The time has finally come... to start writing my dissertation! Over the last three years at Royal Holloway, University of London I've been thinking about areas in which I can focus my research. The beauty of studying Liberal Arts is that I have the opportunity to study within a range of different fields. If you've followed my academic journey then you'd know I've mainly been focused on three key areas; visual arts, political science and human geography. These three areas encapsulate a lot of my academic interests, and represent my desire for further research.
Over the next year I'm going to be documenting the dissertation writing process in monthly instalments to update you with my progress, talk about the highs and lows as well as how I'm managing it alongside other modules, work and social activities. If you have any tips or even any questions about my research then please do get in touch, I'd love to hear from you!
APRIL 2022
This is the start of the process for me, I had a brief introductory meeting to the dissertation module in March but that was just an overview of what we have to do. The project is 8,000 words and is due May 2023 so I have just over a year to complete it.
The top of my to-do list for this process was to find a suitable planner that could help me to compartmentalise my thoughts and aid the planning process. I'd spoken to some of the girls on Gals Who Graduate and a lot of people suggested the 'Dissertation Planner' by Motive Stationary. This was looking like my best option until one of my lecturers suggested that perhaps a digital planner would be a more effective option, it would allow me to have a back-up, be able to easily send it to my supervisor as well as make changes as the months go on. In the end I purchased a digital PDF bundle on Etsy that had everything I needed already in a document ready for me to edit I paid £3 for it, so very budget friendly.
Included in my planner bundle was a calendar where I could plan out tasks for each month, for April I set myself the goal of identifying an area of research and developing a working title. For me this was one of the hardest things because trying to incorporate all areas of my degree into something specific and researchable was proving more difficult than initially expected. At first I was considering doing a political communications based dissertation surrounding the theme of terrorism, as this is something I have been considering for a Masters. However, I wanted to include an aspect of creativity and stay true to my passions outside of my degree. This is where I came up with the idea of 'Geopolitics of Fashion'. I have opted to take an Italian Fashion module in my final year alongside the usual Geography and Politics modules that I've enjoyed doing throughout my degree. Combining the interdisciplinary approach of Liberal Arts allowed me to research multiple areas that I'm interested in.
Once I identified the rough area of research, I wanted to consider the topics/chapters that I would include in the dissertation. Being a longer piece of research I feel like its essential that I have suitable planning foundations to keep the title as the focus throughout. This process was interesting because I was searching academic literature sites to find out what research is already out there, and I was surprised to see that it was relatively limited. There's enough for me to cite sources and develop my own understanding and to form my own conclusions which is the main thing. This process also allowed me to start forming an initial bibliography that I can annotate at a later date. When thinking of chapters and areas of research under the umbrella of 'Geopolitics of Fashion' I found it effective to go back to basics and make a detailed mind-map of all the things I hope to include. One thing I would recommend is downloading a scanner app on your phone so anything you write by hand you can scan in and attach a digital copy to your planner.
On the whole I would say I'm off to a productive start and the planner has allowed me to delegate manageable monthly tasks that mean I can work on things any time that is convenient to me. In May's instalment of Dissertation Diaries I'll be writing my proposal and collating academic sources for my annotated bibliography.
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