Lessons in Research, Both Old and New

Prior to taking this class, I have had some experience with literature reviews as well as ideas related to close reading. I had spent one summer in 2015 gathering and reviewing articles related to disaster management simulations and the evaluation of pedagogic components of games. At the summer's conclusion, I wrote two literature reviews that would eventually become the basis for the chapter, "GIS and Serious Games" in the book Comprehensive Geographic Systems. For the research component, I was taught to condense my notes regarding literature into separate slides, where I would write a few quotes or key points. This way, I could easily extract them later if I wanted to use them in my paper. 

It turns out this method was quite helpful for me and I do not believe the research approach is much different for the field of museum studies. However, this class has taught me useful strategies for better optimizing my close reading. I particularly like the way we approach the dissection of articles by determining the question, methodology, evidence, and conclusion. This approach has helped me better understand research methodologies (namely qualitative ones) and also makes it easier for me to compare articles and their arguments side by side. Closely scrutinizing evidence has also helped me more clearly see the flaws in the author's arguments. For example, for this week I read the article "“Aesthetic Regard for Nature in Environmental and Land Art” by Emily Brady. Although I felt her argument defending land art was solid, closely examining the evidence revealed that she may have relied too much on artist testimony.This class has additionally helped with locating resources and better managing them via Zotero. Previously, I had mainly settled for vague keywords and sometimes less than stellar databases. For my paper, I expect to integrate my previous experiences with the lessons I have recently learned to best optimize the research process. 

B. Tomaszewski, A. Konovitz-Davern, D.I. Schwartz, J. Szarzynski, L. Siedentopp, A. Miller, J. Hartz, GIS and Serious Games, in: T.J. Cova, M.-H. Tsou (Eds.) Comprehensive Geographic Information Systems, Elsevier, 2017, pp. 15 pages.

Brady, Emily. "Aesthetic regard for nature in environmental and land art." Ethics Place and Environment (Ethics, Place & Environment (Merged with Philosophy and Geography)) 10.3 (2007): 287-300.