into this class. The remaining six weeks of this trimester will be devoted to writing the proposal and planning the thesis.

On that date we will review your proposal and thesis ideas.

17/09

• How Aymeric and Steve’s class work together

• Discuss proposal and thesis in general

• Discuss media object

• Identify and make notes for the media object

EMO

In this trimester you will give a short lecture on a 'media object' of your choice and write an entry for the encyclopedia. Your media object might be a physical, digital object, a technique, transaction or cultural trope - but a 'media object' you particularly value and have a particular fondness for. This is the continuation of an ongoing project which began in 2013. The aim in the context of this seminar is to give you the opportunity to articulate the influence of a particular media object on your final project.

24/09

• Review draft of Media Objects in groups

2) Our Simple Wiki Style Sheet: Titles and works = italics Essays = title in caps Notation = Harvard System (writer, page number) = (Smith, 26) URL = make link

1/10

Last week you set achievable aims for your Media Object text, we will be following those up in this seminar and reviewing what has been done and what needs to be done. See agenda below.

10:00 = meet as group - give one minute update

10:15 = group 1 meets with Steve whilst others continue working of EMO

11:15= group 2 meets with Steve whilst others continue working of EMO

12=15 = group 3 meets with Steve whilst others continue working of EMO

Last week you set the following aims for your Media Object text

Lidia = sociogram:

24-Sept = outline

(Steve suggests Nikolas Rose’s Governing the Self - the shaping of the private self- AND Open: Social Engineering : can society be engineered in the 21st century; Otto Neurath the language of the global polis— Steve will bring copies in on 1 Oct - see also work by Pricilla Fernendes [currently showing at SBA])

1-Oct = 1st draft

7-Oct = 2nd draft, sociogram's timeline 1st draft

Joseph:

24-Sept = notes

1-Oct = 1st Draft

Max =realtime

(Steve suggests Max have tutorial with KZ, who is also doing a thematic on performativity this trimester)

24-Sept = Intro to upload

1-Oct - 1st draft 8-Oct - text final read / working on presentation hand in for EMO
15-Oct - presentation of Real-time

Nikos = user profile

24-Sept = gather research material, work toward outline

1-Oct outline

7 oct 1st draft, abstract

Ana Luisa = patron saints

24-Sept= research, make more explicit link of patron saints to modern communication systems (exploit language from conduit model of communication: ‘channel, medium, stream’ &c as well as network model: server, service provider, network &c)

1-Oct = 1st Draft (?)

Mihail = selfie

24-Sept = further research (needs and article= Lidia has it)

1-Oct = (?) outline? abstract?

7-Oct

Artyom = image

24-Sept = Not present

1-Oct

8-Oct fist draft

Lucia = The Magician

24-Sept = further research

1-Oct = outline

7-Oct = abstract + why + choose one path to elaborate

Mathijs= button

24-Sept —— (someone suggested looking at entry in M. Fuller’s Software Studies, also check out the mode of address in that publication, it might be interesting to take a ‘Martian’ approach to your subject [see Martian Poetry])

1-Oct = Draft (?) (Turned out to be too ambitious)

7-Oct = Full draft of history, start of culture, full draft of intro / reason for subject.

Elleke = black square/ non-linear narrative/ spacial 3d book

24-Sept: researching connections

1-Oct

7-Oct

Chen = fairy tale(updated)

24-Sept = research material

1-Oct (outline?)

8-Oct review of outline and working on draft

Fluffy d = Roland tb-303

24-Sept = research material

1-Oct

7-Oct

Bananeo = technoprimitivism

24-Sept = research material

1-Oct = outline/ 1st draft

7-Oct

EMO link here [[1]]

Drafts below:

Group 10:00 - 11:15

Lídia Sociogram Timeline

Group 11:15-12-15

Group 12:15-13:00

7&8-Oct/10

Review Media Object in groups

meet at 11:00 on 8/Oct

15/10

• Publish Media Objects = give presentation

29/10

10:00 - Presentation Media Object = Mihail

10:20 - Review and proposal discussion

11:00 - Work individually and Steve tutorials

Tutorials:

Tutorials: 11:00- 11:30 Artyom 11:30 -12:00 Lucia 12:00-12:30 Lídia 12:30-13:00 Mathijs 13:00 -13:30 nikos Lunch

With Aymeric on Monday 03/11 you will conduct

• group review of the project proposal

5/11

• Group review of the project proposal = = bring in your work from Aymeric's class

12/11

Simon's email 11-Nov, following tutors' review of drafts:

"Having reviewed your draft graduate project proposal as a panel yesterday we wanted to convey the following notes to you.

Your proposal should have specific examples and sketches of possible outcomes and past experiments. Remember this document is a support to the iterative prototyping of your studio work: it is important you document your tests and sketches and present them as part of your practice.

You do not need to present a plan that is rigid and pre-determined but many of the proposals at the moment are only sketches of areas of research interest: to pass the proposal stage of your graduation process you need to bring concrete proposals and prototypes of your own work as well as the contest in which that work sits. What will you create that expresses your vision and your subjective position on the topics you are exploring.

It is also important that these examples should then have a clear and convincing connection to your practice over the last two years. In other words, the proposed work should be realistic and grounded in your past and current work.

The tutors will continue to meet with you on the current rotation and will discuss in detail your draft proposals and their weaknesses and potential strengths. After the the delivery of the proposals and the review panel meeting we will adjust the tutorial schedules in response to your comments yesterday.

Good Luck with finalising your proposals. We are looking forward to reading them.

Simon"

Group review of the project proposal\

Elleke

19/11

• Final review of project proposal

• Plan thesis outline and thesis abstract

24-26/11

Put your latest version here so Steve can review it before the deadline

26/11 DEADLINE project proposal

01/12-02/12

Project Proposal assessments

Part 2: 2015

• Weekly sessions in small reading groups and individual tuition sessions in which we plan, review progress of your thesis and set achievable aims for the next week. Timetable to spend the whole of each Wednesday working on your thesis.

• Make a reading and writing timetable. Stick to it.

general notes for this year

1) Communication - Think of the reader. It is not safe to assume they have knowledge of what you are writing about. Even if they do have knowledge this needs to be contextualized. Generally people appreciate clarity.

2) Description - Remember to describe the texts you are citing (synopsis of relevant arguments) and the things you are discussing (your own work, the work of others).

3) Citation - give appropriate acknowledgment of the text/work you are citing. Do not leave it to the end of the process to place citations, as your texts grow more complex and longer this becomes a tedious task so give citations as you go. Use the Harvard method.

4) Notation - always take notes and log your sources. The alphabet code is an excellent memory storage system - use it.

5) Identify and eliminate bad habits as you go - this saves time. Examples: its/it's / i/I

6) Bibliography

n) stop wiki sloppiness - this is the page through which we communicate so always make a link to the latest version on this page

Next trimester you will begin your thesis: