In the first part of this session we will consider approaches and techniques for effectively reading, absorbing, summarising and recording large amounts of academic literature. Students will be invited to share their own methods for tackling this common challenge. We will also discuss speed reading as a particular reading technique and learn more about what it involves.
In the second part of the session we invite you to look deeply at academic texts rather than at the surface messages. This goes beyond reading what the papers SAY, and examines what they DO and what the papers MEAN.
We will also explore how this would resonate with researcher positionality. This requires the reader to not just read for information but with and through academic ‘ways of thinking’. How we do this will be modelled by evaluating writing from the sciences, social sciences and humanities.
Tutors
Sarah Frodsham is Co-Director of the Graduate School and Chair of Ethics at Oxford Lifelong Learning, Department for Continuing Education.
Alistair Beecher is Co-Director of the Graduate School and a history tutor at Oxford Lifelong Learning, Department for Continuing Education.
About our series of research skills training sessions
In 2024 we launched a trial series of research skills sessions open to postgraduate researchers external to the University and, due to the sucess of these, the sessions have run again each year since.
Each session is independent of each other and can be applied for separately, although a fee reduction is available for anyone applying for all six sessions.
All sessions can be attended either in Oxford or online.
Learn more about the other individual sessions on offer as part of this series:
