Link to book site - https://soumitri.com.au/
Welcome - Ecologies of Care (Series): https://open.spotify.com/episode/5Urz206rneXWiZlS1zURLj?si=13b1c234eba84100
Ecologies of Poverty: https://open.spotify.com/episode/40UAOMvzDqQhoJDmvAjYiG?si=3c56018e18c0495e
Ecologies of Environmental Action: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1sCTwdVkCdheWXt61jlVzP?si=c0157b5d1c6c411e
Literature Review: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5Ocr2gh9woxoqlYXGhWqYA?si=43861e648f124bce
Ethics Application: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5Zg5a9IHBlpef389TMoVsr?si=f120c4d5e8a9476d
The 8 things to do inside an Industrial Design PhD: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2REOvNX0dp3GTLMfFwGeQg?si=c2b39780805d40f5
Can you tell me about a Master's by Research and a PhD? https://open.spotify.com/episode/19CrQo8dG8lt8o8ZIlLNGR?si=9dd4245b8ef846ec
First Person Singular: https://open.spotify.com/episode/19CrQo8dG8lt8o8ZIlLNGR?si=9dd4245b8ef846ec
Austrailan modes of Practice based PhDs have gained currency the world over within the creative disciplines. However with time and translation into other contexts the operating models often lose the core spirit that the focus on 'practice' as both a method and topic was intended to privilege the useful knowledge domain of creative practitioners. Written theoretical takes on the Practice based PhDs describe, Practice-based and Practice-led, as the two ways in which scholarship can be undertaken. This has direct parallels with the way design research focussed upon discovery of new knowledge itself is categorised as Research through Design or Research about Design. The first is not about design knowledge at all and the later is what non-design scholars have tended to do. The often justificatory tone of these texts are attempts at the validation of PhDs in creative practice within the paradigm of the traditional notion of doctoral study as an advancement in knowledge, where the implicit assumption is that this knowledge is required to be textual. Such a justificatory stance was to be expected in the hotly contested nature of the territory of the PhD in design which struggled to gain acceptance with the discipline and then had to gain acceptability with suspicious external institutions. In the contemporary context however such hybridizations can be set aside and the gauntlet of ‘design is research’ can be thrown down to prompt a purer construction of scholarship in design. When design itself is accepted as research, it throws up two questions, how is the PhD to be constructed and how is the work of scholar to be validated? This paper describes a mode of PhD that answers these questions by describing a research paradigm that privileges the practitioner and uses a particular institutional practice for the validation of the scholarship.
https://rawslearn.wordpress.com/2016/06/04/supervising-phds/
While I began supervision in the style of the social sciences, which is very hands-off and privileges an intellectual dialogue with the students, I have also adopted other approaches for specific students. This other approach is one aligned with the classical science approach in that I play a role where the supervisor is hierarchically placed above the student. The student asks for approval and requests periodic engagement to reduce their anxiety and gain approval for the work they have done. In this relationship I adopt a didactic approach to scholarship and emphasize rigorous application of methodologies as a foundation for scholarly generalizations. This style suits some students and they can be both entry-level students or mid-career academics. They speak of the confidence gained from rigorous application of both quantitative and qualitative methods as a foundation for them to build their discussion chapters. This second approach is then a very hands-on approach where I work with the students to an agreed schedule of work.
It appears then that I have a two track approach which accords perfectly with the hands-off versus hands-on categorization in literature about two distinct styles of supervision(Sinclair, 2004; Delamont, 1997). The reality is however messier than this and I often feel I have a different approach for each student. I am also aware that I have fitted in with local practices and in parts may be doing exactly what others do in their supervision, for I jointly supervise quite a lot, and in other places doing a variation of what my colleagues do. Having learnt from books and training courses I also realize I am attempting to do what is expected institutionally. Although I have practices that I share with colleagues locally and with supervisors globally, I realize I may have a few bits that are unique to the way I supervise. For the purpose of this article I have used a reflective process to interrogate my memory of supervision events to arrive at three aspects of my supervision practice that are potentially worth sharing.
https://rawslearn.wordpress.com/2016/06/12/methodological-aspects-of-the-phd-ways-of-making-meaning/
So when you do an inquiry based PhD you are actually going into a field-area and there is a topic for your phd. And so you then produce knowledge about the topic area.
Many creatives refer to this is a ‘traditional’ PhD. A way to appreciate the Inquiry-Based PhD is to delve a bit into the two TROPES about the inquiry-led PhD - one trope dismisses it to deny its value and the other, my current contribution, privileges the virtues of a mode that has delivered a cadre of useful scholars to the planet. So first let us look a the way to diss the inquiry based PhD: It is formulaic and a factory that produces very little value. Industrial designers doing a management PhD can be embarking upon a pathway to nowhere, except to the PhD degree. You will encounter this position when people in design schools talk about the loss of culture and the spirit of design - the PhDs have moved in they say dismissively. [I said something similar years ago when sustainability became a thing for the management types - “wow! The suits have moved in” I proclaimed. That was the 1990s - and yes environmentalists became the ‘old way’ just like that]. How much better to learn to sing, than to do a PhD on music - that also I have heard.
But there is another way to value the ‘inquiry’. Its pure form is Alfred Russel Wallace who tramped about the Malay archipelago in the 1860s collecting species. He would shoot the Orangutang purely as the ‘documenter’ of species. The book The Malay Archipelago is a scream to read - and an amazing journal of a quest for pure knowledge (and bit of excitement along the way). There are others in smelly labs doing Wallace like projects - going deep into the darkness of the bush. I have encountered many such inquiries and have said - in my next life I will opt for that option for my intellectual life. In essence nothing to decry here. So doing a PhD as a reading holiday lasting a few years is pure gold in this narrative.
So if we want a party to arraign the other - the inquiry PhD - I won’t be joining in. Thanks for the invite.