The poetics of practice-based research writing

Abstract

Practice-based research invites us to re-examine the relationship between our scholarly arguments and the modes of expression we adopt to communicate them. A choice of genre implies a commitment to the conventions of a particular discourse, its metaphors, analogies and rhetorical strategies. If different genres express (and, arguably, create) different views, what do ‘hybrid’ forms of writing—writing of uncertain or shifting provenance, such as the prose poem, the poet's critical essay, or the philosophical dialogue—express? What are the consequences of choosing a given mode of expression in research writing? What epistemic assumptions and implications does it carry? What is the relationship between ‘critical’ and ‘creative’ writing in practice-based research? This essay investigates how literary and philosophical genres of inquiry may be applied to research writing.1 Considering Richard Buchanan's concept of design argument in relation to the practice-based doctorate, this paper argues that the ‘hybrid’ text is concerned less with resolving problems on the basis of a theory, than with setting the terms by which the problem can be addressed through calculated performances and gestures. Hybrid literary genres, incorporating strategies from creative and critical practices, can thus help us frame the practice-based investigation, refine its methods, and give voice(s) to its research results, thereby equipping designers as well as researchers with important conceptual and representational tools.