The Rewards of Discussing Research

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One of the most memorable experiences from my high school years was being the chief editor of a student-run research journal that my classmates and I founded. The journal, named the Broad Street Scientific (after a neighboring street), was in its 3rd year when I became chief editor. It showcased some of the most innovative and insightful research projects conducted by students at the school across a wide range of disciplines.

The Volume of the Broad Street Scientific that we published during my senior year.
The volume of the Broad Street Scientific that we published during my senior year.

What I enjoyed most about running the publication was the opportunity to both learn about authors’ research and help authors showcase their research at the same time. Proofreading people’s research papers made me more knowledgeable (beyond just the surface level) on a wide array of research fields, ranging from nanomedicine to hydroelectricity. But after a few weeks of reading over research papers, I caught myself falling asleep on the job. The papers were still super interesting, but editing them alone wasn’t a very engaging process.

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5 research lessons from Social Media Day (as illustrated by the PU Art Museum)

Posted on by Stacey Huang

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“You’ve got to be kidding me.” (Detail of The Four Evangelists by Abraham Bloemaert)

That’s probably your face as you read this title. To be sure, our typical experiences with research usually have little to nothing to do with social media. But we have to remember that, at the end of the day, research is interesting because of its power to change lives. It’s our job as researchers to show how that can happen — by making our work accessible and relevant. And who knows how to be accessible and relevant better than social media experts?

Somewhat surprisingly, that’s where art comes in. Princeton’s recent Social Media Day started with an interactive demonstration—an early morning tour of the collection in Princeton University Art Museum, with the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Chief Digital Officer, Sree Sreenivasan, offering tips on how to share art on social media. This tour was modeled after the “#emptymet” tours that showcase the Met’s artwork online, which helps maintain public interest in the works.

So taking a page out of that book, let’s recap the best quotes from Social Media Day, as illustrated by artwork from the Princeton University Art Museum.

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Five Tips to Tackle Winter Break  

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My wonderful mom keeps sending me pictures like this - this one captioned, "incredible morning sunrise!" I'm pretty excited to be home.
My wonderful mom keeps sending me pictures like this – this one captioned, “incredible morning sunrise!” I’m pretty excited to go home.

In a few days, I’ll be home in sunny Kona, Hawaii. I haven’t been back since June, and by now I’m hankering to feel the warm Pacific on my skin. I’m going to eat homemade chocolate truffles, free-dive with my dad, catch up with old friends…and also write an entire junior paper, and review a semester’s worth of organic chemistry. Gulp.

Last Friday, hoping to figure out how to juggle it all, I attended a workshop at the McGraw Center: Balancing Work and Play During Winter Break. Here are five essential take-aways:

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Surviving D3 with the help of Missing Links

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It’s that time of year: freshmen get their first taste of research at Princeton through their third Writing Seminar assignment, quite unaffectionately known as D3. D3 defined my life in the last few months of 2014. My entire daily schedule was built around it. But at the end of the day, it was probably one of the most rewarding experiences in my life.

Through D3, I discovered a simple formula to find engaging research or project topics that would enhance my academic experience at Princeton. To this day, I still use that same formula, which I call the method of missing links, to stay engaged with my research.

The “Art of Science” exhibit in the Friend Center is a perfect example of an interdisciplinary missing link!

Flashback to December of last year. I sat in my room utterly puzzled. I was supposed to write a paper that actively engaged with 10-12 scholarly sources in order to create an original argument. The last scholarly source I had read took me over five hours to fully understand. Now I was being asked to take 12 of these sources and use them in the framework of a larger self-created idea. And I wasn’t even given an end goal – I had no idea what I was supposed to prove.

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Seeking Originality — in Writing Sem and Beyond

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Be original.

Professors never fail to offer this piece of advice. As R3 deadlines approach, Writing Seminar professors are undoubtedly pushing students to shoot for originality in their writing. And who can blame them? No one wants to read a worn-out argument or encounter unsurprising research findings. But originality is not only your professor’s concern.

Throughout my research experiences, I have infallibly found that I benefit the most from original projects. In my writing seminar, The Politics of Intimacy, a creative purpose continuously drove my work. I began my research with the intention of writing about depictions of sexuality in films and their influence on movie ratings and reviews. I intended to use the film Blue Valentine (2010) as my primary evidence because extensive pop-culture articles and scholarly discussion have addressed the implications of its rating. The Motion Picture Association of America rated Blue Valentine NC-17 (their harshest rating) because they deemed certain sexual acts inappropriate to watch. This rating prompted significant controversy and feminist analyses of the MPAA’s policy that I found to be incredibly intriguing.

In a sea of Princeton students doing exceptional research, how can you push yourself to stand out from the crowd?

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The Project That Made Me a Researcher… Sort Of

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Over the course of the semester, PCURs will explain how they found their place in research. We present these to you as a series called The Project that Made Me a Researcher. As any undergraduate knows, the transition from ‘doing a research project’ to thinking of yourself as a researcher is an exciting and highly individualized phenomenon. Here, Dylan shares his story.

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The Project That Made Me a Researcher. Hmm. It’s a loaded topic for me because it makes a big assumption: Am I a researcher? It feels awkward to ascribe the word to myself, like a shirt that doesn’t quite fit right.

I definitely do research. And I definitely love doing it. But a researcher? Something about it seems so … prestigious, perhaps? Important? World-changing? Where do I fit in all this?

Located in Lincoln Center in New York City, the NYPL for the Performing Arts is an excellent resource for anyone researching theater, dance, or other forms of live performance.

The project that comes to mind is my freshman writing sem paper. I looked at how La Cage Aux Folles — the first Broadway musical to portray a gay couple at its center — tamed its queerness for a commercial 1983 audience. It was the first time I’d discovered that my niche interests could be considered academic, and I felt compelled to go out of my way to learn more than I might otherwise have. My ambition pushed me out of Princeton — twice — to the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, where an extensive archive of video recordings of theatre is maintained. There, wedged into a small cubicle with an archaic looking TV screen, I watched the original 1983 production and, on a second trip, the 2004 revival. Sitting there, surrounded by a smorgasbord of theater junkies fixated on their own little screens, I had an epiphany: research is fun.

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Correspondent Convos: What is your best research advice?

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Correspondent_Convos_IconJust because it’s called “independent work” doesn’t mean that you’re alone. PCUR knows we’ve reached a very research-heavy time of the semester, and we have some words of wisdom for anyone tackling a new project – whether it’s your first or fifteenth at the college level. Watch below to hear our advice; and remember, if you have a specific question, we’re never more than a contact us form away.

— Melissa Parnagian, Chief Correspondent

The Project That Made Me a Researcher: Hands-On Journalism and a World-Renowned Cathedral

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Over the course of the semester, PCURs will explain how they found their place in research. We present these to you as a series called The Project That Made Me a Researcher. As any undergraduate knows, the transition from ‘doing a research project’ to thinking of yourself as a researcher is an exciting and highly individualized phenomenon. Here, Emma shares her story.

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Every researcher has a moment when they realize that their scholarly voice and independent discoveries matter outside of the classroom. For me, this moment came when I took a year-long journalism course as a sophomore in high school. My high school self-identifies as progressive and implements a unique pedagogic approach that emphasizes learning by doing. The journalism course closely fit that theme; instead of reading sample pieces and discussing what defines good journalism, we immediately jumped into the process of writing articles.

The Fifth Avenue Entrance of St. Patrick’s Cathedral where I chose to conduct my research.

My first two articles—each about one page long—were relatively uncomplicated. I wrote about topics that I found interesting, but didn’t push myself to see my subjects in a new or distinct way. My mom was the only person I interviewed throughout the entire research process. The third assignment, however, called for much more involved and independent research. Our teacher instructed each of us to pick a topic of our choice and spend the entire second semester researching and writing about it. He explained that all of this work would culminate in a twenty-page New York Magazine-esque article due at the end of the year. Throughout the semester, we would only meet for a fraction of our class periods and the other time would be set-aside for us to conduct individual research off-campus.

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Lost in Translation

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Princeton is known for its small classes, but imagine taking this to the extreme. Last semester, I took SOC 310, Gender and Development in Latin America. Total students: one.

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Not all classes fill up a lecture hall!

Following an odd turn of events last spring that saw all other students drop the course, I was handed an incredible opportunity: a one-on-one course crafted around my interests.

Much of the class was dedicated to discussing LGBTQIA themes in Latin America. There’s a lot I could write about, but for the purposes of this blog I will focus on one particular oddity. In several articles, I remember coming across the word “transvestite”. I am a peer educator at Princeton’s LGBT Center, and as I had learned in training, many consider this word to be pejorative and outdated. Shouldn’t a sociologist studying queer issues know better?

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Correspondent Convos: What are your research challenges?

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Correspondent_Convos_IconYou’ve probably heard that research is more of a marathon than a sprint. That’s definitely true — Every independent project involves thorough planning and lots of stamina.  But since we’re on the subject of analogies, it’s also true that research is an obstacle course.  Think about it: There are challenges built into the research process, and sometimes they’re impossible to avoid.  PCUR gets real about these roadblocks in our second Correspondent Convo.  Watch below to learn which struggles are most common, and which strategies can help you reach the finish line.

— Melissa Parnagian, Chief Correspondent