Research Reflections

  • As I find myself now nearly 8 months out from my PhD (or the viva anyway), I am becoming ever more aware of the difficulty in choosing direction. For me it feels like there is a mysterious dilemma in research, there is this line somewhere that, one one side, you stay centred and become an

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  • From the beginning of my PhD, I noticed the word “engagement” getting thrown around a lot in the university (and in a number of other academic events I would attend). My initial reaction to this was abject fear as I pictured me trying to do research with children (while I have learned that I do

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  • On my quest to make an acceptable dent in my “TBR” (“to be read” for those peculiar creatures that have read all that they own) list, I finally made my way to Amphigorey: Fifteen books by Edward Gorey. All fifteen tales were magnificent however, it was the first, The Unstrung Harp, where I found myself

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  • I always struggled with my plans for this part of the website. It feels important to have the blog but, as a self publishing platform it felt “messy”. I have always wanted a place designed for reading articles of literary pursuits whilst having a less formal area for all of the other adventures that occupy

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  • The Semester is Nigh

    As a sign to my growing older, I can affirm that time is certainly moving too quickly. Out of nowhere another academic year has catapulted onto the shores of Lesley time (if my thesis taught me anything, it is clearly travelling via race-built galleon). As a side note: This idea of time accelerating is something

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  • What happened next…

    It is just over one month since I passed my viva (1 month, 2 days but no one is counting obviously…) and it felt like a good time for a quick bit of pondering. It is possible that it was just me, but a large part of the PhD was wondering what it would be

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  • It has been a long time since the last post. A long. Long. Time. As I entered this final year of my PhD, I did intend to “slow things down” on here as the effort had to shift to completing the thesis at a comfortable rate. I had ambitiously envisioned a fortnightly, or even monthly

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  • After spending the last few months working on a theoretical paper that will eventually (eventually being now, as I plan to return to the task after this post) my PhD theory chapter. I have been thinking a lot about how ‘academic’ writing is defined and, if creativity has a place in academic writing. Ornament and

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  • Disclaimer 1: When referring to author of the journal being discussed, I have used they/them pronouns as I do not know their preferred terms and do not wish to assume. Disclaimer 2: This may contain spoilers for the Barbie Movie (I am not 100% certain they are spoilers but, in case they are, maybe read

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