One of the most important takeaways I have gained from Art Scholars this year has been from Patrick Thomsen’s lecture on his research on Gay men in Korea. “Understand that your lived experiences and things that appear as objective facts carry genealogies of knowledge.” When I first saw Patrick, I thought, “Hmm, this will be interesting, he seems far enough removed from the topic of Korea.” because, from my – albeit limited – interaction with research, I believed that you had to do something that did not contain any of your ‘bias’ *Sara shuddering from a distance*. It was Patrick who told us that grounding your research in lived experience was not a bad thing and that he had done just that. By moving to Korea to teach English, he managed to find a whole community of gay men like himself – but the gap in his knowledge came from the difference between Korean gay men living ‘in the closet’ compared to coming out. This was the basis for his research, a gap in his knowledge became a question to answer, and that became his article which was published in the Journal of Homosexuality. The idea that he was able to base his research on his life and personal experiences made me genuinely excited at the prospect of research for the first time.
Before this year, I had considered that I would simply be researching something purely for academic reasons and less out of interest to me (though maybe this has more to do with the Classics and Ancient History research I had read previously and less to do with the concept of research as a whole). Patrick’s use of Talanoa, a Samoan methodology, managed to bring two aspects of himself into his research. This feature of individuality in research is extremely interesting to me, and it made me wonder how I would bring gender theory and my lived experiences into Classics or History research in a new way, individual to me. Another reason it was so interesting to me, I believe, was the echoes of Maxine Lewis’ research that I could see in Patrick’s. The acknowledgements of power dynamics and queer theory in both make it some of the most interesting things I have read and made me want to find more articles on their respective topics.
On the other hand, research that is not based on this personal lived experience (though she does have to deal with bad writing in the English department, I would argue that this is not as “lived” as Patrick’s) and instead in academia is less enticing. While Helen Sword was an engaging lecturer, I found myself more interested in her talking about her own research than the actual research or set texts provided. This aspect of personality was missing sorely from her “Stylish Academic Writing” and “The Writer’s Diet”. This disparity in enjoyment has less to do with the subjects; I have little interest in gay men in Korea nor academic writing despite my love of English as a subject and queer theory in general. This leads me to believe that while Patrick’s research is the closest to something I would like to do, Helen’s Western methodologies and much more removed research make me less inclined to engage with her findings critically.
Despite Helen having a more practical question to base her research on, that being why academics often write so badly, I could not bring myself to engage in the way I did with Patrick. Helen’s research left me asking myself no new questions, and it only cemented my hatred for the exclusivity of academic writing. Patrick’s had me questioning my place in academia as a student in a Western university studying ancient cultures halfway across the world in a field dominated by elitist men who think that Rome was the greatest thing since before sliced bread! I think there is a certain amount of, for lack of a better word, pizazz that is needed to make your research engaging critically and on a base level to anyone that may come across it.
My take away from these, and the other, lectures this year is to make my research entertaining not just for myself but for anyone who will have to read because I should frame it in a less traditionally Western way and with my own experiences in mind. I am not sure what this will be quite yet, but the seminars this year have certainly jumpstarted me into thinking about the different ways I could implement the knowledge that the university has given me so far.
