The Nature of Research: Inquiry in Academic Contexts

by Brew,Angela

• ISBN13: 9780415214063
• ISBN10: 0415214068
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-10-12
• Publisher: RoutledgeFalmer

Summary

Increasingly, new academics are entering higher education without conventional research training and without a clear idea of what research actually involves. This is particularly true of academics who enter from having spent time in a profession including many in the newer disciplines. In addition, institutions of higher education which do not have a tradition of research are increasingly competing for research funding. The Nature of Researchlooks at this background and discusses what is wrong with academic research and discusses what is wrong with academic research today, what needs to change for it to survive, how to allow new kinds of research to flourish, directions for future action and how academic research can teach us to live in today's complex and uncertain society. The aim of the book, then, is to provide a stimulus to thinking about the nature and role of research with a view to considering what might be appropriate in the next century. Since research is so central to university life, looking at research will tell us much about what the university of the future might be like.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	vii
Introduction	1	(14)
PART I The practice of research	15	(92)
What is research?	17	(13)
Research and scholarship	30	(18)
Following rules	48	(15)
Knowledge	63	(13)
Problems and questions	76	(15)
New knowing	91	(16)
PART II Research in context	107	(81)
Research as a commodity	109	(19)
Research and learning	128	(14)
Research and teaching	142	(13)
Research as discourse	155	(17)
Research and the future	172	(16)
References	188	(8)
Index	196