Methods North West Interdisciplinary Workshop: Method, Measurement and the Problem of Scale

Tuesday 21 June 2016, 12pm-4.45pm

Venue: The University of Manchester, Cordingley Lecture Theatre

Scale is a problem that researchers of all kinds, whether they turn their analytical attention to the big or the small, the present or the past, grapple with as a feature of what they study. Scale poses problems in terms of methodological approaches and techniques (how do we cope with data on a very large or very small scale?), but scale and scales/scaling are also concepts/tools we employ to address those problems.

While scale has gained renewed visibility through discussions of the potentials and pitfalls of working with Big Data and digital devices, it is an issue which is closely tied to age-old debates on measurement and representation – how do you build scales that capture or allow us to better understand the character of social phenomena of all kinds? How do you make sense of the scales social actors employ to make sense of and manage the world?  Increasingly, researchers also have to think about what might be involved in scaling up or scaling down, i.e. in moving between scales, and what constitutes the appropriate level for social inquiry.

The purpose of this workshop, aimed at DTC students, is to bring together leading researchers working across different fields of inquiry, each with significant international expertise in the social science and arts and humanities, to discuss and reflect upon the problem of scale in a variety of its contemporary forms and ways of productively and creatively engaging with it.

The workshop will take the form of six talks, an interactive problem-focused session and a roundtable discussion.

Presenters are set to include Dr Kenneth Smith (Liverpool), Professor Rachel Gibson (Manchester), Dr Andrew Redden (Liverpool), Dr Thomas House (Manchester) and Professor Peter Diggle (Lancaster).

Programme

12.00-12.30  Welcome

12.30-13.00  Session 1 with Dr. Kenneth Smith (Liverpool)

13.00-13.30  Session 2 with Prof. Rachel Gibson (Manchester)

13.30-14.00  Session 3 with Prof. Peter Diggle (Lancaster)

14.00-14.30  Interactive problem focused session

14.30-14.45  Break

14.45-15.15  Session 4 with Dr. Thomas House (Manchester)

15.15-15.45  Session 5 with Dr. Andrew Redden (Liverpool)

15.45-16.45  Roundtable discussion

Register for this event here