Dear Chris
which then gets us to the other part of this problem - supervisors/examiners.
If Bertrand Russell hadn't been around Witgenstein would had simply flunked.
what of the Z-factor?
cheers
keith russell
OZ Newcastle
>>> Chris Rust <[log in to unmask]> 12/14/08 10:35 AM >>>
Ken Friedman wrote:
> There are many significant instances of students inventing new research methods.
I think Ken and I are singing from the same hymn sheet here but I wanted
just to be very clear what I was proposing because I think it is
important for PhD studies.
As Ken says students can very well invent research methods, I know some
good ones who who have (Owain Pedgley that I referred to earlier is an
outstanding example) and every student should develop a methodology that
is theirs and specific to the problem that they investigate. Sadly too
many students imagine that the problem of research is to simply select a
methodology from a book of available recipes, often before they have
made any real progress in understanding their research problem.
But my proposition was about the idea of students inventing "a whole
body of research practices". That is a discipline-scale problem and it
goes way beyond individual methods and methodologies. The non-text
thesis, the text-lite thesis, the artefact as thesis are at that level.
They present a fascinating problem - we don't have to solve it or even
believe it is solvable now or ever but it pushes us to reconsider what
we do and question how to make our methods relevant to our skills and
the problems that interest us.
Best wishes from Sheffield
Chris
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