Week 22: Major editing work on the location chapter

Maximum number of words: 80,000
Words typed so far:36,185
Words typed this week: 0
Words lost this week: 1814
Total increase: -1814
Days I managed to write this week: 3

Yes that is last weeks photo and I am nearly 2000 words further behind than I was last week but it feels like progress! The truth is I have probably lost twice that number if not more words and put back in a fresh two to three thousand. However as it was not a case of just delete huge amounts and then typing in fresh but restructuring the old and using the new stuff to give it structure, I don't know what I deleted so can't estimate what I added. The task was a big one and I would say I was 90% of the way there with this chapter.

The real reason I am feeling more hopeful is I am beginning to see the way the thesis will hang together, the metaphor I started out with is developing and making a lot of structural and theoretical sense when applied to the data. This is important the scale at which I am working is a little explored scale in sociology. There is plenty of stuff that looks at big societal issues and there is plenty of stuff that looks at how individuals do things but groups have relatively little attention except as subsets of bigger society at least as far as identity goes.  I probably need to do more work on the actual metaphor, so I have ordered a book on fluid dynamics and am going to return to one of the fractal books I tried earlier.

Yes I know I gave up applied maths at Christmas in my second year of my first degree although if I am honest I did bits and pieces of it right through to final year thanks to having applied mathematicians as close friends and finding the department kept dropping the pure and statistical courses I wanted to do so having to make last minute changes. I think I skipped Prof Priest on the Sun but ended up doing a course on solving partial differential equations. You would also be  right in thinking that I never expected to have to use maths to complete my doctorate. However the one thing I have learnt is the more you understand the thing you are using as a metaphor the better you are able to work with it.

The next week is not going to produce a startling amount of progress as I am working on an appendix. My supervisor suggested that when I wanted to write up something in detail (three times in the whole thesis) that actually I should take those out and create case studies in the appendix. The thing is these actually need very very detailed writing and I need to go through two interviews at least to make sure I have the details right.

Week 21: Only slight increase as redrafting starts

Maximum number of words: 80,000
Words typed so far:38,629
Words typed this week: 2088
Words lost this week: 1545
Total increase: 543
Days I managed to write this week: 4

Well the progress is still slow, but I feel a lot more positive about it than I did last week. My supervisor was able to put into words some of my vague wanderings and get me to relate them to my thesis. That was a major achievement. Now I need to re-write the location chapter to reflect this.

The stuff that is wrong with chapter on location is structural i.e. actual organisation of the writing so that I can link it effectively with the theory. My initial solution was to completely muddle up but that would mean ruining the theory part that was close on finished.  What my supervisor suggested was removing a large clunky bit of description and putting it into an appendix. That I have done. I will have another two appendices dealing with two other chain of events that could take over the thesis.

There are interesting things coming out. I am I would have thought fairly typical of many members and suspicious of how much lip service is given to church meeting so finding that when I actually look at people's behaviour it shows that people tend to "get it" even without lots of front and also tend to value it, even if they don't attend. This is even amongst people who might have reason for not getting it. Now I am not suggesting that church meeting were usually exciting well attended events. On the whole they weren't. However the evidence suggests despite being the same old poorly attended business meetings they do speak to people of a church that is governed by the whole people of God.

Next week I am going to try and write the next appendix so as to give myself chance over the weekend to work through the previous chapter and start seriously reorganising. Oh the other thing is I have found a reference to a text that I have sought for a long time. The only challenge now is to find a library that has a copy of the text. It was printed in 1851 according to the reference. As it is a transcript of a text given in 1620 you begin to see the problem. However it is one text that quite a few URC members are able to paraphrase. It is interesting to put it in context and try and understand what it is actually saying.

March's Supervision (another sunny day in Brum)

Today I was down again at Birmingham for my supervision. I am still struggling with the size change from writing papers of 6,000 word size to writing chapters of 12-18,000 words that make up a thesis of 80,000 words. The big thing I am struggling with is writing the theory into the analysis. There is a still a definite gap and I am not making the connections. My supervisor was kind enough to say that my description was theory driven but I was not making the connection clear to others. So it is back to the drawing board, although James and Ruth will be glad to here that the detailed description about car parking has been put into an appendix as a case study. There looks as if there will be three case studies, one from St Andrew's Edgerton and two from Ulverstane. Anyway another major redraft of this chapter but it should be shorter at the end. If it works then that is actually a structure for my other two ethnographic data chapters.

I think I am deciding which piety I am going to present in the final data chapter. It has to be something like the piety of Reformed Dissent in England. It is Reformed, in that like all Protestant churches in the British Isles they tend to draw on the strand that comes under the Reformed label rather than Lutheran or Anabaptist. We also do embrace the more thorough implementers of the Reformed tradition, but we are also shaped by the stance taken by the CofE. That that was a stance of middle of the road Reforms, and therefore balance, have led dissent to adopt the alternative approach of tolerance, I claim my freedom ot practice my faith according to the lights the Lord has given me, in return I allow you to practice yours according to your lights. We don't just accept this, we make a positive virtue of it.

My supervisor asked how I felt about writing now. I got as far as I enjoy writing and then got distracted. Writing is something I enjoy, but there are bits I find really difficult, changing chapters and getting my head around another area, pulling back from the very, very detailed information I have both in my head and my notes so as to write more theoretically. The whole complex internal structure that I have to do. I am pretty sure that by the autumn I will just want to get rid of it, but at present it is too much of a challenge and I need to keep writing, I really suspect if I stop the effort to continue will outface me.

The photos attached are part of the end result of a study by Chris Shannahan of the relationship of social exclusion,  urban youth and spiritualities. He did his doctorate with Martin and Martin has acted as an advisor on this project. I ended up at one stage presenting my experience as an ethnographer to a class that included him. 

So this month I need to do the redrafting while doing the initial draft of bits of the next chapter. So no prizes for guess what I expect to be doing during any extra time off in Holy Week.

Oh by the way I have found a couple of things this month. The reference from Barth I was searching for I managed to cross reference, secondly I have found where to find a full transcription of John Robinson's address to the Pilgrim Fathers. In his published works, but that was published last in 1851. I think I might be hunting through old libraries!

Week 20: Slow progress at a chapter change

Maximum number of words: 80,000
Words typed so far:38,006
Words typed this week: 1111
Words lost this week: 0
Total increase: 1111
Days I managed to write this week: 3

As you can see progress has been somewhat slower this week. There are a number of reasons for this. Firstly I was changing chapter and I had not had chance to plan it. Now don't get me wrong I do not stick to the plan, but I do like to have some idea where I was going. I also in the writing dealing with the description of perhaps one of the most difficult scenes to get right. The fact is this scene really happened and the only way to be fair on everyone involved is to try an portray it pretty much as it happened. However although very strong emotion is going on in the scene it is all below the surface. So I have to show it rather than tell it and I have to give people a respectful appearance. Everyone in the scene behaved with exceptional integrity. I am not breaking any confidences in portraying it but I still have a duty to be honest. I have never felt so inadequate as a writer.

Another thing is I have not been sure of the theoretical input into this chapter, I think it is coming clear and it is also perhaps becoming clearer therefore what I needed to put in the previous chapter. The stuff for this chapter is stuff on the nature of church as institution and community. Theory on emotional activity within an institution and group and also some stuff on congregational government. So I am slowly getting to know my thesis. I find I really do not know what I know until I write it and the task of writing it is the task of analysis. I am also trying a different approach to writing with first writing some of the scenes, then writing the description and finally writing into that the theoretical work.

Two other things slowed progress, I was also doing the final edits to my first real draft of my previous chapter on location and I had a migraine on Thursday which rumbled on in the background for the next two days. Not pleasant and meant I was really only functioning in the afternoon.

I think I am getting there with the planning, I also have a supervision this week and my supervisor will no doubt give me a kick start, he is very good at that. I know I need to loose words from the chapter but I want to hear his comments before I do.

Week 19: First data chapter fully drafted

Maximum number of words: 80,000
Words typed so far:36,975
Words typed this week: 2930
Words lost this week: 0
Total increase: 2930
Days I managed to write this week: 4

Well I am not quite sure how to count the words this week. The 2930 is definitely the amount of increase but as I was loosing some words along the way I no doubt added more than that. However the chapter is finished.

It feels like a long haul this one and most of the struggle has been getting to grips with the literature. I am still unhappy with the depth in my review of sacred space, it feels as if there are a lot of gaps where I should be citing someone yet at the same time I am not sure who to cite. What I do know is the ethnographic stuff but this was more sociology of religion in general and I was slightly reluctant to talk about the ethnographic stuff. Then as always you think, oh I better just look at and suddenly a light bulb goes on.

What I have not done is written a concluding section, I am almost certain my supervisor is going to tell me to, and I think the only way this thesis is going to come in, on size is for me to write everything and then decide what to leave out. I  still have too much going on in my brain.

This week I have to sit down and start thinking about how community was present within the congregations. This will be an enormous task but at least I am beginning to learn how I write so I can try and do things more efficiently by working with the grain rather than trying to do what I think I should do. The thing is I work from descriptive to theoretical and sort of over lay them. So the first stage is to write some scenes. These are creative writing but based on real events. Then I go on and produce an analytic description. This is still thick but its aim is to bring out the details and processes of what is going on. The third stage is to actually do the analytic thinking and find what I want to say.

Week 18: Progress but it feels extremely slow

Maximum number of words: 80,000
Words typed so far:34,045
Words typed this week: 2603
Words lost this week: 2470
Total increase: 133
Days I managed to write this week: 4

So it looks as if I am going forward but it has been a real tough weekend to write in and I ended up doing about half the writing this evening after feeling off colour earlier. Well there is good reason for this. On Saturday one of my placement churches inducted a new minister. I was invited along to the jamboree. However that meant missing most of the day for writing. I did manage some on Friday but as I was busy Saturday I had to shop then. Finally there was a special service at church today which was followed by a meal. Yes I felt I ought to be there. Unfortunately with the weather change and all these big events I developed a minor migraine so had to come home and to bed. Then my brain did not feel like concentrating. The other thing is, it is the hardest piece of writing to date that needs re-writing. If it was hard the first time, it is doubly hard the second.

Some of the 2603 words are cheats as I had to do a massive re-write of a piece of fiction and some of them are from that. So they weren't completely lost, but as I am going to take them to my writers group I did have to abstract them from the thesis. Hopefully tomorrow night they will give me some idea of how to improve it so it actually engages the reader. That is a real challenge, because unless I do that I have not created the alternatively imagined space. If I do it for this one, then I have slightly more leeway in the others.

So with all this I am going to have to spend at least a couple of evenings this week knocking this chapter into shape. Yes I really mean this chapter is near first complete draft stage and I will have to get my head around what I put in the next chapter. I think I will start by writing some sketches.