College of Social Sciences

Mon 7^th & Tue 8^th February 2022 from 10:00am – 1:00pm each day

Registration is now closed

Watch the video below to hear the keynotes from our speakers Dr Lisa Bradley and Amanda Ptolomey (School of Education), Professor Sayantan Ghosal (Adam Smith Business School), and Dr Dave Vanderhoven and Steph Grant (Head Injury and Homelessness Research Group):

About this event

Collective action and empowerment are considered critical in challenging inequalities through mobilisation and solidarity. They are, however, dynamic concepts that require novel methodologies to understand the complexities of their implementation and success.

In this Winter School for PhD students and post-Doctoral researchers we will provide an opportunity to learn from experts in some of the innovative research methodologies for generating collective action. This event will take place across the 7th and 8th of Feb 2022 from 10:00am-13:00pm.

 

Winter School Day 1.

Participants will hear from our three keynote speakers: Dr Lisa Bradley and Amanda Ptolomey (School of Education), Professor Sayantan Ghosal (Adam Smith Business School), and Dr Dave Vanderhoven and Steph Grant (Head Injury and Homelessness Research Group).

Each speaker will run parallel interactive workshop sessions in breakout rooms, and participants will be able to choose from one of three workshops:

1. Arts-based research/methods for change: Zine-making for revealing, connecting, and transforming inequalities by Dr Lisa Bradley and Amanda Ptolomey

Zines are self-published, magazine-like booklets which have historically offered an independent platform of expression for a diversity of underrepresented and marginalised voices, and people with limited economic resources. Furthermore, the process of zine-making has itself been shown to stimulate self-awareness, creative expression, connection, and collective action, serving as a pedagogical tool for empowerment and transformation. In recent years, the application of zine-making as a transformative research method has grown in prominence. During the workshop participants will be guided by a series of prompts to make their own zine. A variety of techniques will be explored, including black-out poetry, collaging, and embodied/sensory mapping.

2. Action Research (AR) – the relentlessly incomplete project by Dr Dave Vanderhoven and Steph Grant

International research shows 50% of homeless people are head injured; findings with virtually no positive impact, beyond the exposure that we are an accident or tumour away from being one of ‘them’

In this session you will have the opportunity to: (i) experience the application of research methods in a highly emotive context – led as it is by survivors of traumatic change in a context that is resistant to change; (ii) consider how our debates about ‘methods’ help or hinder the empowerment of research subjects; and (iii) reflect on the role of emotion in research.

3. Assessing psychological training programmes to address deprivation, marginalisation and stigma by Sayantan Ghosal, Adam Smith Chair in Political Economy

From soap operas to the Simon Bolivar Orchestras to dream building, a number of researchers, from different disciplinary backgrounds, have examined the effectiveness of psychological programmes that address deprivation, marginalisation and stigma. This workshop will focus on engaging participants in addressing methodological issues in assessing the impact of such psychological training programmes. Before the workshop, participants will be asked to focus on a specific psychological training programme, Reflect Action (see Reflect Circle - YouTube and Participation, literacy and empowerment: the continuing evolution of Reflect - pdf) and, guided by a series of prompts, come up with a research design to assess its impact.

 

Winter School Day 2.

Participants will take part in an interactive panel discussion on the challenges of working with comparative approaches beyond the stereotyped 'divides' to achieve empowerment.

Participants will also present their own work, in a Pecha Kucha format, highlighting how they see the workshop methodology informing their work.

The Winter School will then end at 12:30, with an optional networking session running until 13:00.

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To apply

To take part in the Winter School, please register through Eventbrite and provide the following information on the registration page:

1. Choose your first and second choice of interactive workshop session you would like to join.
2. Submit a short abstract (no more than 200 words) highlighting why you are interested in participating in the Winter School and outline what you would like to present on.

First published: 23 February 2022