Difficulties Encountered Throughout Research

Throughout the entirety of the semester in Elite Schooling in Global Context, I have learned a great deal about research methods and gathering information and theories from a variety of different sources. From reading articles on the history of elite schooling in a global lens to reading ‘The State of Nobility’ by Pierre Bourdieu, we have learned about different theories that have been able to be applied to our research of Everdeen. As of now, my research group is finalizing the theories to be used in the literature review aspect of our research project.

Although that seems easy, there are essentially too many theories and sources to choose from. When doing this, we had to consider how each of the differing theories from different sociologists would be able to tie in with each other. We took theories that involved aspects of pressures, athletics, physical and global capital, and other themes of that sort.

Honestly, this was a difficult aspect of the project to manage. Initially, we were unclear as to what a literature reviews even consisted off. We have looked through many examples, however it has been hard to construct. Another aspect of this portion of our research project that has proven to be difficult is pulling out quotes that are relevant to our theories.

There are almost too many important notes throughout all of the interviews, making it somewhat difficult to choose the “most” important ones. We also want a range of quotes from each participating interviewee. However, many of the transcripts don’t have much information that has proven to be relevant to our themes on the surface–so it has been somewhat difficult to gather a larger demographic of quotes.

Another struggle we are soon to face is the editing aspect of our paper. How can we make a research paper flow in a well-read manner with four different authors? Of course, after reading many different articles, it is clear that they make the multi-author practicework. However, we have read a handful of articles as well that don’t seem to flow as well as other pieces. This has honestly proven to be helpful for me, and I am sure the rest of the class. It is nice being able to differentiate between what and what not to do with a research paper.

Despite all of these hurdles, I am sure it will all fall into place. With only a few days remaining before our final presentation, we have little time to do too much more work. Right now, we are working on putting together all of the sections and beginning to edit. Overall, this has not necessarily been an easy research project, however it has taught me a great deal about all the work necessary to be successful within research.