Research Can Be Fun!

 

“Research, as creative writers practice it, is really a combination of treasure hunting, investigative reporting, talking to interesting people, playing detective, and solving mysteries.”

“Enthusiasts visit archives to find out more about their hobbies. For example people who are interested in travel or engineering might use shipbuilding, Post Office or railway collections.”

I think this quote demonstrates a unique way of looking at research. I think that when most students think of research, they automatically move to an academic mindset or a mindset of doing extensive work. I think Gerard, however, is looking at research differently, making it seem more intriguing and exciting to those pursuing it. I think rather than looking at research as an extraneous task, Gerard makes it seem more like a more exciting, detective-like mystery puzzle or game. I think it makes me look at research more as something I would be interested in doing, rather than a chore.

I believe the What Are Archives? quote closely relates to the other one so that’s why it stood out to me. I believe what stands out to me about this concept is that research does not have to be pure academic work. I believe this example of what archives are used for shows that there are people out there who genuinely go look at archives out of pure curiosity. I believe that looking at archives in this way, once again, makes it seem more interesting to an average student, who would typically look at research in a more negative way.

I realize that these two perspectives closely relate to each other because it makes me look at research in a new way. I feel like I may have even done research at points in my life without even realizing it. Typically, when I think of research, I imagine a more academic version but looking back on past things I have done in my life, I feel like I have already implemented research in many ways. For example, I think of how when I created films in high school and was writing the scripts, I spent a lot of time researching those topics that ultimately came into fruition in the final product.

 



Gerard, Phillip. “The Art of Creative Research.” AWP, October/November 2006, accessed January 19, 2021

What Are Archives? King’s College Cambridge, 2021  https://www.kings.cam.ac.uk/archive-centre/introduction-to-archives/a/1 Accessed January 19, 2021

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Latinx Reporting in Cobb County

     This week is an interesting week for me because I finally wrapped up the research process. I found it to be such a great experience to delve deeper into learning more about the Latinx community and the way their experiences can be seen through their art.       The readings this week discussed how secondary sources can speak to each other and I find that to be a great concept. As time goes by, secondary sources can reference and learn from other sources to help expand or show conflicting arguments against other sources. It really speaks to the research process as a whole and makes me think of how this concept could have affected my research process. As a researcher for this project, I wanted to find as much detail as possible about the Latinx community, and as I delved deeper into Contrapunto it was much easier to find primary sources of individual artists. Contrapunto Art Group Jorge Arcos- a local Latinx artist Cataline Gomez-Beuth- another local...
Read more

Starting to Read Green Card Youth Voices

Image
This week I began to read Green Card Youth Voices, as well as an introduction on Critical Race Theory. Reading both works, I really developed a stronger understanding of race in general and the way that people from different backgrounds experience and interact with others. Reading the Green Card Youth Voices book, I was able to really delve deep into these children’s experiences and all they have been through. What surprised me is just how much they had experienced at such a young age. It made me realize how fortunate and privileged I am to have never had to go through similar experiences. It made me ask myself questions- what would I do if I were in a situation like this? How would I react? What would my plans be in the future after experiencing such a situation? And what struck me in the book, particularly, is how positive the students were after going through terrible situations. I think of how many students have escaped violence in their home country, became separated by their fami...
Read more

The Process of Researching Latinx Art

Image
  I learned a lot in this course, not just about Latinx communities but about research in general. A better way of describing my experience of taking this course would be that it opened my mind. I have not taken a course like this and it really opened my eyes up to the research process, particularly for museum exhibits and what happens behind the scenes to put one together. Something I found unique about this class and the project in general, is that we started with questions about Latinx communities, but the primary goal of the class was not necessarily to answer those questions specifically. Our group strived to answer some of those questions, but because of limited historical research on some of these topics, we were allowed to readjust our questions as we researched.      Something else that was encouraged in this project was actually to find as much information about our research topic as possible. A lot of times, while writing essays in the past, I actually ha...
Read more