Write Up (#MelbWriteUp)

24 May 2016 by 5 Comments

JMurphy-smallestJason Murphy is Senior Research Communications Advisor at the Graduate Research School (GRS), La Trobe University. He created and manages Melbourne’s Write Up (#melbwriteup).

Jason works full-time and is undertaking his PhD part-time, which he’s written on before. He’s working on a research project that critically examines the role of marketing in contemporary society.

He’s previously worked in industry as a graphic designer and in the arts sector with the National Gallery of Victoria and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney.

He tweets from @murphy_jason.

#MelbWriteUp in full swing (during a break). Photo by Jason Murphy.

#MelbWriteUp in full swing (during a break). Photo by Jason Murphy.

What happens when researchers with varying levels of experience and from different institutions come together in an intensive, all-day writing workshop?

#melbwriteup happens!

It’s a once a month, day-long meet-up that helps researchers focus on their work, block out all distractions (while still getting to be social), and collectively reach their individual research goals.

The first #melbwriteup in December 2015 was a bit of an experiment, formed out of a conversation a month beforehand between myself (a PhD candidate) and the Research Whisperers (Tseen Khoo and Jonathan O’Donnell).

I had just attended the inaugural 3-day RED writing retreat at La Trobe University, and I wanted to keep that productivity fire burning. Read more of this post

Filed under Networking, Research culture Tagged with , , , , , , , , ,

Shut up and write – so hot right now (Part 2)

1 March 2016 by 1 Comment

The #SUAW table, Pearson and Murphy's cafe, Melbourne (photo by Tseen Khoo)

The #SUAW table, Pearson and Murphy’s cafe, Melbourne (photo by Tseen Khoo)

As mentioned in Part 1, I did a quick survey of various long-time members of the first #suaw crew I started with.

This first crew met every Friday morning at about 9am at Pearson & Murphy’s cafe in Melbourne, taking over the big wooden table.

Many of them still do, and I try to join them every few weeks to get my collegial fix. The fact that I occasionally turn up and face a table full of many people I don’t know makes me both happy and nostalgic. The organic nature of the #suaw sessions is their strength, and I miss seeing various colleagues regularly whose jobs and roles have changed. So, I sent them some questions about their #suaw experience.

Some respondents chose to follow my survey questions closely, while others provided narratives with their own formats.

Because of the great answers and different voices that came back, I wanted to present them in full here.

Voila Part 2!  Read more of this post

Filed under Networking, Research culture Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

On the internet, no-one can hear you scream: A guide for virtual Shut Up and Write

18 August 2015 by 3 Comments

SiobhanODwyer-smallDr Siobhan O’Dwyer is a Research Fellow at Griffith University (Brisbane, Australia) and the founder and host of Shut Up & Write Tuesdays, an online writing workshop for academics and postgraduate students.

Shut Up & Write Tuesdays began as a single Twitter account in 2013 (@SUWTues), and has since expanded to include two other accounts (@SUWTUK – servicing the UK and Europe; and @SUWTNA – servicing the US and Canada) with an international following.

When she’s not helping people write, Siobhan’s research focuses on the wellbeing of people with dementia and their carers. She tweets at @Siobhan_ODwyer. Her ORCID is 0000-0003-4022-1943. 

Writing is a central part of academic life. We write to propose new projects, to secure funding, and to share our findings.

We also write to explore our own ideas, to critique the ideas of others, and to vent our frustrations.

Photo by Edgaras Maselskis | unsplash.com

Photo by Edgaras Maselskis | unsplash.com

But for something that’s so essential to our practice as researchers, writing receives remarkably little attention.

The academic business model views time to write as a luxury, not a necessity.

Rare is the academic or postgraduate student who has ever received explicit training in how, where, and when to write.

Because writing is an inherently private act, we rarely get to see how others do it.

Shut Up and Write, however, is starting to change all that.

Read more of this post

Filed under Networking, Research culture Tagged with , , , , , , , , ,