Brief post - after all, it's Friday night. Really busy work wise at the moment which hasn't left much time for my PhD. Shame, as I'm SO excited about it...and frustrated that I have to steal time to work on it. I am learning to get bits of time to read chapters, update notes and so on. Ironically, the most productive PhD work session was in a coffee shop in Newcastle (upon Tyne) where I had no distractions. I have dreams of sitting in a quiet room with no other things shouting for my time. Does anyone have that?
I went to my 'formal' PhD induction this week, ironic as I started reading and planning so long ago - I have realised I'm not a patient student, because I know the value of my time (busy, lots of kids, also doing a compulsory Post Graduate Certificate as a new teacher in HE - you get the score). I didn't learn ANYTHING I didn't know already! - but to be fair, as I'm a member of academic staff who runs inductions for my students, I guess it would have been useful for most people, but I'm on board already. I met a couple of lovely people; finally, people who 'got' the questions I'm wrestling with and I didn't feel like I was talking a different language to!
I've made some progress on the postmodern / constructivist thoughts I had a couple of posts back. I'm reading 'Organizing Identity' by Paul du Gay (2007) at the moment and was pleased to note his revisions / critique of the constructivist agenda. Not that I want to tear it down utterly, but find a less cynical, more objective perspective. Finding books that help move things on is truly a satisfying thing.
I dropped out of my PhD about a year ago but am re-enrolling in an EdD. So am going to be following along side you. What do you want to focus on in your research?
ReplyDeleteHi Sarah - thanks for visiting! I'm looking at narratives about professional identity in multi professional children's services (catchy, eh?). I'm interested in how people 'navigate' their professional identities in relation to others and their environments. Just (re) writing my proposal at the moment, so when I've done this I can email it if you want. I'm planning on using a visual, metaphorical methodology to support the generation of visual and oral narratives (model making, making cultural maps etc).
ReplyDeleteSounds really interesting...I'd love to hear what you find out about how people navigate their professional identity in the online environment.
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