I had never made a video reflecting my research before, although videos are an important part of my research when considering themes in, for example, sci-fi. I was vaguely aware, from such work, of the significance of videos and short films in our culture today. Particularly in an academic context, though, videos have an entirely different audience as well as a different style to written forms, and that was something I was keen to explore when the opportunity came about.
The first step was finding ‘my story’. After spending years cultivating a more analytical, less personally-engaged style for essays and papers, this proved to be a difficult thing to pin down. Working with Alys Kay from the EPS Graduate and Researcher Development team, though, we were able to informally discuss a few key events that pre-empt what I am studying now, albeit in ways entirely unknown to me at the time. (For example, seven-year-old me colouring in pictures of the Nativity scene in Sunday School had no idea that eighteen-year-old me would embark on a degree in Religion and Theology; and eighteen-year-old me trying to paint a more complex picture of religion had no idea that twenty-three-year-old me would be asking questions like whether robots are alive or threatening to us.) The story finding process was ultimately about joining the dots between ideas and events in my life that brought me to where I am and what I am studying now.
It took some time to adjust to focusing on the narrative rather than the research, as the short film task demands. But at the same time, making the connections between ideas that are otherwise difficult to relate helped me to make sense of the way that I uniquely approached my research, and how I was drawn to the weird and wonderful world of robots and religion in the first place. Over the course of recording my narrative overlay and finding my story, which turned out to be a bit of an academic psychoanalytical trip, I was able to see how technology was always in the background of my existential questions, and so studying that now alongside religion was a logical step in my story.
Overall, making my short film enabled me to be more reflexive about my research, which in turn allowed me to be more personally engaged with what it is that I study, as well as the way that I approach it. In spite of the fact that I’m not the most comfortable in front of a camera, the skills and insights that I have gained from the process have justified the work from a practical, research perspective. Above that, though, making a video allows you to step away from the books and enjoy your topic by exploring and expressing it creatively; it’s a fun and unique opportunity that I would encourage all researchers to consider!
