Space of Inquiry, v1

I met with Paul and Katie yesterday to talk about short term goals and my first quarter independent study.

While an independent study can be focused in many, and maybe even any, direction, we are going to use it as a support on the way towards "comps," which I'm learning is a comprehensive exam—a written paper that starts to show my expertise in something (a "mini domain.") This will start with articulation of domains of interest, and ultimately, getting towards a space of inquiry.

I created the above as a starting point of trying to identify where my interests for this PhD come together; I'll call it a Space of Inquiry v1 (v.000001 could be better...).

The core of all of this, and maybe it should be at the middle, is Making Things. It's why I'm pursuing the degree at all: to understand how and why people make things, the value the things play in their lives, and really, why people don't make things and miss out on that value.

Making things gives people autonomy, a sense of self, a sense of purpose, control, personal satisfaction, and a rich perspective on life. It's a temper for and opposite of consumption. It helps us escape the canned script we find ourselves in. There's a lot of reasons people don't make things. Maybe they don't have time, money, resources, interest, or guidance. Maybe they don't know they can. Maybe they've told themselves they can't. Maybe they actually can't. Lots of maybes.

Katie urged me to think about education as learning, or at least to reconsider the word choice. I'm interested in both the institutions of education, and how creativity is learned. I'll see how that can shift around.

I've been primarily reading creativity literature and the thread between that and everything else is pretty clear, but the way it's discussed is pretty muddy.

And design has been my focus for my whole career, so that's a big rock here.

I'll try to update this periodically, maybe as a reflection of direction rather than current-state. It should probably inform my reading list rather than react to it, or maybe both.