Week 12 - Erina
I finally finished writing up the final assignment and am in the final stages of editing it. A minimum 4000-word limit was quite a challenge as I have never written that much for a paper. My undergraduate years mostly consisted of writing pages of math for economics problem sets, so this was a new challenge!
There were a few things I noted while I was writing. First, I had read many papers this term, but I did not reference all the articles I read because some of them were irrelevant to my proposal. That being said, I would not have been able to write up the proposal without reading around the topic. Second, my writing has improved over this term. I had been out of school for quite a long time living in a non-English speaking country for a few years, so writing, nonetheless writing in English, has taken some time getting used to. Third, if possible, if I do end up writing a thesis, I would like to take advantage of the writing support resources at the University of Toronto. I could not schedule an appointment this term because the slots filled up so quickly, and I was slow in writing up the first draft, but I would like to take advantage of these resources in the future. Fourth, I struggled cutting out the passive voice when I was writing up the proposed methods section of this assignment. Fifth, I would love to take another stab at writing up the proposal in a few months after reading more papers and talking to professors about how I can refine the research proposal. Save for your input (thank you all!) I have not had time to get feedback on my research design from others.
Lastly, a little note about the readings this week. I found Knight's (2011) reference of Sternberg (1993) was relevant for this assignment:
"I have often thought that I knew what I wanted to say, only to find that when the time came to say it, I was unable to. The reason for this, I think, is that in thinking about a topic, we often allow ourselves conceptual gaps that we hardly know exist. When we attempt to communicate our thoughts, however, these gaps become obvious."
I also found Knight's (2011) explanations of why researchers need to argue the importance of our research beyond the local very relevant to our fourth assignment. I thought Knight made an interesting point when he mentioned researchers need to explain the importance of our research compellingly to persuade editors and publishers to publish your article or book. I imagine this is obvious for those in the academic sphere, but this is certainly very new to me as an 'emerging scholar.' From this week's readings, I have learned that our research question does not speak for itself and that the researcher must make a compelling case to readers on how and why the research question is important.
Knight, P. T. (2002). Small-Scale Research: Pragmatic Inquiry in Social Science and the Caring Professions. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
Sternberg, R. J. (1993).
The Psychologist's Companion (3rd ed.). Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press.
Hi Erina, I really enjoyed reading your reflection on your final assignment. As someone who came from a science background, I completely understand and agree with the 4000 word limit being quite a challenge! In science we are encouraged to write as concisely and minimally as possible so it took me a while to get used to including more detail in my writing. I really like you thoughts regarding Knight and the importance of arguing for importance beyond the local. It reminded me of the importance of justifying your research methods and proving sufficient evidence for each an every choice you make in your research design.
ReplyDeleteHi Kaitlin!
DeleteYes, I never realized the full implications of the importance of arguing the relevance/importance beyond the local beforehand. I've enjoyed Knight's readings over the term because every chapter covered general and relevant insights into research methods for beginners. The readings really helped me understand how the researcher must be aware of issues that may arise in every step of the research process.
Hi Erina,
DeleteI found your discussion about importance beyond the local relevant as well. For the purposes of my study, at first I did not know how to frame the importance. It was just intuitively important to me that what I am studying is important. Preserving memories that would other wise not be preserved felt important enough. However, as I thought about it more, I realized that building cultural understanding is a key part of doing research about cultures. This was how I framed the importance beyond the local in my study. Without learning about other cultures, people do not have the opportunity to question prejudices. I found this was particularly relevant to a study related to museums. One of the goals of museums can be to create an environment where people can directly question the prejudices they may hold about another culture because the museums may present a different narrative about the community being displayed. Hopefully this is a goal that hooks other readers into my study.
Aden
Hi Aden,
DeleteYou provide a great example showing why it is important to discuss the relevance beyond the local! I admit, I intuitively thought your research was important but was not able to pin point exactly what made it important. Having the researcher highlight it certainly helps the reader place the study within the greater social context.