17/11/2020

This month, the BBC director, Steve McQueen’s anthology, Small Axe, a collection of five films exploring histories of African-Caribbean communities coming to and contributing to the UK’s social, economic and political life life and struggle for racial equality. The first in the anthology, Mangrove is  the story of the ‘Mangrove Nine, Black community members who find themselves in trial at the Old Bailey charged with high penalty offences of rioting and affray following the heavy handed, violent policing of a peaceful protest on 9 August 1970. The protest organised by reluctant community leader, Frank Critchlow, was a reaction to continual and sustained police attacks against him as the owner of Mangrove, a Notting Hill, community restaurant and hub. On one level, Mangrove is a chronicle which humanises Black women and men through its central protagonists, Altheia Jones-Lecointe (university student and leader of the UK Black Panthers), political activists, Barbara Reese and her partner Darcus Howe, and Mangrove’s owner, Frank Critchlow.  It is also about the power of self-organising as a collective and the creating of space for activism and organising. Against the insistence of the Critchlow that it is just a restaurant, a place selling cultural dishes for consumption by the community, Mangrove is co-opted and politicised by the Black community as not only ‘a home from home’, a place for pleasure and connection, but a productive space for collective resistance and action.  The importance of the enterprise is recognised by the state forces of the council, and police who make it a target for raids which attempt to disrupt the powerful roles it played in the Black community.  

The story of the Mangrove Nine is recovered in various historical accounts and provides some insight into how and why centres of community activism and organising emerged and evolved, the roles they play and the internal and external factors that affected their lives and trajectories, including the critical roles of white allies or ‘accomplices’. The important position of and impacts on women at the frontline of resistance is captured in the figure and leadership of Jones-Lecointe. That the hub was used by multiple Caribbean communities (run by a Trinidadian but attracting people from different islands as well as British-born Black people) and the UK Black Panthers – born out of the US Black Panthers who held their meetings there, it also speaks to the threads of resistance entangling the stories and struggles of people across the diaspora.

The hereto little-known history of the Mangrove Nine has now impacted mainstream popular culture and consciousness.  That the collective who played a part in pivotal events in British Civil Rights history, became known by the name of the place, the restaurant-come-community centre they protested and fought to protect, is a testament to the importance of preserving and retelling the histories of Black places and spaces of community organising and activism. 

Please find the trailer below:

06/11/2020

CPD: Mining Social Media

Today I attended training on the uses and ethics of using social media posts in research.  First I must say the session led by Dr Andrew Rowe and Dr Wasim Ahmed was probably the best practice in online training that I’ve experienced.  They mixed methodologies using presentation, Padlet (which I must look into), Twitter, #MSMUoN20, demonstration and Q and A.  They shared links to a number of useful resources and interacted with all the chat. A very engaging and fascinating session.

Several mining tools were discussed including Python htttps://www.tweepy.org which can be used before as well as after an event to pick up future uses of a hashtag. These can map social relationships between users and social networks or edgers.

The pros and cons third party packages, TAGS (free), Tweet Archivist ($14-$50 per month) and Twitonomy ($20 per month approx.) were briefly covered. Twitonomy seemed to offer the best service of the three being able to download tweets, track hash tags, and extensive analytics of up to 3200 tweets over an indefinite period. As with other packages there are limitations including constraints on the amount of data that can be mined and Facebook removed the APIs which enable the extraction of data. Another package, NODE, which provides content analysis, would also be worth further exploration.  It is only available for Windows (which I use) and is $39 a year for students.

It was emphasised that we need to spend time with the data in order to become familiar with it and we must also be prepared to spend time on altering and manipulating the data to make it fit for purpose.  This can be very time consuming.

The most useful part of the session for me was a 30 min filmed interview with Dr Chris Carter. Ethics, he said, if we are going for the gold standard, “should be baked in to the design” of our research.  We need to consider a range of questions, including:

• Who are the participants?
• How do we get participants consent? (Participants liked to be asked)
• How do we safeguard people’s privacy, especially if not getting consent?
• What type of data is needed? (We need to take care not to collect data for data’s sake)
• Is it ethical to collect this data?
• Is the data an archival document?
• Is the research text-based data or human research?
• Is the data public or private? (This does vary between social media platforms)
• Is there an expectation of privacy
• How do we avoid using data provided by vulnerable and underage people given that identities are sometimes not straight forward?

Top tips in short

• Consider ethics from the outset
• Engage with the relevant guidelines from AOIR (Association of Internet Researchers)
• Talk with others including who are using social media in their research and the School’s ethics officer
• Minimise risk; maximise benefit and be transparent about any risks so that you can do everything to mitigate against them
• Ask for permission where there is a reasonable expectation for you to do so. Safeguarding anonymity of contributors is paramount. For example, quoting a tweet verbatim would enable the reader to identify the source. We should always be guided by the principle of ‘do no harm’.

The session ended with impressive demonstrations of Node excel which was used on hashtags provided by course participants.  It was a lovely surprise when one of the participants in-boxed me having recognised my photograph.  This was someone who my social enterprise worked in partnership with many years ago.  It was good to connect and we’ll be having a catch up real soon!

Useful Resources

Recording of the sessions:

Presentation:

Social Media Ethics in Research Conversation (with Dr Chris Carter):

Wasim’s Chapter 4 on Ethics:

Polarized Crowds: Political Conversations on Twitter:

Node Excel – Practical Demonstration

Networks that Wasim Extracted and Visualised for us:

Node XL:

I look forward to joining the panel for some hard-hitting and constructive discussion.  I’ll be speaking about community-university partnerships at Bright Ideas Nottingham where I have been a Director for 24 years, and my experiences as a post graduate researcher.

SOS Panel Discussion on the Experiences of Black Academics in the UK’s Higher Education System, Thursday 10 September, 2020, 2pm-4pm

This highly anticipated event comprises a panel of five Black academics from a range of scholarly disciplines (including history, economics, political science, and anthropology) who will discuss their personal experiences of learning and working at universities across the UK. More specifically, they will engage in a dialogue concerning their encounters with Black-centred research agendas, teaching and issues relating to the wider operation of universities. The speakers will also deliberate the types of changes (cultural, structural, administrative) that are most likely to create a more supportive environment in which Black members of staff and students can thrive.

The panel will comprise:

• Dr. James Dawkins (Chair of the Panel Discussion and Research Fellow, University of Nottingham)
• Dr. Jonathan Ashong-Lamptey (Founder & Managing Director of Element of Inclusion)
• Dr. Meleisa Ono-George (Associate Professor and Director of Student Experience, University of Warwick)
• Toyin Agbetu (PhD Research Candidate, University College London)
• Lisa Robinson (PhD Research Candidate, University of Nottingham)

You can sign up below:

4 March 2020

As I think about producing some writing for my PhD, I’ve put together a list of some dos and don’ts which popped up during the Royal Literary Fund writing course which I attended in February:

Do

• Use story telling- this engages the intellect and emotion
• Bring yourself to the page – who you are – what your investment is – your voice and purpose. Make your concerns and commitments apparent.
• Let the questions cascade
• Ask how each chapter changes the perspective of the work
• Think about where to situate the backstory
• Be expressive – academic text loses attention
• Show rather than tell
• Use footnotes for definitions, what you’re not going to do and things that get in the way of storytelling.
• Use first drafts as a way to throw down the clay – you can shape it later.

Don’t

• Say “In the last chapter we saw …” or variations of this
• Use subheadings in chapters – they create more beginnings and endings and stop the flow of your work
• Use lists – they create anxiety in the reader – “First I’m going to do this, then I’m going to do that, and finally I’m going to …”
• Use sentences of the same length – the work becomes monotone

Tuesday 3 March

I’ve been reflecting further on the training I undertook with the Royal Literary Fund, and more particularly about walk-ins as a technique to walk your reader into your work. The writers voice is most apparent in introductions – introduction to the thesis, introductions to chapters. It’s important to open a chapter with precision and to give the reader something to look at – showing them rather than telling them. What is in the work that will resonate with the reader? We can situate the walk in anywhere – an historical place, a building, a stage. Be frugal with ‘sensory’ words and with zoom details – one per page is sufficient.

Techniques to consider:

• Making the familiar strange and the strange familiar
• Ambush
• Seductions
• Present tense
• Inciting incident
• Restore order
• Examples that any reader can relate to
• Enjoy yourself

We can also:

• Create tension (conflict, or irresolution, for example, create tension)
• Lean on genre conventions (e.g. parable, reportage)
• Talk about people – people like to hear about people
• Mix the personal with the political
• Introduce a spoiler
• Use ‘we’ to connect with the reader
• Bridge the gap between the past and present to make it feel accessible and relevant

And of course, ensure that the walk-in links to the work.

I’ve drafted two potential walk-ins for different chapters of the PhD. I now need to send these to Anna at the Royal Literary Fund who will give me feedback. She will also give me feedback on a piece of writing that I sent ahead of attending the course. I’ve already received positive and constructive  peer-feedback on this at the course.

Tuesday 3 March 2020, UoN

Today I attended the University of Nottingham’s Research and Innovation Graduate School’s training on working with in and with external organisations, led by Dr Victoria Sedman. The course has certainly had an impact on how I am thinking about my research project. It confirmed the importance of avoiding extractive research and researching with rather than on communities.  Keeping introductory letters/proposals to the centres I’m hoping to work with short (1 page of A4) and to the point will be critical to gaining access. (I’ve also booked myself on the Three Minute Thesis training so this will help me to communicate in a powerful and succinct way). The letter should use the University of Nottingham (as a Russell Group university with a world class reputation) and my supervisors as credibility or esteem indicators. I could introduce myself as an activist-scholar/scholar-activist working in a consultancy role – rather than a ‘student’.  This will give the proposal further credibility. I should also be careful to outline the benefits to the centres in getting involved with my work. 

The proposal for researching with the centres might include:

• The question I’m investigating
• What information I will be seeking from them
• What time will be involved
• What they can learn from it and how they will benefit

The short-term benefits to each centre involved in the research include:

• The research will be participatory – the offer of my time to work on a specific project as part of my time with them
• Consultancy and advice from someone (me) who has had three decades experience of working in the community and voluntary sector and 25 years of experience leading my own social enterprise as a founder-director.
• receiving a report with recommendations which will enable them to better understand their own practices and be able to improve them

Medium and long-term benefits include:

• Sharing with them the learning from the other centres that I interview as part of the PhD
• Exposure for each centre through the thesis and through presentations at conferences and public events.

I also need to give thought to drawing up a contract and tailoring this to each of the centres I undertake research with. This contract must consider the issue of confidentiality.  I will be naming the centres in my thesis but sensitive information gleaned will need to be treated appropriately. I learned that the Rights Lab and the Centre for Advanced Studies are potential sources of support for thinking this through. The Research and Innovation website also has a raft of information about research ethics and integrity. This reminded me that I need to book on to the online training available on research ethics.

During the course I considered how my non-traditional approach to the research can be modelled and shared with other scholars.  I need to think more deeply about modelling this aspect of my methodology and perhaps writing it up as a paper so that other researchers can learn from it. I left the course wondering about intellectual property. To what extent do the centres and communities own my work? Will I own my research or whether it will be owned by the AHRC? Gulp.

Monday 17 February and Tuesday 18 February, UoL

“Get your work read because you can’t see yourself dance.” Kathy Lowinger

“Write a sentence as clean as a bone.” James Baldwin

“Writing is music” Gary Provost

“Wonder does not need to be tamed” Marina Benjamin

I was so pleased that my application was accepted for this two-day course on improving academic writing facilitated by Marina Benjamin from the Royal Literary Fund and it did not disappoint. Held at the University of Leicester, the course provided opportunities to receive and give feedback on PhD work, lifted my confidence in my own writing and provided a number of techniques including ‘Walk In’ and ‘Free Writing’ to nurture creativity.

My top ten nuggets from the course:

1. Snuggle up to roadblocks
2. When reading someone else’s work feel (rather than think) your way into it
3. Your reader is your main concern. Be responsible to them
4. Using simple, readable language to communicate complex ideas – guide the reader around the complexity. Only use specialist language when necessary
5. Dive into the material rather than posture around it
6. Tell a story with your literature review
7. Don’t be afraid to reveal the contours of your professional personality
8. Give deep thought to where you choose to pause the lens
9. Start writing as though you are an expert
10. Writers throw away a lot of words

As a result of the course I will be employing the techniques which were demonstrated and practiced. I’ll dedicate more time to editing and taking out unnecessary words, phrases, sentences paragraphs.  With the reader in mind, I’ll also ask more questions about the content I am including and in Marina’s words I’ll remember that “wonder does not need to be tamed”.

As well as following academic blogger, Amy Benson Brown , I’m adding a few texts to my reading list including:

• Doing Ethnography – Giampietro Gobo
• Watching Closely: A guide to ethnographic observation – Christena Nippert-Eng
• What Is Posthumanism? – Carrie Wolfe
• Alive in the Writing – Kiran Narayan

I was also reminded of my supervisor’s suggestion to use Zotero software (free!) to keep track of all my sources. The course practiced what it preached. It was creative, nothing was redundant, it was audience focussed and engaged my attention throughout. This is what I will aspire to as I begin to craft my thesis.

Tuesday 24 and Wednesday 25 September 2020, UoW

Two fabulous days at the University of Westminster with the first cohort of 86 M4C students.  The lack of visible ethnic diversity in the cohort was unsurprising but still a little disappointing.  It’s such a privilege to be part of the group but I can’t help thinking about those that miss out.  The shape,  content and pace of the two days was perfect. We had an excellent participatory session on communicating with confidence and an illuminating workshop on nutrition – “How to Fuel Your PhD”.  I think a vital message that I will take away from the residential is the importance of having a life outside the PhD – taking time away from it, socialising, exercising, and eating a lot more greens and vegetables – aiming for 10 (!) a day. The other is to take full advantage of all the training and development opportunities both here in the UK and abroad.

The explanation on what to expect year by year was clarifying.  Year 1: Literature review, shape your contribution, set research question and think through how you will answer these questions. Year 2: Test and refine your approach, execute your methods, organise the evidence. What does your evidence say and what’s the answer to your research question/s. Do they need to change? Year 3: Organise the thesis. Write. Get feedback. Re-write. Edit.

There are several sources of additional funding to support research and researcher development: Research Development Fund (RDF), Engagement Fund (EF) and Cohort Development Fund (CDF). I can use the RDF for conferences, primary research/archive visits/field work as well as study visits in the UK and overseas.  I need to apply for the fund two months ahead of the visit which means I have to really think ahead and there are no limitations on the amount of applications I can make. The EF can be used for specialist training and developing new skills and can cover travel and accommodation (not Air B & B!) for collaborating with an external partner.  Applications need to be over £100. Applications for both funds need to link to one or more sections (A/B/C/D) of the Development Needs Analysis. They need to be submitted to the site director by the 29^th of each month. The CDF is open to non-funded* PhD students in the Arts and Humanities – a minimum of 2 students from 2 M4C institutions. (*I need to double check this.)

I can include take up a placement for one to three months. This must take place between weeks 7 and 35 of the PhD. It takes three months from application to approval and I need to have passed my mid-term review to be considered. The funding extension does not extend the submission date for the thesis.

Dates for my diary:

30^th March 2020 – Powerful Presentations

21 May 2020 – M4C Research Festival (look out for training to prepare for this)

Also, I need to look out for dates for The Royal Literary Fund offers a two-day course, Academic Writing the Creative Way

Starting the PhD has been a long time coming.  I’ve wanted to do this for so many years, setting it as a long term goal over ten years ago. Today my ‘Bestie’ played mum and insisted on driving me onto campus and helping me to find the building. I don’t know why I felt so nervous and a little like a child on my first day of school. I guess it’s because I want this so much. It was emotional walking towards Pope Building. I admit the tears welled up.  I felt, feel so lucky.

The induction was pretty low key, focussing on useful information and how to complete registration with the university.

• Moodle: https:moodle.nottingham.ac.uk
• Student Services Administrator: Jo Pullen ss-ce-pgr@nottingham.ac.uk
• Director of PG studies: Matthew Pethers matthew.pethers@nottingham.ac.uk
• Post-grad work spaces: Trent B47 / B49 (more space: B57,58 and 59 and Hallwood Library)
• Pigeon holes for CLAS – Trent B floor
• PGR noticeboard – Trent B Floor (B10)
• Training – SSAGS (Social Science and Arts Graduate Centre): https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/graduate school/archive
• Counselling – based at The Orchards 0115 951 3695
• Student Welfare: Amreen Aslam and Johnathon Kavanagh
• Postgraduate Community Learning Forums take place in November, February and May – issues, concerns and problems can be raised with reps

So, action for me:  

• Complete online registration – registration@nottingham.ac.uk
• Complete a student online profile
• Follow CLAS on Twitter and Student Services @UoNstudentlife