CCRI: Establishing the context for your research – what and how to review

Any individual research project takes place within a wider research context. When you are planning your own PhD project, writing about your work in your thesis, and discussing the project in your viva, you will be required to clearly situate your research, and confidently explain how it fits into this wider landscape. This process will involve bringing together a range of material together from a host of different areas, which might include (but are not limited to) scholarly literature outlining existing research into aspects of your chosen topic, the theoretical concepts that inform your research, relevant historical and literary sources, and significant examples of related practice.

In this session, which will be led by Kirsty Hemsworth from the Skills Centre, you will be given the opportunity to reflect on the context of your own project, and to identify where these key areas of contextualising material lie for your own research. The session will provide practical guidance on how to approach the tasks of reviewing research literature and other materials, identifying relevant sources, and synthesising these often disparate areas into one overarching narrative outlining your research context. You will also have the opportunity to ask any questions you might have in relation to your own project.

This session is open to all CCRI PGR students, at any PhD stage, so we hope that you will be able to join us. The workshop will be relevant whether you are at an early stage and starting to consider the specific focus of your research project in more depth, or you are closer to submission and working out how best to establish the context for your research in your written thesis.

If you are a CCRI PGR student and have not received the registration details directly, please email Culture & Creativity PGR Admin team to request these.