New Methodologies in Art and Design Research: The Object as Discourse (Royal College of Art Research Papers, Vol 2, No 1, 1996/7)

A discussion of the methodologies of researchers in art and design: should they adopt and adapt methodologies from other academic disciplines or develop original approaches unique to the quality of discovery in art and design? In the key area of research by project, where the end product is an artefact, the need to develop original research methodologies seems essential. This paper reviews the methodologies of three Royal College of Art-based research-by-project doctoral students - Ian Ferguson, Les Johnson, and Anthony Dunne - who have begun to develop unique research strategies

Research Methods for MPhil & PhD Students in Art and Design: Contrasts and Conflicts (Royal College of Art Research Papers: Vol 1, No 3, 1994/5)

This paper explores the inherent tension in the nature of research for art and design at doctoral level, and notes how these tensions have been accommodated in the Royal College of Art’s Research Methods course. Alex Seago outlines the traditional components of the course, including the need to map the background to one’s theory, and to demonstrate originality. The methodological section of the course has proved more problematic owing to the significant minority which is sceptical about the idea of methodology itself. Seago notes that debate polarizes around positions which have been described by Gerald Holton as ‘Dionysian’ (which regards traditional methodology as stultifying) and ‘Apollonian’ (which regards analysis as central, and dismisses unconventional approaches as pseudo-science). Seago argues that the process of discovery in much successful research is a combination of the two: pairing rigorous methodology with the following-up of intuitive hunches

EAST AFRICAN POPULAR MUSIC. From Alex Seago, Richmond College, London, 1985.

When compared to West and Central African popular music, East African music has received relatively little attention from music critics. The main reason for this seems to be that pop in East Africa has tended to be an imported, or at least, an imitated music. During the 60's and 70's the Zairean rhythms of Franco, Rochereau and Co. took Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania by storm to become firmly established as the dominant urban sound. Zairean musicians moved east to take up residences in the clubs and attracted huge crowds of Kenyan, Tanzanian and Ugandan fans

Supplemental Income: British newspaper colour supplements in the 1960s

The introduction of colour supplements by three ‘quality’ newspapers during the 1960s was a key development in the British press during the decade, and was described by the editor of the Sunday Times as ‘perhaps the most successful single innovation in post-war journalism’. This article provides an overview of the advent of the colour supplements, explaining why they emerged when they did and developed in the manner they did, and exploring some of the difficulties and issues that attended their arrival. The article also demonstrates that sections of the British press were capable of taking advantage of changes in print and advertising culture brought about by the arrival of the post-war consumer society. However, the term ‘colour supplement’ became pejorative shorthand for the perceived vacuity of this new society, in part because of the tension that existed between the editorial and advertising content of these modish new publications. Consequently, the success of the colour supplement experiment was not universally celebrated

Collision, Collusion and Coincidence: Pop Art’s Fairground Parallel

This article looks at parallel methods, motivations and modes of consumption between formative British pop art and British fairground art. I focus on two strands, the emergent critical work of the Independent Group and the school of artists based at the Royal College of Art under the nominal leadership of Peter Blake. I use iconographical and iconological methods to compare the content of the art, and then examine how pop art tried to create both a critical and playful distancing from established rules and practices of the artistic canon. I focus on non-institutional cultural groupings and diffuse production and consumption models

Pop Art and Design

The first book to unearth the beginnings of British Pop and its relationship to Design. This book offers the first in-depth analysis of the relationship between art and design, which led to the creation of 'pop'. Challenging accepted boundaries and definitions, the authors seek out various commonalities and points of connection between these two exciting areas. Confronting the all-pervasive 'high art / low culture' divide, Pop Art and Design brings a fresh understanding of visual culture during the vibrant 1950s and 60s. This was an era when commercial art became graphic design, illustration was superseded by photography and high fashion became street fashion, all against the backdrop of a rapidly-evolving economic and political landscape, a glamorous youth scene and an effervescent popular culture. The book's central argument is that pop art relied on and drew inspiration from pop design, and vice versa. Massey and Seago assert that this relationship was articulated through the artwork, design, publications and exhibitions of a network of key practitioners. Pop Art and Design provides a case study in the broader inter-relationship between art and design, and constitutes the first interdisciplinary publication on the subject

The impact of the nursing hours per patient day (NHPPD) staffing method on patient outcomes: A retrospective analysis of patient and staffing data

In March 2002 the Australian Industrial Relations Commission ordered the introduction of a new staffing method – nursing hours per patient day (NHPPD) – for implementation in Western Australia public hospitals. This method used a ‘‘bottom up’’ approach to classify each hospital ward into one of seven categories using characteristics such as patient complexity, intervention levels, the presence of high dependency beds, the emergency/elective patient mix and patient turnover. Once classified, NHPPD were allocated for each ward. The objective of this study was to determine the impact of implementing the NHPPD staffing method on 14 nursing-sensitive outcomes: central nervous system complications, wound infections, pulmonary failure, urinary tract infection, pressure ulcer, pneumonia, deep vein thrombosis, ulcer/gastritis/upper gastrointestinal bleed, sepsis, physiologic/metabolic derangement, shock/cardiac arrest, mortality, failure to rescue and length of stay. The research design was an interrupted time series using retrospective analysis of patient and staffing administrative data from three adult tertiary hospitals in metropolitan Perth over a 4-year period. All patient records (N = 236,454) and nurse staffing records (N = 150,925) from NHPPD wards were included. The study found significant decreases in the rates of nine nursing-sensitive outcomes when examining hospital-level data following implementation of NHPPD; mortality, central nervous system complications, pressure ulcers, deep vein thrombosis, sepsis, ulcer/gastritis/upper gastrointestinal bleed shock/cardiac arrest, pneumonia and average length of stay. At the ward level, significant decreases in the rates of five nursingsensitive outcomes; mortality, shock/cardiac arrest, ulcer/gastritis/upper gastrointestinal bleed, length of stay and urinary tract infections occurred. Conclusions: The findings provide evidence to support the continuation of the NHPPD staffing method. They also add to evidence about the importance of nurse staffing to patient safety; evidence that must influence policy.This study is one of the first to empirically review a specific nurse staffing method, based on an individual assessment of each ward to determine staffing requirements, rather than a ‘‘one-size-fits-all’’ approach