Using Social Theory

`If there is a single question that presses upon the intellect of the current generation of human geographers, it is surely: "What do the great insights of social theory imply for the way we conduct geographic research?" Until now there has been no single text to turn to that explores the epistemological complexities of field work, the problems of writing and language, and of the logics of inquiry that link theory, method and evidence. Using Social Theory is a magisterial effort to open up the black box of research methods, and to provide students, in a way that no other geographical text has done, with a road map for the practice of geography' -

Michael Watts, Chancellor's Professor of Geography and Director Institute of International Studies, University of California, Berkeley

Before joining the Open University I worked in the School Management, UMIST (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology), the Department of Land Economy, University of Cambridge, and the Department of Geography, Queen Mary, University of London.

I was a Fellow of the Institute of Advanced Study and a Fellow of St Johns College, University of Durham from 1 October to 20 December 2007.

I am a co-editor of the new Journal of Cultural Economy.

My research interests lie broadly within the field of visual culture. I'm interested in visuality as a kind of practice, done by human subjects in collaboration with different kinds of objects and technologies.

One long-term project, which resulted in a book from Ashgate Press in 2010, looked at family photos. I approached family snaps by thinking of them as objects embedded in a wide range of practices. I interviewed women with young children about their photos, and also looked at the politics and ethics of family snaps moving into more public arenas of display when the people they picture are the victims of violence. The book explores the different 'politics of sentiment' in which family snaps participate in both their domestic spaces in the public space of the contemporary mass media.

Other work is extending my interest in subjectivities, space and visual practices by exploring experiences of designed urban spaces. I completed an ESRC-funded project on this theme with Dr Monica Degen at Brunel University in 2009, in which we compared how people experienced two rather different town centres: Milton Keynes and Bedford. Monica Degen, Clare Melhuish and I started a new ESRC-funded project in the autumn of 2011. 'Architectural atmospheres, branding and the social: the role of digital visualizing technologies in contemporary architectural practice' was a two-year ethnographic study of how digital visualizing technologies are being used by architects in a number of architects' studio in London.

I'm also interested in more innovative ways to produce social science research, especially using visual materials. I was involved in organising the ESRC Seminar Series 'Visual Dialogues: New Agendas in Inequalities Research' (2010-2012). Please visit the 'Visual Dialogues: New Agendas in Inequalities Research' for more details. I'm also a member of the OpenSpace Research Centre.

Introduction - Michael Pryke, Gillian Rose and Sarah Whatmore PART ONE: ASKING QUESTIONS Introduction - Gillian Rose A Question of Language - John Allen The Play of the World - Nigel Clark A Body of Questions - Gillian Rose PART TWO: FRAMING A FIELD OF RESEARCH Introduction - Sarah Whatmore Imagining the Field - Doreen Massey Generating Materials - Sarah Whatmore Practising Ethics - Nigel Thrift PART THREE: WRITING UP THE RESEARCH Introduction - Michael Pryke Telling Materials - Mike Crang Writing Reflexively - Nick Bingham Situated Audiences - Michael Pryke