On Collaborative Research and Writing

Like so many PhD students these days, I did many other projects while I was "writing my thesis". A mixture of trying to avoid the isolation that plagues doctoral study, insatiable curiosity and an inability to focus on a sole project for too long lead me to take any collaborative opportunity which came my way. The longest running of these was the "How to Get an Academic Job" project, which I joined as a bright-eyed, naive first year PhD. As our article based on the project has recently been published, now seems like a good time to reflect on the whole process.

Back in late 2012, Dr Anna Mountford-Zimdars - Senior Lecturer at King's Learning Institute, specialising in access to Higher Education and employment - put out a call through the Graduate School for PhD students to participate in a project on academic hiring, which would involve interviewing academics from our discipline. She ended up with 12 researchers from different arts, humanities and social science disciplines, as well as two international students (from Italy and Korea) who provided an insight into academic life and hiring in their home countries. Over the course of the academic year, we worked collaboratively to develop research questions, carry out the study and analyse the results. The first stage was a meeting with Anna and Charles, our learning technologist, which began with a discussion about what we, the student-researchers, wanted to get out of the project. This was a decisive moment: while Anna had planned a project on academic hiring - what do junior academics think helped them to get their jobs, what do senior academics look for when they are on hiring panels - it soon became clear that as student-researchers we were concerned about whether we should be trying for an academic job in the first place. Is it worth it? The interview plan thus developed to include questions about what academic life is like day-to-day, what academics value about it and what they dislike, alongside the questions about career histories. When the time came to analyse the results, the most interesting findings in my mind came from the interplay between these two areas. Of particular note was the fact that many academics gave human interaction - above all nurturing students - as what they valued most about the job, and yet it was one of the least recognised factors in academic hiring.

The research itself involved each of us interviewing two academics in our field - a new hire and a professor or head of department. In the article we eventually published, we recommended more dialogue between graduate students and staff about career trajectories, as the real life stories are often quite different to the image created by just looking as person specs or job adverts. Some participants also noted that it made high-up academics seem much more human to them, perhaps opening a path for more collaboration across career stages. To carry out the interviews, we were all given training on qualitative research methods and ethics, entirely new to some of us.

After our first interviews, we posted recordings and our preliminary thoughts on a private online discussion forum. We were paired up so that researchers from different disciplines listened to each other's interviews (I learnt about Management) and also wrote down our thoughts on them. This both allowed reflection on similarities and differences between subjects, and established closer relationships between members of the team. When we met up to discuss findings and next steps, all of this was celebrated with cake, a much needed part of any project.

After this meeting, we set up a working group to process the data. Between five of us, we produced materials including top tips, case studies and visualisations, used in a leaflet for students, a website and on a poster presented at a teaching and learning conference at King's. 

The final stage was just Anna and me. This is where the real collaborative work began. Rather than each working on separate sections, we worked together to write first a presentation for a Higher Education Academy conference on student transitions, and then the aforementioned article. Over tea, pizza, and more cake, we discussed the shape of the paper, what was important to include, and how to respond to the reviewers' suggestions. Anna brought expert knowledge of the discipline, I brought my linguist's eye for the nuances in words used in interviews, and for crafting a story out of data. Such collaborative writing seems to be the done thing in Education, it is much less common in languages (although notable recent examples include this paper on Modern Languages and Digital Humanities by Claire Taylor and Thea Pitman. I'm hoping to continue writing collaboratively if any volunteers are reading! 

Ironically, I'm pretty certain the article did not help me to get an academic job. The academics we interviewed offered a wide range of factors they look for when hiring - including enthusiasm for the discipline and collegiality - but, as to be expected, publications came out on top. And publications means publications in your discipline which can be submitted to the REF- as recent job interviews have confirmed - not an education article. But the skills I learned from it, the intellectually challenging experience, and the social aspects have strengthened me as a researcher and will no doubt influence my future work.

Connections, collaboration, and communication: what I learnt from the LAHP Languages and Policy Workshop

On Monday 7 December 2015, I attended a workshop on languages and policy hosted by the London Arts and Humanities Partnership. Having worked for The Policy Institute at King’s while completing my PhD on literature and cultural policy in Venezuela, I was very keen to learn more about how languages – or, more broadly, language-based area studies – interact with policy. This thought-provoking workshop highlighted three areas of interest: how policy affects the study of languages, the intersection of languages and policy outside of academia, and how aspects of language-based academic research can link to policy. For me, the workshop can be summarized in three linked key terms: connections, collaboration, and communication.

From Jocelyn Wyburd’s facts and figures about the crisis in languages education, particularly the deficit of secondary school language teachers, it was clear to me that we need to work together across the languages to lobby the government and encourage the study of languages. To do this, we must also reach out to other disciplines, such as neuroscience to show the cognitive benefits of language learning, or social scientists to discuss multilingualism and social cohesion. Philip Cavendish from the School of Slavonic and Eastern European Studies at UCL gave an example of a department which combines traditional language-related research (study of a language and its related culture) with subjects including politics and international relations, while also working with institutions beyond the university (the FCO, Open Democracy, the Calvert Foundation). I found it a shame, however, that there is not much communication between SSEES and other languages departments. I strongly believe that scholars in different languages have a lot to gain from working together; not only the traditionally taught European languages, but also the Asian and African languages which are often limited to specialist institutions such as SOAS.

In the second session, Chris Murray (Institute for Public Policy Research), Helen Laker (Southwark Council), Carolina Gottardo (Latin American Women’s Rights Service) and Lucila Granada (Coalition of Latin Americans) all demonstrated the interplay between languages and policy in the real world, in sectors such as education, health care, housing and employment. What struck me most was that all four depend on volunteers. While it was suggested that volunteering could be considered as an internship for PhD students, I thought that as undergraduate students often complain that they do not get enough speaking practice, why not put them in contact with associations or charities? I would like to explore further how to integrate this useful language practice into the undergraduate degree.

The final session stressed the importance of putting yourself out there, meeting people, making connections and being prepared to go beyond your comfort zone. I noted that Hilary Footitt called her work on the language policies of NGOs ‘a strange project to have arrived at’, and I paraphrased Ben Schofield with ‘If someone offers you something weird and wonderful, go for it’. The panel encouraged us to think creatively about links between our research of obscure literature (in both Ben’s and my case at least!) and wider policy implications. They suggested going to conferences on subjects outside of our own to find links, as Hilary did, both with other disciplines and other institutions. From lobbyist Zacahary Bishop, I learnt to develop my USP/‘elevator pitch’, so that if I’m ever in a room with policy-makers they can tell straight away if there is an opportunity for collaboration. Finally, Ben (who is something of a Twitter personality: @haben_und_soll), reminded us that social media is a useful tool: we should let the world know what we’re doing so people can find us!

Given the focus on connections, communication and collaboration, it was great to have not only speakers but other attendees from a wide range of disciplines, including sign language, education and medical humanities. We definitely learnt a lot from each other, and left inspired to build more connections beyond our own disciplines.

For more information about the LAHP, visit www.lahp.ac.uk

Celebrating interdisciplinarity, collaboration and the digital

(Originally posted 1 June 2014)

In the past few weeks I’ve been lucky enough to participate in a range of events at King’s and beyond which have filled me with enthusiasm both for my own research and for the future of academia. These events have shown me the possibilities for collaborative research across disciplines, for making the most of the digital and for sharing learning beyond the classroom.

First up, on Friday 16 May, was Research with Reach, a full-day event organised by Ella Parry-Davies and Penny Newell from the Department English, which brought together postgraduate researchers from across the Arts and Humanities and a fascinating range of speakers from within and outside academia. The day was born from Ella and Penny’s desire to learn more about how to share knowledge beyond the academy while hopefully supplementing our incomes in the process! We gained useful insights into journalism, running public workshops, speaking at festivals like Hay, and making the most of blogging and social media. It was a particular pleasure to meet Prof Alan Read, the driving force behind the Inigo Rooms and the Anatomy Theatre, as I really admire how those spaces have been created to bring art and performance into the university and allow innovative ways of exhibiting research.

Then on Tuesday 20 May, the Union conference, run by my fellow Arts and Humanities Life blogger Naomi Lloyd-Jones and a very dedicated team of postgraduate researchers from across the departments. The aim of the conference was to explore and celebrate interdisciplinarity by giving new researchers – including many MA students who had never presented a conference paper before – the chance to share their research beyond the restrictive boundaries of academic departments and find connections. I really loved noting how research in philosophy, for example, linked with my research on nationalist cultural politics, while the very novel ‘paper as performance’ which ended the day not only impressed me but left me with concrete ideas for improving my own teaching practice. Explaining my thesis to non-experts proved to me that I really know my research and don’t have to hide behind long words, and the final lively workshop and debate session only reinforced my enthusiasm for sharing my research with wider audiences.

While the participants of Union enjoyed a tasty conference dinner, I headed off to Birkbeck Arts Week to celebrate the second birthday of Alluvium Journal, an open access, post-publication peer review journal of twenty-first century literary criticism. Having followed Alluvium and many of its editors/writers on Twitter for some time, I was very excited to meet them in person and to hear more about their pioneering developments in the production and dissemination of knowledge about literature. One particularly interesting case was Zara Dinnen’s use of Google docs to write papers collaboratively with friends and colleagues in other countries.

Overall, it was incredibly refreshing and inspiring – amidst all the doom and gloom that surrounds academia in the age of funding cuts and mounting bureaucracy – to meet like-minded people who are passionate about creating exciting new research and sharing it both beyond departmental borders and with the wider public.

Upgraded!

(Originally posted on 10 April 2014)

As I mentioned in my last post, it seems like for as long as I’ve been at King’s, I’ve been “preparing for my upgrade”. Now, after 18 months, I have survived the process and am finally a fully-fledged PhD candidate.

I really had no idea what to expect from the upgrade meeting. I had spent the day before rereading the 20,000 word chapter that I had handed in for examination back in February, assuming that I would be quizzed on it. As it turned out, I wasn’t expected to say much at all in the meeting. Instead, it was a chance for the examiners, especially my secondary supervisor who had not previously commented on my work, to share their comments, queries and advice. While my two supervisors work on literary/cultural studies like myself, my third examiner was from political science, so she brought an interesting alternative viewpoint to the discussion.

My supervisor insisted that it went really well and that all three examiners had been impressed with my chapter, but I must admit that at the time I was just completely overwhelmed by the amount that I still have to think about. The wealth of further reading recommended by the examiners, and their suggestions on how to expand or refine sections of the chapter will surely prove invaluable in the long-run, helping me to make my thesis better. However, at the time I just wanted to run away and hide from it all. Only now, two weeks later, having finally completed the paperwork, that it has finally sunk in that I’ve passed. Now I can relax for the next 18 months (well, except for researching and writing and teaching and conferencing!) until submission, which I’m sure will come around all too quickly.

Putting It Together

(Originally posted on 23 February 2014)

Art isn’t easy
Every minor detail is a major decision.
Having just the vision’s no solution,
Everything depends on execution.
The art of making art is putting it together.

Writing a PhD might not seem like ‘making art’, but while I grapple with the sprawling mass of knowledge I’ve accumulated over the last 18 months, Sondheim’s words are stuck in my head.

It seems that almost since I started my PhD I’ve been preparing for my upgrade. It was going to be after 9 months, then 12, then 18. It really is happening now, as soon as we can find a time when all three of my examiners are free (which is proving remarkably difficult). As part of the process, I had to write ‘a substantial piece of work’, which usually translates to about 10,000 words. I set myself the challenge over the Christmas holidays to turn the knowledge I’d amassed so far into a coherent contextualising chapter. It took many hours of puzzling over spider diagrams and discussing with my supervisor before the lightbulb moment when I suddenly realised how it all fits together. It turned out I had far more to say than I thought and the chapter ended up at 20,000.

With that done, all I had left to prepare was an outline of my thesis. It was only one page yet I almost found it harder than the 60 I’d written over the holidays. I had been planning to write a chapter about each novel in my corpus but it soon became apparent that this wouldn’t work, or maybe it would, but a thematic approach would make a far better thesis. Having worked out a plan with the main themes arising from the novels, I took it to my supervisor who promptly suggested that I lose the whole first section  and concentrate entirely on the second.  While I know that she is right, it will make a much tighter, more coherent thesis, and I’m excited to be working on this one theme (metafiction and intertextuality in contemporary Venezuelan novels), I can’t deny that I felt a brief mourning period for the topics that I first came in to the PhD with (reactions to nationalism and socialism in fiction). I know I’m not alone – another girl in my department scrapped half of the material that she had planned to include in her thesis at the halfway point too. Part of the PhD process seems to be accepting limitations and evaluating how to do the best research in the time-frame allowed. I keep reminding myself too that the work I’ve done so far isn’t lost or worthless by any means. Hopefully once I finally get this upgrade out of the way, I can turn that earlier work into an article to publish. In the meantime, it feels great to finally have an outline of my thesis on paper and start to envision the finished product in the not-so-distant future.

Making connections: Latin American literature in China

(Originally posted 4 February 2014)

This academic year I have been co-organising our departmental seminars (www.splas-seminars.com) with a fellow PhD candidate. These seminars give current students a chance to try out their research in an informal setting, usually before a big scary conference, and get constructive feedback. Other weeks we get a external speakers in to share their expertise. I love the opportunity these seminars afford to learn about other aspects of my field that I never usually encounter, but this week’s was a particular joy.

Last Wednesday we welcomed Tianai Wang to the department to talk about the influence of Spanish language literature in translation in her native China. Tianai has recently graduated from the MA in Comparative Literature here at KCL so her presentation was also a homecoming, as staff were certainly very happy to see her back.

What I most enjoyed was the opportunity to learn about a culture that I know shamefully little about and the surprise of how much Latin American literature (my own speciality) has influenced contemporary Chinese writers. Mo Yan, for example, was praised for his ‘hallucinatory realism’ when awarded his Noble Prize in 2012 in much the same way that Gabriel Garcia Márquez was for his ‘magical realism’ upon winning the prize in 1982. Tianai’s presentation therefore gave me a new way of thinking about literature that I am very familiar with, as well as an entrance to a whole new literary world.

Tomorrow’s seminar is Dr Juliet Perkin’s talking about translating the 15th century chronicles of Fernao Lopes, worlds away from contemporary Chinese literature, but another topic that I look forward to learning more about.

A Room of One's Own

(Originally posted 19 September 2013)

When I first started at King’s a year ago, my enquiries about a postgraduate office/workspace were met with blank stares and mumbles of ‘try the British Library’. I was disappointed as I’ve always had an aversion to working in libraries, especially the silent kind, and I’d been hoping that a workroom would be a space where catching up with colleagues would brighten the otherwise lonely business of doctoral research.

Now with our shiny new Virginia Woolf building on Kingsway, I’ve got all I wanted and more. Not only bright, open-plan research space, but a kitchen and comfy sofas too. The best part is that SPLAS now shares this area with the German department. I’ve often said that one of my favourite aspects of the PhD is getting to know other researchers and learning from them. The daily contact with German PGRs and staff opens a whole knew world of research specialisms to fascinate me, from contemporary Austrian theatre to the reception of Hollywood rom-coms in Europe. Then when the study-guilt kicks in and we leave the sofas, knowing there are other people at the neighbouring desks powering through that journal article or rewriting their next chapter is a great motivator to keep on working. We’ve only been moved in for a week, but I already feel like the new building will make this a very productive and enjoyable year!

The Latin American Studies Association Conference or ‘How I met everyone I cite in my thesis’

(Originally posted 18 June 2013)

Regular readers of this blog will know that I’m a confessed conference junkie, but all of the conferences I’ve been to so far this year added together still don’t come near to the enormous scale of LASA. As the international conference for anyone working on any aspect of Latin American Studies – from politics and economics, to culture, geography and even medicine – LASA attracts several thousand attendees. The swarm of Latin Americanists in the lobby when I first arrived at the hotel in Washington DC where this year’s conference was overwhelming, but I quickly realised that, beyond the lobby, panels at LASA were much the same as at any other conference, thankfully.

With Profesor Gisela Kozak Rovero and one of her former students

The amazing thing about LASA is how it attracts the leading scholars in my field, who I would never otherwise get a chance to meet. I got all fangirly in the presence of such academic stars: ”Professor X, I’m a huge fan of yours, I’ve read all your books, squee!” Most of this happened in my panel, embarassingly. When I was selected for LASA back in January, I had barely begun my PhD and had little idea of who the other four presenters in my panel were. Now I cite three of them in my thesis. In the audience were another three of my sources. Talking about a Venezuelan novel to a roomful of leading literature professors from Venezuela was intimidating, to say the least, but they were incredibly friendly and welcoming, and gave me invaluable feedback for my thesis.

With writer Dayana Fraile in the enormous Venezuelan literature section of the University of Pittsburgh library

Taking advantage of being on that side of the world (and the insanely cheap Megabus), after the conference I headed to Pittsburgh, for a – sadly far too brief - visit to some Venezuelan writers who I also cite, and in the case of Israel Centeno, have a whole chapter dedicated to. Once again, it was an incredible experience to meet people whose work I so enjoy and admire, and I learned so much for my thesis. Now I just have to write it all up!Share on twitterShare on emailShare on pinterest_shareMore Sharing Servi

Looking for a PhD topic? Try the British Library

(Originally posted 21 March 2013)

This week in our SPLAS seminar, we were lucky enough to be joined by Dr Geoff West and Dr Elizabeth Cooper, subject curators for Spanish and Latin American Studies respectively at the British Library. They explained the many facets of curating: acquisition, maintaining the collection, organising material for exhibitions and other public engagement exercises, and one thing not many people are aware of: supervising PhD students. 

As one of the two biggest libraries in the world (the other being the Library of Congress in Washington DC), the British Library has over 150 million resources to explore; not just printed books and manuscripts, but sound recordings, microfilm, even a lock of Simón Bolivar’s hair! With so many treasures lurking unexplored in the archives, there is plenty of material on offer for an exciting PhD based on first hand analysis and investigation of these invaluable literary and historical documents.

Beyond allowing access to its resources, the BL supports doctoral research by offering joint supervision with universities including King’s. One notable example of this partnership is Tom Overton, whose joint PhD between the BL & King’s on John Berger lead to the recent Art and Property Now exhibition at the Inigo Rooms. Tom told us how he was the first person in decades to look at Berger’s private documents, which offered him a unique glimpse into this key figure in British art history.

So if you’re on the hunt for a PhD topic and you would enjoy exploring original documents, why not investigate the BL. You can find out more about PhDs jointly supervised by the British Library here.

Young Researchers Conference in Madrid

Being a PhD student has many perks, but perhaps one of the best is being funded (thank you very much to the School of Arts and Humanities’ Small Grants for Research Students scheme!) to travel abroad for research and conferences. Last week, I travelled to Madrid for my first conference abroad: the ‘First Colloquium of Young Researchers in Latin American Literature’ at the Universidad Complutense, Madrid. Between enjoying the sunshine, visiting the Reina Sofia gallery and eating about 50 different types of ham, I had an amazing time meeting other young researchers who shared my exact interests, building my network and learning so much from them. 

When the time for my presentation came, I was extremely nervous as it’s the first time that I’ve had to present in Spanish in front of an almost entirely Spanish-speaking crowd. Then when Eduardo Sánchez Rugeles, the author of the book I was about to talk about (Blue Label/Etiqueta Azul) walked in, nerves turned to terror, as I panicked that he would hate everything I said. Thankfully, the presentation went very well and he seemed to really enjoy it – more than anything he was shocked and grateful that someone from England would care so much about his work! He had also very kindly brought me a copy of his latest book, which I had desperately wanted for months.

Later that evening, another of my favourite authors, Juan Carlos Méndez Guédez, came to finish the conference with a reading from his latest book and a Q+A session. I got a free book from him too, as well as a chance to discuss his writing and my translations of his work.

So I returned to England with two books, lots of new Latin American literature enthusiast friends, key insights for my research and even a bit of a tan – bring on the next conference!

Integrating Knowledge - A King's Cultural Institute and Central St Martin's Collaboration

As a firm believer in the importance of public engagement for academia, I jumped at the chance to be involved in the Integrating Knowledge exhibition, even if only counting visitors and handing out information packs!

  

Integrating Knowledge is a collaboration between King's Cultural Institute and Central St Martin's to present research to the public in innovative and exciting ways. The project, curated by Caroline Sipos, paired students of MA Communication Design with academics and PhD students in Geography, Anatomy, English and Law to find ways to express academic research through videos, installations and interactive presentations. 

The exhibition covers topics as diverse as the Argentine Dirty War to neuroscience, while the theme of place/space runs through the exhibition in pieces about gentrification, regeneration, and the difference between public and private.

One of my favourite pieces is Taco-trification by Eunjung Ahn, Michelle  Dwyer, Ferdinand Freiler and Wenquing Yu, based on the work of Juliet Kahne from the Department of Geography. Through a short stop-motion film, they illustrate the gentrification of Downtown Los Angeles through tacos, which have gone from a cheap staple for local people to an overpriced trend that only the yuppies can afford.

I also loved Handwritten Waves by Mariane Assous-Plunian, Mairead Gillespie, Julia Stubenboeck and Dusan Tomic, inspired by Kate Symondson's deconstruction of Virginia Woolf's The Waves. They covered a whole wall of the gallery with extracts from Woolf's text, each handwritten by a different person, and created six books, collecting the handwritten pieces that represent the subjective experiences of each of the six main characters. Absolutely stunning.

Certainly the most ambitious piece of the whole exhibition is Howbrain by Shesley Crustna, Hoc Ling Duong, Timothy Klofski and Apolline Saillard, presenting research by neuroscientist Prof. Jon Clarke into the functioning of brain cells. Visitors can interact with the piece by stepping on pads on the floor which control the projection, choosing between research on the sub-cellular level, the cellular level and aspirations of future research. 

Overall, the exhibition achieves exactly what is hoped from a collaboration between artists and academics, engaging audiences on both an aesthetic and an intellectual level. In the three days I spent working there, visitors frequently expressed how much they'd learnt from the show, while others just enjoyed the beauty of the installations and videos. I hope to see more collaborations like this soon, as its great to see research inspiring people beyond classrooms and academic journals.

Integrating Knowledge runs until 28 April at Inigo Rooms in the East Wing of Somerset House, and is absolutely free.