Research and Methodology Inscription as a Liberating Practice

Aisha J. Brownlee
12:20-1:00
Last week’s freshman seminar lecture, given by Dr. Dana Williams, focused on the topic of research and methodology inscription as a liberating practice. Basically the lecture was on the importance of research and valuing its outcomes. The goal of the lecture was to gain an appreciation of research, offer independent discovery, and expand a commitment to academic excellence. This is essentially the focus of freshman seminar; this class assists students in developing issues in today’s society and being able to successfully conduct the research. I thought that Dr. Williams’s presentation on research was very informational and revealed to me the vitality of freshman seminar. This class was designed to aid the students in doing well organized and through work. Although my group hasn’t finished our research, I now know why it is important to know how to do research and how it is essential to every field of study. To summarize the rest of the lecture in relation to the research projects, the highlighted objectives were to identify principle components of research and relate them to the research question. For the group presentations, each group is to look at a specific challenge in relation to the research question. The basic components of research are vital in guiding how research should be done and good methods in finding research topics. Determining how you will address the research question is called methodology. This process is the method of data collection where one can collect information from a primary source, a secondary source, or an interdisciplinary source. The framework of the project is basically how the research is presented, whether as a report, presentation, or paper. Dr. Williams ended her lecture by stating some key facts in continuing our research projects, one, to know our limitations and two, ask ourselves what new insights the research reveals. This lecture highlighted many key concepts in conducting research and can be very helpful later on for future projects.