Being Critical Tutor led by Andrea Norrington 20^th July 2020

This was a really useful session, we discussed:

Bring critical on:

• On the work you read – by peers and other academics/writers.
• On the work you view – by peers and other artists.
• On your own work in progress – use reflective practice to evaluate and move forward with projects.
• On selecting work for assignment/assessment. Don’t rush decisions, it’s good to live with work before submitting. But when you submit be final in your choice, don’t leave it to tutor/assessor to decide on edits for you.

Being critical is not being negative. It is not designed to pick faults but rather to be a process where you engage with work and move forward:

• How do particular texts work?
• What effects do they have on the reader?
• Who has produced the text, under what circumstances, and for which readers?
• What’s missing from this account?
• How could it be told differently?

Think: What? Who? Where? When? How? Why? And then move onto: • What if • So what • What next

This process allows to work through the following stages:

• • Describe define terms: say exactly what is involved
• • Analyse examine how parts fit into a whole: give reasons, compare and contrast
• • Evaluate judgements: on success/failure, conclusions, recommendations

Critical thinking can also be used to ask questions about and assess other people’s writing. Try asking questions about a text to see how scholarly or scientific it is: What does it claim to be true? Can you believe its claims? Does it provide you with good reasons, evidence, or both to support its claims? And how ‘good’ are the reasons, or is it ‘good’ evidence?

Four questions to frame critique:

• Describe- what do you see- explaining only what is in front of the audience
• Analyse -how has it been done: techniques, formal elements
• Interpret– what do the audience get from it, meanings, visual communication, mood, how do they feel about the work?
• Judgement– now the audience know the facts what do they think? Does it work, what else can be done for it to be engaging?-

An important way to demonstrate the quality of your arguments, or evidence, is by referring to work by others:

“The status of work depends on how authoritative it is, look for ‘authority’ in references to relevant supporting work which has been published in academic journals, or text books (the content has been ‘peer-reviewed’, it should be independently evaluated by another qualified academic); this is unlike the material which may often be found in newspapers, magazines or from many online sources, where the content may not have been checked by anyone else, or where the work simply puts forward one person’s opinion.”  

(Learning Development, 2010) The Critical Thinking PDF from Plymouth University is a very clear resource.

OCA Librarian Helen has created a Library guide for photography students https://ucreative.libguides.com/OCAPhotography

Suggestion: (Ossian Ward, writer on contemporary art)

• (T) Time – stand still for a few minutes
• (A) Association – can you relate to work
• (B) Background – understanding context but no need to be an expert
• (U) Understand – maybe you are just one step away from understanding
• (L) Look again – second look, use background to inform
• (A) Assessment –subjective but the process above allows for understanding and maybe appreciation

Make sure you have the whole picture before making judgments/conclusions

• Have you got all the information you need?
• How does the work fit as part of a series?
• In evaluations/summaries you can highlight gaps in knowledge

My learning:

My notes from this session are now pinned to my wall, I shall try to integrate this line of thinking into my practice when researching and looking at photography – invaluable!

References:

Learning Development, (2010) Critical Thinking, [PDF] At: https://www.plymouth.ac.uk/uploads/production/document/path/1/1710/Critical_Thinking.pdf (Accessed 21/07/20)

Norrington, A. (2020) Photography Zoom Talks 2019/2020. At: https://oca.padlet.org/andreanorrington/laq2kvhc5mpg (Accessed 21/7/2020).