Crit Group Response from 3.29.15

Crit Group Response – for meeting on Sunday March 29^th – via Skype (audio)

I had asked for comments primarily on my Research Paper.

I had been struggling with the structure of the paper. My research advisor had suggested a completely different structure than the one I started out with. As I am not coming from an academic background, I am not familiar with the traditional structure of a paper and my original intention was to guide the reader through my own chronological journey of discovery throughout my studio and research practice – as I felt this was the only way to convincingly speak in my own voice.

However, I am now being advised to spend much more time at the beginning of the paper to set up a context for the reader.  A context of references, a “scoping of the field” of performance pedagogy and an introduction of the texts I will later be discussing.

My peers all agreed that more contextual set-up was necessary, but that it did not need to be “instead of” my chronological report, but to serve as an introduction to it. They also concurred with my advisor that the thematic aspects of my work need to be presented to the reader as part of the introduction. Here I am referring to the underlying themes in my work of transformation, metamorphosis and transcendence. In the paper I introduce these themes, as well as my concepts of the “self” as medium within the context of Butoh dance, where they are fully embraced and utilized by the Butoh methodology.

It seems that my paper will make a lot more sense to the reader and enable them to understand more clearly where I am coming from conceptually if I present this information as part of the introduction.

(However, it seems that there needs to be so much information included in the introduction that by the time I’ve presented it all, it will not be the introduction anymore – but about halfway through the paper!)

Another question I had was in regards to how to frame something I consider to be an “original” idea or concept – one that I have developed independently of direct influence and might be unable to find a reference for it in regards to contextualizing it within the field.

I don’t think there was much in the way of a solution for this – except for the suggestion to find a method or philosophy with an opposing view or strategy with which I could contrast my own and explain the differences.

However – I feel like searching for references to either support or contrast my work can be like looking for a needle in a haystack!

I expressed my frustration with the incongruous requirements of being an artist in academia – the artistic requirements of innovation and original thought – yet there has to be a reference given in order for any statement to be academically valid. How can one validate an original idea? Why does it have to be supported by evidence of others having already done or said it?

In regards to writing styles, from reading some of last year’s papers it appears that a great variety of writing styles and methods of structuring a paper have been considered acceptable – and in my peer group, one person in particular (Lindey) is structuring her paper as a journal because this is the whole concept of her project.

However, it seems to be the general consensus between advisor and crit group that I try to follow a more traditional layout with a formal introduction and contextualization.

It reminds me of the joke about advice given to someone preparing a speech or sermon: “First you tell ‘em what you’re gonna tell ‘em. Then you tell ‘em. Then you tell ‘em what it was you just told ‘em!”