Refracted Input

Clare O’Farrell’s blog on books, TV, films, Michel Foucault, universities etc. etc.

A version of this piece was originally published as ‘Conformity blunts creativity’, The Australian. Higher Education Supplement, Dec 12, 2007. I have added a few minor tweaks to bring it more up to date. But unfortunately not a lot has changed since 2007! Up till now there have been two dominant images of the humanities and …

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The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity by Julia Cameron My rating: ** Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam; 2nd Edition, 2002. This book is an international best seller and often referred to in discussions on writers’ process, with many fiction writers claiming it has …

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Links via Stuart Elden’s blog Geoffrey Galt Harpham notes the following (citation via JJ Cohen at In the Middle) [Research is] an immense undertaking in which countless people performing the most tedious small tasks are able, collectively, to liberate the modern world from the grip of doctrine, authority, and myth. The value of each contribution …

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Kate Clancy notes the following on The Scientific American blog (link via Jo VanEvery’s blog) But are peer-reviewed publications, read and cited by only by a select group of those peers, the best way to assess influence and importance? They are certainly no longer the only way. My 2006 paper on iron-deficiency anemia and menstruation …

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Posted on my site michel-foucault.com Does there exist a pleasure in writing? I don’t know. One thing is certain, that there is, I think, a very strong obligation to write. I don’t really know where this obligation to write comes from … You are made aware of it in a number of different ways. For …

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There has been quite a discussion of late going on in the academic blogosphere about both the advantages and difficulties associated with academic blogging. (See links at the end of this post). I have found references in this discussion to an avoidance by academics of public exposure particularly interesting. This kind of avoidance has become …

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I was interested by this comment by Rhiannon Bury in an interview on Henry Jenkin’s blog Let me close by saying that Web 2.0 technologies are changing the way I disseminate research on fandom. The norm in academia is to analyze our data behind closed doors and not report on it until we have a …

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Stuart kindly responded to the comments in my previous post with some further interesting observations. I am adding a couple of clarifications here to clear up the amibiguities in my initial comment. I should emphasise that I am coming from the point of view of readership and impact, rather than production. The problem of readership …

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