Creative Writing for Academics with Kip Jones

Creative Writing For Academics with Kip Jones

Bournemouth University
Friday 19th and Saturday 20th February 2016

Summary: The Creative Writing workshop will be a unique event in that it will not be a typical 'writing retreat' (with trees to hug and lots of time to ruminate), but rather a very active experience with lots of exercises, suggestions and supportive feedback on participants’ work from Kip Jones and other participants.  The point is to encourage both students and academics who would like to include more creative writing in their outputs, particularly those whose writing includes reporting on narrative and other qualitative methods of research.  It also helps immensely in the move to publishing in the wider world of blogs and online outlets, moving work to media and film, auto-ethnography and even fiction.

 

Justification: The important point of Creative Writing for Academics is to help academics and students achieve the goal of achieving more of their work read by wider audiences; in other words, impact. By providing an intense two-day experience for participants to engage in developing writing skills, the playing field is levelled and opportunities for facilitated learning developed. By engaging in creative writing, it becomes possible for all to write more clearly, more simply, even more creatively, when writing not only for academic publications, but also for outlets previously unimagined.

Methods: The workshop will present opportunities to work with academic material and expand its means of production and dissemination to new and creative levels through interfaces with techniques from the arts and humanities, including blog and magazine writing, film treatments and scripts, and poetry and fictional exercises. These intellectual exchanges encourage joint exploration of how researchers can engage with principles and tools from the arts in order to expand and extend the possibilities of dissemination of research data. Concepts of creativity itself will evolve and be transformed by participants’ outlooks and willingness to engage with unfamiliar territory. These processes comprise a ‘facilitated learning’—in that knowledge will be gained as a secondary goal through a process of developing new relationships through small group problem-solving and self examination, grounded in personal past experience and knowledge.

 

 Kip Jones BA MSc PhD is Reader in Performative Social Science and Qualitative Research in the Faculties of Media & Communication and Health & Social Sciences at Bournemouth University. Jones has produced films, videos and audio productions and has written many articles for academic journals and authored Chapters in books on topics such as masculinity, ageing and rurality, and older LGBT citizens. His groundbreaking use of qualitative methods, including biography and auto-ethnography, and the use of tools from the arts in social science research and dissemination, are distinguished internationally.

Workshop Price: £120. for two days. £90. for students/BU staff

Academics and students at all levels welcome!

Register online at: 

http://creative-writing-workshop.eventbrite.co.uk

“Styles of Good Sense” Ethics, Filmmaking and Scholarship

Crew shooting early scene for the short, research-based film, RUFUS STONE

Kip Jones’ draft Chapter for The Routledge International Handbook on Narrative and Life History was deposited today on BRIAN and Academia.edu. The book’s section on Ethics is edited by Ivor Goodson, with assistance from Ari Antikainen, Molly Andrews and Pat Sikes. Jones’ Chapter entitled, “Styles of Good Sense—Ethics, Filmmaking and Scholarship” is based upon his experience as researcher, author and producer of the award winning short film, RUFUS STONE.

Jones proposes that aesthetics and ethics need to be considered in concert and that they are at the very heart of arts-based research. Ethics and Aesthetics become intertwined and support one another. Jones states:

‘Ethics, much like aesthetics, is often misunderstood as something effusive, illusive and somehow, decision-making by the few on a rarefied echelon, involving pronouncements of grand moral impact and/or sophisticated discrimination. For these kinds of reasons and to avoid potential headaches, it is often assumed that checklists and committees will be far better at making such decisions than mere individuals.’

Jones believes that ethics and aesthetics need to remain the prerogative of the researcher/filmmaker and her/his participants and audiences. By developing a trust in instinct and intuition and the naturally expressive and moral potential of our personal resources, research involving people’s stories can become richer and more human, if we only are willing to jettison some of the baggage of the old academic rigor and dry procedural ethics.

Jones’ involvement in the section of the book on Ethics will include co-contributors Arthur Frank, Norm Denzin, Laurel Richardson and Carolyn Ellis, and will be published in the New Year.

Pathways to Impact: Part Deux!

A Call-out to all with an interest around LGBT and ageing issues! 

We are inviting you to Bournemouth! Come spend Saturday 7 Nov. with us!

Are you interested in LGBT and ageing issues?  Are you looking for tools to engage your group or staff about the discrimination experienced by older gay or lesbian service users and what to do about it?  We are inviting participants who attended the first ESRC Festival of Social Science in 2012, the Masterclass in Ageing and LGBT issues the following April to share their experiences with all who are interested in reducing discrimination in ageing, particularly concerning LGBT citizens.

We are holding an ESRC Festival of Social Science event tby inviting participants who attended the previous one-day ESRC Festival event 2012 entitled, “Pathways to Impact: ageing, diversity, connectivity and community” and/or attended the Masterclass in Ageing and LGBT Issues “Train the Trainers” in April, 2013. Now is the chance for them to share with others, both in person and/or on record.
There will be opportunity for informal discussions about diversity, the potential damage of discrimination experienced by many older gay and lesbian citizens, and what can be done about it. The two previous events included a screening and distribution of the award winning, short film, RUFUS STONE and the launch and distribution of the Methods to Diversity Method Deck learning tool to inspire agencies, practitioners and communities to think about diversity within their ageing population.

Copies of the film and Method Deck will be available for free to new participants!

The aim of this event is to share our tools with you and hear the stories from others who have used them. We are inviting them to discuss how they have used the two learning tools within their organisations' activities. Our part will be to listen! Lee-Ann Fenge and Kip Jones from the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences will facilitate.

We will listen to these experiences of using these tools in two focus groups, over coffees and at lunch, and share with each other how the tools might be used by newcomers. The morning will be set aside for individual reports, then all will be invited to share their own experiences of using these tools in two focus groups and share with each other how the tools might be used in the future. The morning is reserved for those who prefer to present more formal presentations of their use of the tools, successes and challenges. Please just let us know ahead what your time requirements will be and we can reserve a time-slot for you (approx. 20 minutes each).

We will be transcribing the discussions to develop an evaluation of the impact of these two innovative tools on real world practice.

Lunch, coffees and teas will be provided. Unfortunately, we are on a tight budget so there is no funding to cover your transportation costs. We suggest you book travel early and take advantage of reduced rates and Saturday travel prices.

The Event itself is FREE, but numbers are limited.

Please register on Eventbrite   http://aq.be/327d2f

 where you will find further particulars and details.

RUFUS STONE shortlisted for AHRC Research in Film Award

The research-based biopic RUFUS STONE has just been shortlisted for the AHRC Research in Film Anniversary Prize for best AHRC funded film since 1998.

 

A central strand of the activities taking place throughout 2015 to mark the AHRC’s tenth anniversary, the awards attracted nearly 200 entries across the five categories.

The awards are designed to recognise the creative and innovative work being undertaken at the interface between research and film by world-leading researchers, practitioners and filmmakers in the UK arts and humanities research community.

RUFUS STONE was based on three years of research on older LGBT citizens living in south west England and Wales. The research team was led by Kip Jones and included Lee-Ann Fenge and Rosie Read on the team.

Bournemouth’s Kip Jones acted as Author and Executive Producer, with Josh Appignanesi directing the film. RUFUS STONE was produced by Parkville Pictures, London.

More information on the research and film-making

Watch the film here.

Social Science Space features impact of BU's RUFUS STONE film

Sage Publications' Social Science Space has published an article highlighting the impressive impact of Bournemouth's research-based film, RUFUS STONE. The web-based publication stated, "The film’s impact in sheer numbers and geographic reach is breath-taking". RUFUS STONE has recently achieved 10,000 views in 150 countries via Vimeo on the Internet. Social Science Space continues: "The medium of film itself opens doors to audiences that otherwise would never come across academic research".
The award-winning, short film,  based entirely on research carried out at Bournemouth University on older people in terms of isolation and connectivity, rurality and sexuality, was funded by Research Councils UK as part of the New Dynamics of Ageing national programme of research on ageing in 21st Century Britain.

View RUFUS STONE here
Background on the research and making of the film here
Social Science Space article here 

RUFUS STONE Reaches 10,000 Views!

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The award-winning, short film, RUFUS STONE, based entirely on research carried out at Bournemouth University on older people in terms of isolation and connectivity, rurality and sexuality, and funded by Research Councils UK, has been available for viewing on Vimeo on the Internet since early this year.

As of today, more than 10,000 people worldwide in 150 countries have viewed the film for free.

 

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Project Lead, Executive Producer and Author of RUFUS STONE, Dr. Kip Jones remarked, “The bidding process took three years, the research a further three; writing and producing the film another year. The film has been seen widely in community and academic settings nationally and internationally since and is used by many practitioners and service providers in their trainings, including Alzheimer’s UK nationally. What I am saying is that substantial research and its dissemination takes time, but has a ‘long tail.’ In most cases, patience and perseverance are the keys to meaningful, in-depth impact”.

Plans continue to spread the use of the film and collect stories of its use and effect. An event being held on Saturday, 7 November at Bournemouth, “Pathways to Impact: Part Deux!” under the auspices of the ESRC Festival of Social Science will do just that. Participants who attended two previous events at BU around LGBT issues and ageing and the use of the film and a “Method Deck” learning tool will be invited back for a day of sharing at BU. We will ask them to elaborate on their experiences with the tools and give us feedback for an impact case study around concerns of older gay and lesbian citizens in the community.

Drs Lee-Ann Fenge and Kip Jones are organising the Event with the help of BU’s ESRC Festival of Social Science team led by Naomi Kay and assistance from FHSS’s Impact Champion, Zoe Sheppard. Jones and Fenge are both members of the newly configured Social Work and Social Sciences Department in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences (FHSS). Jones is also aligned with the Faculty of Media & Communication.

RUFUS STONE is available for viewing at: https://vimeo.com/109360805

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Background about the research and filmmaking: https://microsites.bournemouth.ac.uk/rufus-stone/