Literature Review - Draft Abstract

More thoughts from the swimming pool.  100 lengths this morning.

I have an appointment to see my Subject Librarian, Gill Evans at Coventry University tomorrow.  I am struggling with the search terms for my literature search.  Having an abstract for my literature search would help target the session.

Abstract:

The aim of this literature review is to explore why, what and how women value other women.  The time range has been restricted to the last 30 years - 1987 to date.  The literature review aims to identify different methodologies by which women's values have been explored, and to consider how the outcome of the research is impacted by the method.  Further analysis will take place to identify how the values of women have been represented in art, by women, with examples of media which have a materiality that resonates with the subject.

Three Minute Thesis

Thoughts from the swimming pool - where I do my best thinking (and keep forgetting how many lengths I've done!).  Coventry Uni runs a 3 minute thesis competition, which is really good for getting the nub of your research defined.  So here goes:

The Golden Circles - Why, How, What (answer in this order for good quality thinking that leads to original artwork; the other way round for artwork that reworks established thinking)

Valuing Women

Why: Women are valued differently to men in UK society.  The representation of people in galleries and museums gives a narrative about the values of a society to the viewer.  As an artist I look at these representations - and I find more male artists represented than women artists, and more men than women represented as artwork (except for men and women depicted unclothed, in which case women are a huge majority).  The media in museums and galleries tends to be that favoured by men - oil on canvas, sculpture, with fewer examples of materiality favoured by women - textiles, stitch, print, watercolour.

The values which underpin gallery selection criteria are usually described as universal values because they do not overtly preference men or women.  However, historically, most values that have been identified to support these choices, have been made by men, then applied to men, which means they are masculinist values, not universal.  These values (which have been validated on men), latterly have been applied to women, often resulting in a mismatch in how women are represented to a 21st century audience.

National Portrait Gallery Collections policy is symptomatic in its aims to address some shortcomings in its collections: targetting 20/21century artworks that representing women and BAME, that highlight achievement in fields of: sporting success, entertainment, science, the arts, business, politics, and intellectual life.  This definition of achievement appears to focus on notoriety, celebrity, status and money, and can be argued to be based on masculinist values.

How:  I intend to review and explore what values are seen by women in other women.  I shall select women known to me, who are prepared to be the subject of research into what they, and other women, value about them.  I shall conduct semi-structured interviews to identify values specific to individual women, who are not in the public eye - 'ordinary women'.  Then I shall collate results from different women to see whether patterns and trends appear in how women value women.

What:  I am a textile artist who hand stitches samplers.  Samplers are a traditional form of artwork, requiring skill, that are strongly associated with the education and values of women.  My samplers - abstract portraits - depict ordinary women who would rarely be exhibited in a gallery; use a traditional female media to tell a narrative; name these women, and celebrate these women's value to their society.  My samplers aim to gain a smile of recognition from the viewer as they identify the female values of their nearest and dearest, portrayed in a gallery.

3 minutes 15 seconds.

Let's see what my tutor makes of it!

Idea for an Exhibition

I was at the swimming pool this morning and had an idea.  I was thinking about how interesting the FiLiA conference was, because it was full of interesting artwork, but also about how the professionalism of the display left a bit to be desired.  I also thought about how strategy documents from the NPG said they were trying to address the narrow media and restricted range of people shown at their gallery.  Then I thought about the event I am going to attend tomorrow night at New Hall, Cambridge, Art & Eco Feminism, organised by Eliza Gluckman, curator of the feminist collection at New Hall.  I remembered speaking to Eliza, after the Guerrilla Girls talk at Whitechapel Gallery - when I was really impressed - but her comment was "all well and good, but where's feminist art going?"

While I believe my work is never going to get into the NPG, I think there is a place for non-traditional art gallery media and under-represented groups to be exhibited professionally at high status venues.  So what if I contact Eliza and give her an idea, to run an event, at a suitable location, accessed by her professional art contacts.

An exhibition called "Marginalised (tick symbol), Recognised?" Or "Marginalised (tick), Valued?" Put out a request for artworks by or about marginalised groups, using media appropriate to these groups.  Set up a conference and a call for papers in appropriate fields.  And workshops to work with/by/for these marginalised groups.

Hmm.  And in the meantime I'm still struggling with all the IT for uni, and downloading photos from my phone!

Tutorial with Imogen Racz 17/10/17

I asked for information about the art journals with highest impact in the field and she gave a good explanation about why this does not matter to her – some of the higher rated journals are narrow, not worth their rating because of the restricted range of people writing in them; old fashioned etc.  I’m better off looking at feminist journals as they push boundaries, although they may have been short lived. 

As my time range has been limited to 30 years, this restricts the scope to 1987-2017; nicely correlating with the end of Thatcher, when the consequences of her political policy were ramping up. 

Imogen wondered whether what I was looking at was the concept of domestic comfort.  I’m not sure it is, although I had realised my sampler on Aunt Joan had led to the realisation that her life was all about creating domestic comfort for her nearest and dearest (but very few others!).  Look at Sue Gallop. 

Take a concept (eg domestic comfort)

As an abstract notion (what is this?)

Critique it. 

Consider Subversive Stitch; TU Banners; Suffragette Banners

Explore ‘overlooked values’ (I really like this term)

Explore this in a soft medium – ie sewing. 

I see women’s values as diverse.  Imogen said 70s feminists like Griselda Pollock were full of definitions about what women’s art could and could not be about – clear boundaries – yet this was unhelpful.

My work is about life stories of women known to me – what was valued or overlooked, in an urban, UK setting.  Maybe look at one person, actually known to me and work with Identity and Memory – who we are in consciousness.  How does the individual relate to the collective within a particular timescale.

Then Imogen and I started getting somewhere with what interests me.  I refer to work quite a lot (my own employment history).  It’s all about work – how what people do, is valued. 

Contrast paid, undervalued labour,  with domestic undervalued labour. 

Critique paid labour using strategies of domestic labour. 

Use sewing to critique paid labour. 

Who came after Rosika Parker?

Look up The City Reader – Rob Shields Looks at what goes on in places in the margins.  Sheila Lowenhak

Female strategies for the Overlooked Worker

Then I travelled home and felt very anxious about the Literature Review.  I think the hand-in date is a couple of weeks earlier (7 December) than I realised, and I feel I have not really identified what I am interested in, let alone 4 suitable writers to compare and contrast.  Maybe I need to clarify the Literature Review with Jill, my first supervisor, then book an appointment with the Academic Writing Centre to help me get a plan together.

Exhibiting at Feminism in London Conference (FiLiA) at Institute of Education

A very educational experience.  I was delighted to have my Self Portrait sampler selected by Desperate Artwives to be exhibited as part of this conference.  However it was a salutary learning experience about how to choose which organisations/venues for me to select as an artist. 

I was away for a few days immediately before the staging time.  So I dropped my artwork and mounts off with Amy Dignam, the Desperate Artwives lead.  The IoE venue is a brutalist building near Russell Square – probably listed(!) – and no damage to the walls was allowed.  No drilling holes, and no Sellotape on painted walls  This venue was certainly not ‘white box’ - but unadorned concrete.  I have come up with a great, simple way to display my work.  Foamboard cut slightly smaller than the samplers, attached with Command Strips (upmarket blutac that pulls off without bring paint with it). 

There was confusion between IoE, FiLiA, and Desperate Artwives about access for staging, which rooms were allocated to whom and who/what else the rooms had been booked out for, on the Friday prior to the Conference.

Amy and Kate were stuck on a failed train so were an hour late arriving.  Desperate Artwives were allocated a corridor, and a room for display.  These locations were not secure, either during the day or at night.  Then we discovered the staging time window was 5-6.30pm and the room allocated was booked for auditions 6.30-10pm.  We were thrown out of the room at 6.30 for the auditions.  One artist, who is very precise and whose artwork is very desirable, and portable(!) was anxious about security of her work and insisted her work be kept locked away at night.  The organisers were confident that because of the type of delegate to the conference, security was not an issue (I was not – we don’t know the delegates, no tickets were checked on entry, and anyone could have entered the building).  Expressed concerns led to the more portable work being staged in the allocated room, and the less portable on the brutalist concrete walls in the lobby outside.

I concluded that artwork in the feminist arena is often created to be attention seeking and message based and is consequently non-precious, to the point of being disposable.  If you want your work to be precious and cherished, maybe the venue needs to be gallery based or for high-level intellectual conferences (the artist who was anxious had had her work at a major medical conference where specialist researchers had studied, understood and recognised the quality of thought and skill in her work).

However, I enjoyed my Sunday afternoon there.  There were many issue-based artworks that expressed the nature of being woman – all different ways of being woman.  I think this may be one of my fields for exhibition.

I practiced using my camera and iphone to see which took better photos. Photos to follow.

Two days spent in How to be a Researcher module

Feeling a bit overwhelmed at the moment.  So much stuff to do, and I have not yet got the structure clear in my mind.  Maybe writing about it will help.

We are independent researchers - this is not a BA - no timetable will be provided.  So I need to define my timetable myself.

Session started with 3 helpful basics - name, faculty and 3 key words:
Cathy MacTaggart - Faculty of Arts & Humanities - Women, Values, Feminine Imaginary.

Imposter Syndrome - very common to feel this - this is OK ... but you need to learn to feed yourself - using appropriate development activities for you:

Read
Visit museum/gallery/place of learning
Conversation with knowledgeable person (supervisor; peers; friends; multi-disciplinary)
Internet (reliable sources)
Build models
Observe people
Draw
Mind maps
Travel - see how other cultures do it.
Youtube
Modules
Social media
Conferences
Accessing bibliographies

Look up Research Development online - rdonline - enrolment code

ACTION - Find a Research textbook in my discipline ... and read and apply it!

Erik Borg - Research Writing

There will be a Writing for Publication module - date tba
Also Writing for Scholarly Publication normally done in second year, once you have completed your database.

Start writing early.  Start with methodology and introduction

Writing for Research themed week 6-11 November.

The Golden Circle : most people work through What, then How, then Why.  Good research works the other way - be clear about Why you are working, then go to How, which will then produce What you make.

Think - Act - Communicate.  It should be that everything we do, challenges the status quo.

We were advised to look at the blog of Pat Thompson and her comments on how to use citations and how not to do it.  It was a brilliant read from the perspective of an assessor - pearls of wisdom in how NOT to give bullets for the panel to fire at you at your viva!.  I suggest you read it. https://patthomson.net/category/citation/citation-dump/.   Courtesy of Pat Thompson.

There is an Academic Phrasebook online at Coventry Uni.  Note to self - Use It!

Academic writing is always seeking the gap in the literature, and a unique answer to a question.

Always seek out peer reviewed journals - higher quality.  Find out from Jill Journeaux, her opinion on best journals in our field.

Post Graduate Researcher Ethics

We must have ethical approval before data generation.  Submit 2 ethics forms.  First one within next 10 days to seek permission for literature search - this will be deemed low risk to gain project approval, will be completed within 6 months and can be authorised quickly.

Second application is about primary collection phase.  Speak to supervisor to set up methodology: interviews with candidates; define questions etc.. Data collection within next 3 months - medium to high risk, esp anything dealing with outside UK, vulnerable people, vulnerable locations, funding. etc.

Progress Review Panel at end of first 12 months.  Must pass to progress to year 2.

Look up Research Excellence Framework - describes how to ensure your Research is robust.

The principle of research ethics is to maximise benefits of your research whilst minimising harm.

5 Rs of Ethical Research

Record Keeping - informed consent; archiving and disposal
Regulations - law; code of conduct
Respect - research integrity
Rights - anonymity and right to withdraw
Risks - personal safety and other risks.

CU Ethics give online ethical approval.

ACTION - Create Ethics Submission

Research Evaluation. 

Research Excellence Framework (REF) focusses on Originality, Significance, Rigour.  I'm still not really clear about this but Make your position clear.  In my case, because I am defining how I, as a woman, see values and the feminine imaginary, I can write using the personal pronoun.  This may make the methodology original.

Look up Jean McNiff - Action research and practitioner research.

Finding your papers. 

How to choose your papers :

- Find the journals in your field that are robust - use the impact factor - Ask Jill
- Gain confidence sourcing journals online - Find out from the IT office how to gain access when off campus as at present I can get to the journal, but not the full text.
- Keyword search in library
- Speak to your supervisory team
- Can use papers that you used in your proposal
- Seek out papers on your topic that use different methodologies.

Pick 4

Literature Review

Purpose:
What's already there
Don't reinvent the wheel
Identify the gap - what is my contribution?
Identify good/poor methodology
Interlinking information between writing forms your Questions
Build trust with the reader - show knowledge to examiners
                                               - but now we are researchers so the actual methodology is fascinating
                                               - How to find out?
                                               - Learn methods and theories.

Identify writers you like - to emulate their style

Coverage: (more at PhD level than MRes)
- errors/omissions/negligence
- Use and application of literature (your assessors will. be journal editors!)
- Critical evaluation
- Macro structural coherence
- Relationships between literature
- Appreciation of disciplinary context.

Build towards your gap.
Sustain an argument - relating to your study

Identify problems with a specific approach - and use this to validate a different method that addresses it.

Look up systematic literature reviews and narrative literature reviews.

Ways of mapping your literature

Organisational mapping
Conceptual mapping
Spreadsheet
Relational maps

Mind maps - sets out ideas and how to organise it.  Try using post-it notes on wall - gives hierarchical outlines.

Conceptual maps
- historical/chronological
- conceptual
- taxonomic (categories)
- heirarchical

Use reworks. - ACTION Book welcome programme workshop

Write to your purpose
Be critical:  Question the evidence, method etc.  Critique the who, what, when, where, why, and how. Disciplinary knowledge - the more you read the better your questions.

Criticalness in your writing
Hedges - possibly, maybe, anything cautionary
Emphatics - certainly, definitely
Person markers - I, we, our, mine
Attitude markers - unfortunately, hopefully
Relational markers - rhetorical questions
Evaluative markers - importantly, misguided

Creating a stance
Don't sit on the fence.  "A good example..."  "However, this approach has been criticised"

Citations in Text. 

Integral and non-integral:

"Chandra et al (2004) argue for ..." - Integral - emphasises sources not ideas

"Some have argued ... (Briggs 2009)" - Non-integral - focuses on what was said - this is your argument.

Define your argument clearly - "A seminal book (Name) (Author) said ..."  
Focus on paraphrasing others.  You want to focus on your ideas - but select use of punchy quotes is good.

Checking

This is what the area shows (multiple sources) and this is what I want to focus on.  Read Pat Thompson The Citation Dump blog post - good stuff in here.

Book: Ridley The Literature Review.

Arts and Humanities Research  with Imogen Racz (my second supervisor and Art Historian) and Jill Journeaux (First supervisor and textile artist)

Imogen:
Identify the boundary of knowledge
Where is the archival material?  Is it accessible?
Start with broad questions and filter down to your question
What has been written?  In what context?
Your idea may be about the context.  To make it researchable  you may need to realign and refocus.
Originality may be to use a theory in a novel way.
Primary knowledge leads to new understanding
Try out different structures
Work out your headings and sub headings.
Keep notes and file under headings.
Try making notes on index cards - write on one side only.
(Imogen advised me to only write on one side on my notebook pages- but at least I took notes - no-one else did!).
Charts and timelines can be new knowledge - pieces of new knowledge - listing data and political events/other significant events can show links)
Artist/media/year of birth/Representation/solo exhibitions/group exhibitions as an example can show links between who knew whom, whose work was shown together and possible influences.
What is the back story - can I fill in (new knowledge)

Use good theses - look at their bibliography
- use their good sources
- BUT make sure yours is slightly different, more extensive, more recent.

Next Tuesday - Tea at Lanchester Library. 1600 in the Gallery

Jill:  Research from own practice

Looking for gaps.
Look at Grayson Perry Reith Lectures.  Good stuff.

Writers : Quality of questions - evidence - answer
Artists : Quality of questions - artwork - not necessarily an answer but an interpretation

What, why how for artists:
Knowledge gap in thought leads to research
Knowledge gap in practice - leads to a complex path for practice and research.

Autobiography - personal experience
Understanding your own culture. This is exactly where I am coming from.

Jill inspired by lace archive - drew lots.  Remade lace in drawings.  Then drew with stitch.

Look at artists collections.  Collections build meaning.  Look at Artists and collections. Collections are deep rooted in practice.

Best work comes from collaboration.  Leads to dialogue - and your work gets correction by others and is strengthened.

First tutorial with Jill

I think Jill and I are going to get on.  I had sent some preliminary thoughts to her prior to my tute.  She cut through it in several fell swoops, and very effectively restricted the range of my questions.

Key Questions:   These questions may be further narrowed

How do museums represent the work made by women? 

What cultural values are attributed to women?

How does framing and/or the gaze impact on the representation of women?  (I thought framing and the gaze were different things - need to investigate)

Aim(s):  - To develop a series of narratives that explore the values attributed to women’s work in contemporary urban Britain, as an artist working with stitch and the traditional sampler format.

- to challenge notions of trivia associated with women and their family history. These aims will evolve as the research continues.

Context and Scope
                                                                                                      

I’m restricting the range of artwork that I consider to Museums and Galleries from the last 30 years - 1977, maybe a bit more to include second wave feminism.  Restrict the range to art by women about women.

My life experience is urban UK, so this will be my focus

Methods

Visual texts and data: paintings, textiles, other applied arts as identified as of interest, archives e.g. V&A and Tate archives, British Library etc.  NB V&A can be difficult to gain access to their archives - but there is a big project identifying women artists of the last 30 years, so it is topical for them.  I know Mary Schoeser (who used to work there) and her network might be of help!

Interviews - 2 categories
- semi-structured interviews with people about values they see in specific women

(this should identify how women see values in women, compared to how men see values in women?)

- interviews with women artists who work on female subject matter.

Literature review to include PhD theses.

Create a glossary (Autobiographic; ethnographic; trivia - relativism; etc)

How do gender norms vary impact my research?. .  I can only comment from a white working class woman’s cultural perspective – so the work is autobiographic and I need to use an ethnographic methodology to consider women who have impacted on my life

Restrict the range of my research to:

Art by women about women 

Iconographic analysis - this is the old term for semiotic analysis. Identify and reconstruct the role of women in an art form. What values are portrayed?  How do I code my findings? – 

Book: Naked Truths: Women, Sexuality and Gender in Classical Art and Archaeology

Subset questions

What is the role of the viewer in gender construction of value in art? Read about the gaze and precis it in your literature review

Who are the patrons of art about women and who was the intended audience? Read

What was the social and economic status of patrons and artists? – so you are asking how does patronage work Helen Gorrill who was at your interview wrote her PhD thesis on this but it is embargoed whilst she writes a book from that thesis for IB Tauris due out late next year – but you could go to Cumbria and interview her.

Also suggest you interview Andrea Hannon whose PhD was entitled The House is Still Named After and is in our library. Andrea lives nearby in Leamington.

Mandy Havers is on our staff as a 0.2 – look her up! And her studio is nearby in Coventry – she would be good to interview too.

What is the required and accepted behaviour of women in order to be valued?

What roles are played by women who are valued?

Do women who are valued act beyond stereotypical roles?

Read between the lines – what is implied and look for the belittled roles to disclose the real context of women.

Suggested reading: -

Writings by Marsha Meskimmon – including Women Making Art

Simone De Beauvoir The Second Sex also Greer, Dworkin and Friedan

Rebecca Fortnum:   Contemporary women Artists in their own words

Luce Irigaray This Sex Which Is Not one

Guerrilla Girls

Rosika Parker The Subversive Stitch: Embroidery and the making of the Feminine

Writings by Griselda Pollock on gender eg Vision and Difference

I’ve just realised - by restricting the range of what I consider, to women’s art about women, means I am focussing on defining my version of the female imaginary.  As Luce Irigaray postulated that the female imaginary had not yet been clearly defined, I am targetting a clear definition that satisfies me, from my reading and subsequent artwork.  And in order to get the female definition, men need to be omitted because the definition is not about them.

"Defining my female imaginary”. 

Great outcome from a tute.