A Morning Coffee in Melbourne: Discussing the Contentious Spaces of Media Practice Research

Abstract

This is a conversation that took place between three practitioner-academics one morning in Melbourne. All three work and practice in the field of the moving image: from screen production to audiovisual installation to screenwriting. Our conversation is underpinned by previous research we have undertaken in this field, namely the launching of a moving image journal, Sightlines, and a companion journal article on the process of setting it up, which focussed on the issues presented when trying to establish peer review protocols and guidelines for moving image works.

We favour the idea of a conversation because the form allows us to be a little playful and provocative. The casual nature of this dialogue was intended to reveal the lived, embodied ways in which we deal with the issues screen production researchers are facing. We have allowed ourselves to speculate; to articulate ideas we do not necessarily hold, but know are held by others in our field. We are playing devil’s advocate, attempting to untangle an argument we know it might not be possible to untangle. We use the space of dialogue (and/or fiction) to perform our ideas in ways that - we hope - also speak to the experiences and concerns of others in the field.

Rather than providing a singular voice that encompasses the huge diversity of our practices, and the different perspectives regarding the nature of creative practice research, we carry out this poly-vocal conversation (see Batty, 2016; Stroud, 2008; Williams, 2013). In it we actively look for the difficult lines of inquiry not with the intention of finding resolutions that satisfy us all; but rather with the view to maintain certain contentious spaces and encourage new ones as they emerge. This is the very strength of our field: that we can dwell in the negotiated, maintaining complexities rather than flattening them out with binaries. Might we then propose this approach as another type of discourse: an 'alternative' mode of publication that becomes key to understanding creative practice research, where the 'research' part is 'embodied', not separate to it?

This conversation also needs your input. Through your publications, we invite you to listen to the voices and speak back to them, with your own views or provocations or experiences. For us, the appropriate way to sign off on the conversation was to pose new questions that still linger for us, and which may provide impetus for further conversation (and research) within the disciplines that we work.

A LITTLE SOMETHING BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION

In 2014 we organised a conference that looked more like a film festival for screen-based research works. We called it Sightlines. We put out a call, with an emphasis on screenings, but also accepted papers and panel discussions pertinent to screen-based research. We received a very enthusiastic response, with both national and international delegates keen to see what it was all about and contribute to the debates.

Within the schedule we held three plenary discussions to unpack what we identified as being three key questions to the sector at the time. These were:

1. Do you think academic filmmaking needs written text to count as research?

2. What do you think the relationship should be between the screen industry and academic filmmakers?

3. How do you think academic filmmaking could be funded?

We continued these conversations informally to camera. These interviews were published on the Australian Screen Production Education and Research Association (ASPERA) website^1,2, where we also launched a page dedicated to the Sightlines event. The idea behind this strategy - and for the companion journal (see below) - was to make transparent the thinking, reasoning and problems being experienced within the field, especially the processes for peer reviewing screen production works. We wanted to create a space where the debates could happen publicly, where the community could gather and re-visit later (i.e., the website), and where some of the frameworks for the journal might emerge as a result of the conversations (see Glisovic et al., 2016).

Following the event we developed a fully refereed audiovisual journal, also called Sightlines. This was based on the films (and screenplays) shown at the event, and involved a post-event process for peer review. We decided to make the peer reviews available to the public, with the opportunity for the creator/author to respond, in order to generate debate and assist people's thinking around what it means to do and assess this type of research work. The idea was to grow the journal in future years, creating a space not only for disseminating research outputs, but also for capturing ongoing debates about filmmaking in the academy. A second Sightlines event was held in 2016, and we are currently developing the second edition of the journal. Associated projects, commissioned through ASPERA, include a scoping study of the issues that practitioner-researchers are facing in the discipline, particularly in relation to the ways in which research guidelines are being interpreted variously; and a guide/principles for assessing what 'quality' might look like in screen production research, including the prestige of venues and measures of peer esteem. Both of these projects will be available via the ASPERA website in 2017.

It seemed to us the really pressing issue in terms of growing the sector was the dearth of peer reviewed publication platforms for screen-based research work. With this comes the very complicated problem of how screen-based works are evaluated and peer reviewed.

We used the Sightlines journal, issue 1, as an experimenting ground. We researched ways other people were dealing with the question of peer review. In large part we modelled our approach on the Journal for Artistic Research³. Our aim was to make the very process of peer review the focus; to make all of the guidelines and processes transparent so that we could build a dialogue around these very processes and the ‘problems’ they bring. As can be seen from the comments section on the website, there were very few responses. This, here, is our attempt once again to develop this space, one that is still being negotiated. We do it with renewed enthusiasm, noting that since 2014 the landscape has shifted in some very positive directions. There are more platforms for publication/dissemination, for example, and many of them are also making transparent approaches to peer review, evaluation and selection.

We did in fact contact several online journals that are publishing moving image works to probe this question further. We received some enthusiastic responses for collaboration: to create an international network of journals that are interested in and dedicated to this space.

silvertwin Feb 13

With this comes the very complicated problem of how screen-based works are evaluated and peer reviewed.

As we've heard from, in the UK context, REF sub-panel reports and consecutive editorial pieces in JMP, there is a vicious circle here in that the REF panel are calling for more practice researchers to 'step up' to be on such evaluative platforms but also practice researchers may need to be more coherent as a community about criteria for rigour. So posing the question again within an 'output' is part of the problem, not the solution, perhaps? In which case, can you articulate how the informal conversations to camera, this piece and SIghtlines work as a research 'output'?

craigbatty Feb 14

Others may have stronger views on this matter, but I see the conversations and interviews as ways of 'educating' the discipline and (ideally) giving good examples of how things might be done. We wanted Sightlines to provide an opportunity for output, but also to use its form/methodology to generate rich discussions about some of the issues facing the discipline. We are, in fact, conducting two projects for ASPERA: 1) scoping the discipline (in Australia) to see where these issues are coming from, and how/why pretty stringent research guidelines are being interpreted variously; 2) provide guidance for assessing 'quality' in a screen production research work, that we can start to build excellence in the discipline.

silvertwin Feb 15

(2) sounds like something readers of JMP, and the editorial board, will find VERY helpful, any way to offer some signposts here to the emerging criteria from this?

Smiljana.Glisovic Feb 20

The idea behind the Sightlines journal was in many ways very similar to some of the intentions of this very issue of JMP. We wanted to make transparent the thinking, reasoning, problems, behind the process of peer reviewing screen production works. We wanted it to be a place where the debates could happen publicly, a place where the community could gather and where some of the frameworks might emerge as a result of the conversations. Unfortunately it didn't really get up that kind of momentum! As a response to this, we tried to get this debate going at Sightlines #2 conference (there was a designated workshop session for this). We are looking through the results of this presently, and hopefully can comment very soon on emerging criteria.

#mediapracticepublishing #disruptedjournal

silvertwin Feb 27

If it's possible to add something to this piece on that, it would really add something in turns of taking the conversation further I think.

NealW Mar 6

I am really interested in this from a quality perspective, as someone who might peer review work - or ask another to do so. In this context, what then are the questions that are asked of the reviewer that might differ from a standard journal text. "What is the quality of the reflection in the work on process etc etc … "

craigbatty Apr 25

This is a good question! And I guess the answer lies in the context of the research question/exploration. What is being sought (investigated) and how is it being sought? And on that basis perhaps the peer review parameters come in? The idea of one area being 'quality of reflection on process' could work for those projects that are about process - but it is important to note that not all practice research is about process (there is a process in all research, so what is it about the process that is being interrogated)? I wonder, too, how one might see/know/judge the quality of reflection on process. Is it evident in the work? Or only in writing about the work (i.e., an articulation of the research)? Either way, it is a very useful premise to consider what peer review questions might be (more) appropriate for media practice work.

NealW Mar 6

these online journals

Can you reference your research in some form.

Endnotes?

craigbatty Apr 25

For example:

http://www.jar-online.net

http://screenworks.org.uk

http://mediacommons.futureofthebook.org/intransition/

At this point in the process, however, we would like to discuss some of the issues that have arisen for us, which for some are still contentious. This is not necessarily with the hope of resolving them; rather, to provide impetus and momentum for discussion along these lines of undecidability (perhaps).

With this background and experience, we – three Melbourne-based practitioner-researchers – held a discussion, allowing it to branch out into the more and less marginal notions. This is what we present here, with the intention of encouraging other productive arguments and viewpoints. Screen-based research is varied. It can and does do many things. While conditioned by various institutional, governmental and personal imperatives, we are interested in maintaining the complexity and diversity of practices and not dimming its vibrancy by eliminating contentious spaces. We hope others will be compelled to contribute to this debate.

A Morning Coffee in Melbourne

Discussion/Propositions

Craig:

Being a screenwriting practitioner-researcher, much of my work straddles the disciplines of media practice and creative writing. In developing my research career, including doing my practice-based PhD in screenwriting, I have found literature from creative writing to be not just useful, but in fact essential. This, I think, is because there is a much stronger understanding of creative practice research in that discipline, with a wealth of material available to help understand and put into practice methodologies, methods and creative-critical experimentation. Creative writing has also been much more strident in providing opportunities for practitioner-researchers to publish creative works for/in/acknowledging the academy (see, for example, New Writing: The international Journal for the Practice and Theory of Creative Writing⁴; TEXT: Journal of Writing and Writing Courses⁵). This, I think, provides a solid basis for how media practice and screen production might conceptualise what it offers.

Smiljana:

Do you think the creative writing field has done this so successfully because the mode is the same, i.e., written language? For the screen production researcher the leap between the medium they work in, and the written word, is a larger one to make?

Leo:

I agree with this, although I also think an issue for media production as research is not so much about resolving the tension between communicating through audiovisual means (instead of through written text), as it is about communicating research through a creative/imaginative/dramatic approach (as against a critical/analytical approach). In relation to this second tension, screen production has a lot in common with (and a lot that can be learned from) creative writing.

Craig:

The Australian journal TEXT, for example, has to date published seven special issues dedicated to creative writing as research. These include creative writing broadly, scriptwriting, and queer writing. The first of these special issues, in 2010, featured 18 works spanning poetry, prose and experimental writing. Responding to the Australian government’s new rules for assessing research (Excellence in Research for Australia⁶), which from 2009 (the trial year) included non-traditional or ‘creative’ works, this special issue celebrated how the new mechanisms would ‘provide creative writing academics the opportunity to write in innovative ways that add new knowledge to their art form and the discipline’ and ‘subtly [change] the position writing academics can hold within the research framework’ (Krauth et al., 2010: 3).

Smiljana:

I think it is important to keep the relationship between the policy makers and researchers an ongoing one, where experts from all disciplines are meaningfully involved in the conversations around policy. While I recognise the positive changes that ERA has made in recognising creative practice research, I also think we should be wary of always defining our research in terms of the frameworks of the day.

Leo:

To me this is a strategic issue where we have to fight on two fronts. For a filmmaker/researcher like me, there are compelling pragmatic reasons why I need my creative practice research to be recognised by my university under the existing definitions. I will not get an allocation in my workload as well as other forms of support if my research outputs are not counted. However, I also think it is important to not just accept the current research paradigms if they do not adequately reflect the way we undertake and communicate research in our discipline(s).

NealW Mar 6

the current research paradigms if they do not adequately reflect the way we undertake and communicate research in our discipline.

The challenge for institutions is very real, as to differentiate between scholarly activity, practice which is also research, and practice which is not, might mean recognising activity which is also not paid for, practice outside the academy. Then we have issues of ownership etc too, along with many others. Again, if there are practical approaches that have been researched as part of your previous activity, and which are of use to other practitioner / researchers, this would be valuable to readers.

craigbatty Apr 25

For me, the definition of research (which does vary to some degree between countries, such as the UK, Australia and New Zealand - at least in the way it is unpacked) has to be at the centre of recognition. While one might be a world-leading practitioner, the question still remains: is this research? It is very easy to argue that there are ideas and knowledge in a work, but the key question is, is is new knowledge? New knowledge and knowledge are different things. At our university we developed a guide that walks practitioners through the steps of understanding, identifying and articulating research. This serves well as a way of educating them about research, too, for future projects. That is, of course, if they want to do research. I also find a different understanding of research between those who have done a PhD and those who have done a (Professional/Creative/Education) Doctorate. But I think that's for another paper … 

NealW Mar 6

but what KIND of impact is it making?

Impact in UK - which is part of our beloved REF is not the same as dissemination. For Impact to have value, its qualities must be transformative, to an audience, a policy, or to a group in terms of distinct categories, such as; health and wellbeing, cultural enrichment. Providing evidence of the pathways, or in areas such as public engagement, has been under scrutiny for some time, but the arts / creative areas have been looking at this for years too - so Arts & Humanities fared well relatively in 2014.

craigbatty Apr 25

Indeed, the difference between 'engagement' and 'impact' can get confusing for some. In Australia we are going through a process of developing a process for measuring engagement and impact, and the key thing to note so far is, the government is recognising the two aspects: engagement (which is not impact) and impact (which usually results from engagement). I recently surveyed some impact statements from the latest REF and note how some of them are actually talking about engagement, not impact. I wonder if this came up in post-REF reports?

NealW Mar 6

‘knowing’

Really interesting - as well as knowing, there is not knowing, about a subject or an area, which leads to research processes being developed. These new approaches or methods being the actual area in which new knowledge lies, can also be transformative, or lead to epistemic things (Rheinberger, Schwab, White etc) - many in the field of art research, that do not seek to explain a subject, might use such as distinction which also speaks of methods, or 'models of research practice'.

craigbatty Apr 25

Yes, true. I think the idea is that at the end of a research process, the work is 'knowing' because it contains research - the fabric of the work (craft, aesthetics, whatever) operates in a particular (new) way because (via research) it ‘knows’ what has gone before and so does something in a new way. Hence a creative practice research output, not creative practice as a method (the research output then being the writing up of such).

lskains Jul 19, 2016

If we consider writing as a process of thought ‘in action’ (i.e., ideas transcribed through language), then what’s the problem with screen practitioners having to produce a statement of research? Is writing the problem; or is the problem actually a lack of research? I think this is a key element in practice-based research in media in general - if we look at the creative practice as analogous to data (in the sciences, for example), then we still have to make the contribution to knowledge explicit through a statement of research and/ or exegesis. The sciences don’t just throw raw data at each other and ask one another to figure out what its contribution is - that’s what papers and reports are for. I can tell you a lot of them don’t like writing it up either! But at its core, isn’t that what research is – collecting data, analysing it, and communicating it explicitly to others in the field (and even outside the field)?

#disruptedjournal #mediapracticepublishing

Smiljana.Glisovic Aug 1, 2016

I like your point about scientists throwing data at each other! But I resist thinking that research is about ‘data’. Traditionally, and in science, this may be so, but I do think that research can be ‘thought in action’. How we make, and what we accept the current research paradigms if they do not adequately reflect the way we undertake and communicate research in our discipline(s). But, this also involves being able to articulate and argue for why creative practice research in screen production is different. I also think this is an ongoing process for our discipline and there is still considerable work to be done.

Craig:

Going back to the creative writing example, these works are published with an accompanying short research statement in the format dictated by Excellence in Research for Australia. Scholarly interventions such as this, which make it very clear that the creative works presented are research artefacts, not only value creative practice as research, but also ensure that they are subjected to rigorous, double blind peer review, as would be expected of a ‘traditional’ academic publication.

Peer reviewing guidelines for TEXT include:

Your work will be peer reviewed, the reviewing process is double blind, neither author nor reviewers should know of the others’ identities at any time during the process.

Leo:

For screen-based creative practice as research (such as film, TV and video production), peer review presents some challenges that I do not think exist for creative writing. One is defining the purpose of the peer reviews as leading to an improvement in the work prior to publication, which is the case for most text-based works. For many films this is currently seen as impractical because of the expense and logistical complexity of the process. It can also be hard to ‘blind’ the maker of the work, either because the film/video is complete with credits or simply because the existence of the creative work is well known within the field.

Craig:

Please note that refereed articles make a distinctive contribution to knowledge that extends the current scholarly literature in the field.

Smiljana:

This is interesting in terms of traditional ways of understanding ‘citation’, and ways in which one’s work directly contributes to, and extends, the field in general. How do screen works make explicit reference to their communities of practice?

Craig:

Refereed papers will draw on a sound framework of methodology and scholarship relevant to the paper’s topic, although this may include personal experience and/or anecdotal evidence where relevant to the argument, and where this is supported by scholarly literature.

Smiljana:

This is working off an already, deeply established scientific framework, which is not necessarily non-contentious. For example, the entire notion of ‘methodology’ is contested by some creative practice researchers (see, for example, Manning and Massumi, 2014). Is there room to completely re-think/re-invent the very foundations of how we produce ‘new knowledge’, which may have nothing to do with a ‘sound methodology’? Perhaps it is a matter of having a more flexible definition of methodology; perhaps it is a matter of using another term that does not bring with it a series of assumptions that are not helpful to the researcher-practitioner.

Leo:

I do not have a problem with the definition of research involving the discovery of ‘new knowledge’, but I think for many forms of media practice the definition of knowledge should be broadened, to include areas such as affect as a form of sensory knowing (see Berkeley et al., 2016).

Craig:

Creative work will be accepted for refereeing if it makes a distinctive contribution to knowledge that extends the current scholarly literature in the field and is accompanied by a 250-word exegetical statement for publication that makes this case. The statement will indicate the research significance of the creative piece and will follow the ERA guidelines on this element (Krauth et al., 2010: 5).

Smiljana:

ERA has other guidelines, too, such as the importance of where the work was exhibited. Here, there is a very different kind of standard than the one for traditional outputs. For example, if the work was shown (not as a research artefact but as a commercial product) at a cinema, or film festival, it usually has a high standing. This I think is problematic. Perhaps it is relevant in terms of ‘engagement and impact’, but what kind of engagement (that leads to) impact is it having? Commercial success seems to creep in as a more important marker than perhaps the research intentions and contributions. It is for reasons such as this that I feel we should approach these governmental frameworks critically.

Leo:

Film festival selection is an indicator of quality, but not of research quality. Using it as a proxy indicator in this way has never made any sense to me. This is why I would argue there should be specific festivals (such as Sightlines) and forms of publication that focus on creative media productions made as research. Peer review should primarily address the significance of the works as research. Of course, identifying in what ways the creative work is ‘doing’ research is the big question that is being discussed elsewhere in this conversation.

make, precipitates new and unique relations, and it is at this site that new knowledge emerges. It is then a joy to use a writing practice to deepen this emergence, to share it with others and to seed yet other possibilities.

#disruptedjournal #mediapracticepublishing

lskains Jul 28, 2016

100% agree. Creative practice isn’t pure data, that’s for sure. There’s a lot more qualitative research that goes into it and comes out of it, and a lot of it is personal, interpersonal, cultural, etc. It’s the kind of thing that you can’t get do with purely “data”-driven studies, like the psychologists (try) to do. That’s what makes practice-based research so important - helping us talk to one another and to understand how we as practitioners work.

#disruptedjournal #mediapracticepublishing

craigbatty Jul 30, 2016

Interesting discussions, and I agree with the points made. On the data front, I wonder whether it’s worth mentioning the difference between practice-based research/researchled research - and practice-as-research/ practice-led research? (These are my views, by the way!) With the former, I think ‘data’ (of whatever type) is used to inform what the creative work is (looks, feels, sounds like) - basically, data shapes a product. With the latter, I think the data is iterative and is really about process - so, the making is ‘data collection’, in a sense. The creative work might not actually be different - but the way in which it is made is different (or more understood)? In a nutshell, I think there is a difference between the types of data available, which inevitably leads to different research contributions. Maybe Smiljana’s ‘thought in action’ is about process; a new way of doing?

#disruptedjournal

lskains Jul 29, 2016

I discuss some of the definitions of practicerelated research in my project: http://scalar.usc.edu/works/creative-practice-research/what-is-pbr. I’d love to have discussion on it - there are so many ways research feeds into creative practice (whether as background research, or research that informs process), and vice versa. I definitely think having clearly defined approaches to the work and openly communicated methodologies is important to understanding whatever research contribution is being made.

#disruptedjournal #mediapracticepublishing

jonathanshaw Jul 19, 2016

Are the artistic and scholarly spirits fundamentally at odds? Is artistic practice at odds with academic notions of research?

They shouldn’t be! After all, in a lot of ways, no matter what our purpose in creative practice – whether for research or not – it nonetheless is a form of research. We are experimenting with art, trying to be better, get better. It’s always research in an implicit sense. What makes it explicitly research is when it is incorporated into a defined methodology that allows us to explore and respond to specific research questions, and to communicate how the practice helps us answer those questions. Ideally, it should be a symbiotic relationship.

Also, who defines what is “good”? The academy? Research councils? Consumers? Prize committees?

#disruptedjournal #mediapracticepublishing

craigbatty Jul 30, 2016

The idea of there being a ‘conscious awareness’ of research is spot on. Might we talk about ‘research’ and ‘Research’? Methodology has a lot to do with it - in short, being aware of what someone is doing, why they are doing it, and how it will be done (and reflected upon). We could, and some people say we should, retro-fit all creative practice activity as research - but I think this is dangerous. Sometimes it is purely commercial, personal or whatever. That is not to say that research cannot include the commercial and the personal - but, it really needs to be set up as research in the first instance (unless the research question is about ignorance and chance?!) Some universities value other types of practice; research-intensive universities quantify things via research discourse. Maybe this is the ‘problem’ or ‘predicament’? Maybe practitioners need to consider their choice of place of employment, and how they will be valued or not?

#disruptedjournal

lskains Jul 29, 2016

It would be a hard fight to say that even commercial and/or personal creative practice does not constitute research, at least to some current practitioners in the academy. I personally think that the research contribution for creative practice should be as explicit as any other field of research. Part of the problem with the academy lies in its measurements of “success” - participation in the (UK) REF. Universities want practitioners to teach attractive subjects (creative writing, composition, fine art, filmmaking, etc.) to better recruit students, and at least in some places (I’m thinking the US) it was enough to be a good practitioner and a capable teacher. After all, HE jobs are often how artists make a living. It’s when they are forced by universal measures to start justifying what they do as “research” that things turn nebulous.

#disruptedjournal #mediapracticepublishing

Craig:

Though contentious for some, the notion that a research statement is required to accompany the creative work is important to me. Discussing the background, contribution and significance of the research, not only does this communication of research give context to the creative work as an outcome of research, it also – crucially – ensures that the work can be understood by those outside of the discipline or those with limited knowledge of the form or genre. In this way, research is made explicit and transparent rather than veiled and open to questioning. In my view, and from my experience of working as a research leader in the creative practice space, leaving the research endeavour open to interpretation can be dangerous, if not damaging.

Smiljana:

I agree. But I do not think one can do this in 250-300 words, as per the statements that are provided for processes such as ERA or the Research Excellence Framework (REF)⁷ in the UK. The nature of these statements seems very cursory to me. I think a much more structured, rigorous kind of ‘exposition’ needs to take place. An argument needs to be made and evidenced. An argument cannot be made in 250-300 words. Yes, this implies that screen production researchers, for example, must also be writers. They also need to be versed in the language of the academy. When we do research it needs to be communicable. It was evident from our Sightlines journal experiment that many of the reviewers, who were all peers of the authors of the submissions, needed some parameters around how and what to review. The peers themselves needed the ‘research’ dimension of the submission to be articulated to them because much of the time it is not simply there, explicitly in the film. It is important that the research is communicable because it can then be taken up by others. This is one way a discipline grows.

Leo:

I think it is possible for a film to do research and communicate research without the need for written text to accompany it, particularly if it is a documentary or essay film. However, I also accept that in many cases the nature of the research is not clearly evident in a screen-based creative work, even through an informed viewing of the work. This particularly applies in relation to research on the media production process, which is a particular interest of mine. It is hard to see why there needs to be a restrictive form required for a research statement. I would prefer this to be open to the practitioner/researcher, with an encouragement to use written text, audiovisual means or any other method to focus attention on the research.

Craig:

If we turn to Ross Gibson’s (2010) idea of ‘knowing’ (i.e., what does a work know; how, on the basis of research, is the work created so that it does ‘know’ something?), what happens if that which the work knows is open to interpretation? If, for example, in a PhD examination the assessor feels (i.e., knows) something about the creative work that is different to what was intended (i.e., the research pursuit), how is the work assessed: as a failure, or as a triumph? Brabazon and Dagli’s (2010) argument that creative practice in the academy should always be called research, not art, is interesting (if not contentious) here; and I have to admit that for me, a clear communication of research (i.e., a research statement) that accompanies a creative work is essential in an academic context.

Smiljana:

I think the scenario you posit is a fine one. If the peer reviewer sees something other than what the researcher intended, this is cause to extend the conversation, to extend the research and its contribution. But how could this be called a failure? Rather, a dialogue between these researchers and the broader community should be taken up. To focus too much on ‘assessment’ is limiting. Might we not think about what potentialities have been opened up by a particular contribution?

Leo:

I have argued elsewhere for a broader definition of knowledge in relation to creative media practice works, but the other factor relevant to evaluation in this area is for the research to produce new knowledge (or make a contribution to knowledge). This is why peer review is important and why not all creative practice undertaken in the academy can be understood as research. A lot of it is interesting and worthwhile for other reasons, but it is not making a contribution to knowledge in the field.

Craig:

To end on a reflection of examining scripted works in the academy, for PhDs and for general research, where authors either chose not to or simply forgot to provide a research statement with their creative outputs, the task of appraising them as creative practice research was extremely difficult – if not impossible. It was unclear what the intention of the scripts were, and so instead of spending my time valuing how the works were informed by and embodied research, the default was to respond to generic issues around content and craft. This was probably inappropriate at best, but given the lack of background (to the research) not much else was possible. Here, then, I found myself working as an industry-style script reader rather than a screenwriting academic.

Smiljana:

Yes I can see how this would be the case. This is because a creative practice research artefact is not necessarily a container where the ‘knowledge’ lies. Creative practice research happens at many levels of a much larger research process and intention. Perhaps there is no knowledge in the film itself, for example. In which case the film itself is perhaps not the ‘output’, but rather other collateral (usually written papers) are needed, in conjunction with the work, to expose the research. At this particular point I think the written word is important. For my specific practice the relationship between the moving image work and any writing I do about it has to be negotiated with each new project. For me this very relationship can lead to further findings, further research questions: to deepen and extend the research in general. So for me it is not just about writing, it is about the KIND of writing in relation to the KIND of moving image practice particular to that work, which is important to interrogate each time.

Leo:

How might we summarise these discussions? What questions are we left with? What do we all want to explore further?

Craig:

If we consider writing as a process of 'thought in action' (i.e., ideas transcribed through language), what is the problem with screen and media practitioners having to produce a statement of research? Is writing the problem; or is the problem actually there being a lack of research?

Leo:

In filmmaking as research, does it matter if the film that emerges from the research is unsuccessful?

Smiljana:

Are the artistic and scholarly spirits fundamentally at odds? Is artistic practice at odds with academic notions of research? Or is there a wonderful, entirely other kind of beast, that is the artist-researcher?

craigbatty Jul 30, 2016

You hit a very good point here, Lyle - universities using their staff successes to recruit students, but then (kind of) ask something different of them ‘on the job’ in terms of research - at some universities, not all. So for me there are competing messages about what they want staff to be and do, and what research is and/or should be imposed. The reality is, that unless - in creative practice terms - a ‘research work’ is major and breaks ground, probably winning critical acclaim and numerous awards, it will never be of the top standard (4* REF; 5 ERA). It’s a hard fact, but I believe it’s true. The interesting question there is, do these awards come from research of professional practice domains? The latter, of course, thus bringing us back to square one :-)

#disruptedjournal

NealW Mar 6

Next iteration of REF is trying to wrestle with this question - asking are all academics researchers? Many artists struggle with these challenges in the workplace of the academy, but spend a long time in their studios undertaking unpaid research. Yet, they are concerned as to how the writing up into another context not only changes the process, but how they are seen within the non-academic context. In the end, the question might be simply more relatable to the practitioners concerns and their preferred methods of working.

Notes

1 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17503175.2015.1133262?journalCode=rsau20

2 http://aspera.org.au

3 http://www.jar-online.net

4 http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rmnw20/current

5 http://www.textjournal.com.au

6 http://www.arc.gov.au/excellence-research-australia

7 http://www.ref.ac.uk