All that talk on theory and where do we begin writing...

I haven't posted since I left Manila almost a year ago.  It will actually be 1 year in 5 days from today.  I guess the auspice of today being International Teacher's Day is a good start to share things.  Some quick blog nuances.  You might notice a pattern on the authorship of each blogpost as you go down the archives.  Sometimes it's my moniker in Spart - Empress - and sometimes it's the more formal full name with the official pre/suffixes.  The blog was born from my old personal email, which got associated to the moniker. I've added the formal email for the sake of the accreditations that Sparta encounters, a bit of homage to our honored guests.

But for the time being, I'll be using the one with the moniker since I'm writing as a faculty on leave and currently studying here in Taiwan. 

With that, let's go to the heart of today's post.

I've been pondering on the puzzle of my own upcoming dissertation writing life, and thus my research questions.  This part is a constant reminder to me by my adviser, Natalie (Wong, one of the coolest and insightful professors ever, don't ever call her by full name nor address her with 'professor' that's how she jams).  Part and parcel of having a topic is having a set of research questions. 

The answer to your research question is your thesis, the word thesis being synonymous to argument.

Not addressing this ends up with the usual, we have a topic but no argument.

Note: as a way of illustrating I'd sometimes refer to my topic, but since I don;t like broadcasting ideas until it gets published, we will affectionately call it WITNHIT (short for what in the nine hells is that!?)

Going back, so we have questions and the argument we pose to address that question.

There's another cool prof that I have this semester, Dr. Lev Nachman. One of the cool parts is that he graduated from UCI, so I can imagine myself as being mentored by a professor from the mythical CalSci (hi Daniella and Lolit :) ) in the Numb3rs TV series :D.

But he's got a really nice engaging way of class discussions.  During these he calls the question or what is generally called "problem" as PUZZLE/S.

Let use that for our own mindwalk. 

As political or social students, let's imagine ourselves at a place, our potential study site?

Imagine the phenomenon, the event we're interested with, i.e. an election, a protest, a something happening at a market place, an accident, a disaster, or a fan meet?

Is there anything puzzling?

Here's where one of my favorite quotes in magic the gathering comes in :D

(Photo from Wizards of the Coast, Inc.)

Yes look and observe, see the building blocks: who, what, when, where.

Then check the higher order parts: why and how?

There was a great war in the the early and mid 1900's, who were involved? what was done? 

But why? and how?

Now let's take it a bit further.  Is this how and/or why causal?

It's from this where you can proceed even toward your methodology - is there a systematic way on how I can prove this how/why?

But we're not here today for method, we're here on the germ from which we begin research.

And we have puzzles, theses, and also a third one: theory.

You could've began thinking of your topic because you saw a puzzle (question/problem).

You could've began thinking of a topic because you have an argument (we'll do a separate one on the ramifications of this next week).

And you could also begin with theory.

How best do we use theory?

A theory is already an existing argument in the body  of literature.

I.e. Weber's, Tilly's, Castillo's (ehem, just kidding on the third).

One way is...

Since a theory exists, then if there's already a detailed set of variables on that theory, you can test it.  This is conducted quantitatively.

This reminds us also of systematic thinking.  You can't just choose quanti over quali because math is your weakness or you like math over reading long interviews.

Just like any part of a thesis, can you defend it? I.e. this study quantitative because the author is testing X's theoty, which was originally used in North America, and we are now testing it's universality by testing it across the Pacific, in Southeast Asia.

Another way is 

You are either challenging the theory or expanding on the theory by qualitatively looking at possible variations of the original variables.  I.e. An argument says that state failure (dependent variable) is caused by the loss of monopoly of the use of force (independent variable).  Is it possible that there may be other causes other than the loss of this state capacity?  Notice now that I classified "monopoly of the use of force" under "state capacity." (this is where your excellent grasp of concepts and jargons after more than two years in the discipline comes in).  

Since one concept can belong under the umbrella of another, and there's possibility of other concepts within that same umbrella, then a possible pathway for the analytic methodology is classification.  I.e. this paper intends to classify variations of causes of state failure in the Middle East.

Or, you might instead map out the process on how "capacity to monopolize use of force" is lost.  In this case you are discovering processes rather than categories. 

A variation of this way is

You have an alternative theory to clash with the first theory or your possible findings will create a new theory.

Before we close for this post, a reminder.

One reason why you have tons of readings is that it gives you insights on the vast body of literatures that there are within the discipline.  This in a way is your preparation which leads you either to a puzzle, an argument, or a counter theory for your own writing.

Another is field exposure, that is why going out of the four corners of the classroom is important.

Field trips are not often but...

Every time you read the news, you are going out to the field (note that reputable news, magazines, and books are literatures too.

Every time you go out to engage with communities, i.e. community development activities.

So go out and about.  Observe, take notes in your mind or jot them down in a JOURNAL of your own, like some field researching Indian Jones.

And think of readings a puzzles that you are unlocking:

Let's end with another cool prof.  Dr. Courtney Work, my powerful professor of ethnology who gives us ACE-FA

That's the:

Argument

Conversation (how did the author talk to other authors - that's his/her/their review of literature, so that you know how to do yours)

Evidences (how did the paper prove the argument? what evidences?)

Those three are at the heart of the readings.

FA are for checking out quality (for when you are the one picking up references)

Funding - so you know if the author is biased or has real clout.

Author - let's you know of the reputability of the article (also check out the quality of the journal, more on this in future posts)

That's it for now.

Happy International Teacher's Day to me, my mentors, and my colleagues.