Aside from having to add a few little things to my proposal such as references and images I feel like I have had a change of heart on writing this essay. I must admit I did initially think that writing about what you are going to write about seemed like a bit of an unnecessary and ridiculous process however I have completely changed my mind. I feel like if I found writing this fairly hard which means I would have found writing my dissertation even harder without having done this. I really feel as though it’s a good place to start and helps you get some of the ground work done for when it comes to doing the real thing. I am yet to talk to my tutor about what I have written however I do feel that I may have been a little too repetitive although I do feel as though some of the points to talk about did cross over in what they required to be written. Anyway, as I have finished early I will have time to make improvements but I do currently feel quite relaxed about it.
Category Archives: 2nd Year Constellation
The rest of my dissertation proposal
After finishing all of the literature reviews I had to put together the rest of my proposal. Some of the other areas we fairly easy but some I found quite difficult because it really required a lot of forward thinking and knowing how your dissertation may unfold; these areas took a lot more time and thought. I found the ‘explanation/discussion of your proposed title and dissertation research’ and ‘justification for your dissertation research’ fairly straight forward to answer. However I struggled more on writing about my ‘research aims/objectives’ and especially the ‘Chapter/section structure, outline content and organisation’ as it required a very forward thinking approach and I felt as though I had no idea about how I was going to write my dissertation! When it came to the ‘Abstract’ I had to go back to lecture notes and research what it was and what I had to include as I had never come across what this was before. Once I started writing I found it a lot less daunting as I had initially thought and found that all the previous work I had written really helped with this section. I got all of this finished 3 weeks in advance to the deadline so that I would have time to make any necessary amendments and so that I wouldn’t be last minute rushing and churning out a poorly written essay.
Dissertation research
To start writing my proposal I felt like I had to start by reading the books that I had been recommended first to make it easier for me to answer all of the other questions. I think that reading through chapters in the books was the hardest for me because i’m a fairly slow reader and find it hard to take things in first time around. I decided to take notes as I went along so that I would have reminders to look at when writing the essay. Each book did take me around a day to digest and then a little longer to write about as essentially we are writing about something that we currently know quite little about. I decided to get the book and journal reviews done first so that I could get what I thought was the hardest out of the way and give me the knowledge that I needed to know to continue writing. It took me a little while to find a journal that I thought appropriate but I am pretty happy with the article that I have decided to review, called ‘Design as communication: exploring the validity and utility of relating intention to interpretation’. It contains two sides of an argument which I find is a really good way to explore something and perhaps a little different to some of the books that I looked at. When writing my first book review I did send it to my tutor just to make sure I was working along the right lines, luckily I did because I hadn’t quite got it right. What I was writing he said was good however too in-depth and instead I should be writing about the book as a whole and whether it is well written and useful etc. The feedback was very useful as that enabled me to write my other reviews more accurately, knowingly and easily.
Dissertation prep – library support lecture
Although I already knew some things about the library this lecture was quite useful on how to research for my dissertation. I now have a list of useful means of doing my research including summon, scholar, met flicks , databases etc as well as different resources in which to obtain the information for my essay.
I also have a tutorial with my newly allocated tutor tomorrow so I have had a little brainstorm which will also help me to instigate questions that I would like to ask my tutor. I have started to think about various ways of approaching my essay and key points that I could focus upon. I feel now that after the tutorial I should begin thinking more deeply about areas that I could talk about within my essay so that I can start to research more precisely.
Constellation – Dissertation
As soon as I returned to Uni I booked a slot for a tutorial with Mahnaz Shah to work out a potential question for my dissertation prep form and to talk about feedback from my last essay. At the time of the tutorial I really had little idea on what I wanted to write my dissertation on but we talked through ideas and came to a possible question. I’m really glad that I attended a tutorial early on.
Following my tutorial I attended 2 lectures on dissertation. The first one was very general and gave me an overall idea of how this part of my degree would work, I found it fairly useful however as I had attended my tutorial early on I already knew quite a bit about what was said. The next lecture was a lot more in depth and a little more daunting. It covered a series of areas including how to approach research for the dissertation and talked about finding an angle, this I found very useful and it urged me to start researching books and journals asap!
My dissertation prep form had to be submitted by the 6th which I delivered on time. I decided to stick with what I had discussed in my tutorial as there was an option to change once talking it over with an allocated tutor. I have decided on a question about how a single designer can have such a huge influence on society, I feel content with this question at the moment however I feel that perhaps it may need to be a little more specific… But I will consider this further with my allocated tutor.
Constellation – Mannerism – Mahnaz Shah
In this lecture we looked at negative and positive space, shapes and artists such as Theo Van Doesburg. Although I found that I learnt new information and there were some interesting aspects incorporated into this session, I didn’t find it overall particularly useful. I feel that as I had roughly decided on what to incorporate into my essay, very little of this lecture was of use to me and my writing.
Soon after this I decided to write a draft as to get some feedback earlier on. The feedback I received is as follows:
“Its a good start, but I would encourage you to review more academic books, papers, journals on new media or media based discourses and artist statements to support your main argument. You may also consider giving the readers a few definitions on what is the conventional meanings of the terms you discuss along with how you tend to agree/digress from this. When you mention artists both 16th century and contemporary you need to mention the dates and any other piece of information that would help the reader situate the person within the context of your argument. Remember this is an academic paper so geared to edcate your readers on the subject as much as trying to understand your perspective”.
I’m definitely glad I started working on my essay early! I tried to take as much of this on board as possible. The final essay was more academically specific and comprehensible, it also included supporting research from journals, media pieces and academic books. Fingers crossed that it was an improvement!
Constellation – Mannerism – Mahnaz Shah
In between lectures I thought up ideas and did brainstorms for my essay, I found that starting earlier on this year would lessen my stress nearer to my deadline. I jotted down a list of rough ideas to include:
I thought about the media, perception and reality, strange becoming accepted over time ‘trends’, the perfect proportion of man, how photoshop alters strange and ugly, society expectations, Man Ray as well as other artists. I found this a useful start as it got my ideas onto paper to ensure that I wouldn’t forget them.
CONSTELLATION – MANNERISM – MAHNAZ SHAH
The next session I went to we were all briefed on the 500 hundred word essay due in on the 19th December titled ‘How would you define the concept of the ‘strange’ and the ‘ugly’ within your subject specialism? What is the difference? How can it inform your practice? How did the Mannerists apply it in their works?’ I actually felt quite happy with this essay and thought I could apply it to my subject specialism fairly well partly because ‘strange’ and ‘ugly’ are subject to each individuals preference. In this session we listened to some presentations delivered by various students which I found useful as I got to hear a variety of perspectives, so I really felt as though I took something good and worthy from this. The rest of what we were taught by the lecturer I really found interesting this time, I found that I could identify with it more easily. I learnt about the perfect proportion of man and artists such as Odilon Redon and Man Ray, all of which gave me some ideas of which I could use in writing my essay. I felt a lot happier after this lecture than the last.
Constellation – Mannerism – Mahnaz Shah
The first session on Mannerism was mostly about establishing the meaning of the word and looking at artists such as Michael Angelo and Leonardo Da Vinci. We looked at natural and man made beauty, what is ‘classic beauty’, balance and order (Golden Ratio) as well as artists’ paintings in great depth. I found this session quite overwhelming and found myself very lost and out of my depth at times. A lot of the paintings had a religious connected which I found quite difficult to follow as I didn’t know a lot of the religious facts which were being talked about. I tried to follow as best as I good as well as taking notes but didn’t hugely participate when answering questions . I did learn some very interesting facts surrounding art such as what the Mannerists were actually about and how they challenged traditional art conventions. However it was quite different to what I usually learn in Graphic Communication and therefore I was perhaps a little less attentive.
mgarciawright 