Centre for Culture in Society - Doctoral Students

Doctoral Research topic
This research aims to understand the differences and similarities in the constructions of Malta’s music scenes from the perspective of its members and that of national cultural policy imaginaries. Thus, this thesis may challenge the analysis of popular music policy which tends to assume fixity to music scenes.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
The research will adopt a discursive methodology to policy analysis combined with an ethnographic approach to analysing music scene constructions.

Keywords
cultural policy, music scene, poststructural policy analysis (PPA), problematization, discourse, imaginaries

Supervisors
Professor David Stevenson, Dr J. Mark Percival

Doctoral Research topic
Open Body as Entertainment is an exploratory reader-guided of Medical Reality Television using online audience conversations as a source of analytical themes.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Reader-guided textual analysis

Keywords
TV studies, body studies

Supervisors
Dr Jill Marshall, Dr Lesley-Ann Dickson, Dr Stefanie Van De Peer

Doctoral Research topic
The Institutionalisation of Whistleblowing Within Corporate Communications in the Scottish Health Service.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
A qualitative research approach using an interpretivist framework, with case studies as the primary means of collecting data.

Keywords
whistleblowing; Scottish health service; institutionalisation

Supervisors
Dr Magda Pieczka, Dr Rebecca Finkel

Doctoral Research topic
Beer as a Signifier of Masculine Identity in the Films of David Lynch.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Critical Discourse Analysis with Grammar of Visual Design

Keywords
gender, media, identity, CDA, beer

Supervisors
Dr Ana Tominc, Dr Rebecca Finkel

Doctoral Research topic
I am working on crafting a narrative framework around COVID-19 through the lens of branding so that health organizations can adopt a narrative approach to health communication in order to advance pandemic-related health outcomes.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
I plan to use qualitative methods (such as interviews) in order to explore the narrative elements that go into the stories health organizations tell through their official communications and the dynamics and factors of the general public’s engagement with COVID-19 narratives.

Keywords
risk communication, health communication, narrative theory, branding

Supervisors
Dr Magda Pieczka, Dr Isidoropaolo Casteltrione

Doctoral Research topic
Exploring Male Intimacy Through Filmmaking Practice.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Practice-as-research investigation using filmmaking as a tool for discovery.

Keywords
masculinity, intimacy, filmmaking, cinema, bromance, practice

Supervisors
Dr Michael Stewart, Dr Anthony Schrag

Doctoral Research topic
Success through Failure. This research focuses on investigating if the work undertaken by the City of Paisley throughout the bidding process for the UK City of Culture, initiated a transformation of City’s cultural ecology and addressed the barriers to cultural opportunities and engagement.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
A case study using qualitative semi-formal interviews, a literature review, and ethnographic analysis of physical sites.

Keywords
Cultural policy, participation, strategic planning, evaluation

Supervisors
Professor David Stevenson, Dr Rebecca Finkel

Doctoral Research topic
The role of cultural rights in determining provision of cultural and creative activity by the public sector. To effect systemic change requires new means of discussing and evolving policy, new fora for those discussions, a new lexicon, and a new framework – cultural rights – to act as its philosophical and practical foundation.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Action research, integrating sociological theorising with empirical research to develop a mid-range substantive theory

Keywords
culture, rights, equity, policy

Supervisors
Professor David Stevenson, Dr Anthony Schrag

Doctoral Research topic
Journalistic autonomy and digital transition at the Herald newspaper 2000 - 2020.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Grounded Theory, Oral History, Newsroom Ethnography

Keywords
journalism, autonomy, digital labour, precarity

Supervisors
Dr Dominic Hinde, Dr J. Mark Percival

Doctoral Research topic
Beyond Grants and Donations - Impact of Social Enterprise on Charity Finance.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Abductive Research Approach will be adopted integrating both qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection and data analysis.

Keywords
social enterprise, charity, third sector, funding and sustainability

Supervisors
Dr Magda Pieczka, Dr Mo Yan

Doctoral Research topic
My research explores the structures and practices within a rural arts and cultural organisation in the process of development and transition. Using Alchemy Film & Arts in Hawick, Scotland, as a case study, my aim is to contextualise rural creativity, cultural management, and perceptions of professionalisation within Scotland.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
I am employing a case study methodology that relies heavily on ethnography, practice-based research, and arts-based methods

Keywords
professionalism, rural arts, cultural management, organisational structures

Supervisors
Dr Anthony Schrag, Dr Melanie Selfie

Doctoral Research topic
The Lived Experience of Parents and Carers Feeding their Children in Gorebridge, Midlothian. My PhD thesis explores how working-class people in Scotland decide what to eat, how they shop, and what influences parents and carers decision on how and what they feed their children.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
This research adopts a mixed methodology approach that combines Ethnography, specifically Visual Ethnography, with an overarching theme of Action Research.

Keywords
working class, access to food, food poverty, media communications, language of food

Supervisors
Dr Ana Tominc, John Docherty-Hughes, Dr Vivienne Chisholm

Doctoral Research topic
Teacher experiences of media education in Scottish schools: exploring communities of practice as online in-between spaces to highlight the importance of teachers as curriculum makers and agents of change. An investigation into the ways of re-balancing power towards those that work in the classroom.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Online ethnography; autoethnography; rhizomatic; qualitative; pragmatic.

Keywords
media education; teacher experience; ethnography

Supervisors
Dr Robert Munro, Dr Sandra Eady

Doctoral Research topic
Lobbying Practice and Regulation in Scotland.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Mixed method. Survey and interviews.

Keywords
public affairs, lobbying, regulation, Scotland

Supervisors
Dr Magda Pieczka, Dr Dominic Hinde

Doctoral Research Topic

The research aims to develop creative practice approaches to transform human perception and experience relating to river environments to influence water management policies

Doctoral Research methodological approaches

Environmental and participatory art approaches, hydrological methodology and posthuman philosophy

Keywords

Water management policy, posthuman, participatory art, environment, rivers

Supervisors

Dr Anthony Schrag, Dr Magda Piezcka and Dr Eurig Scandrett

Doctoral Research topic
My subject is arts managers who are, or were, creative practitioners in any discipline. I'm researching into the barriers faced by arts managers in retaining their creativity, how it impacts on identity, and what arts organisations could do to recognise and value the artistic skills of their artist/employees. Although the phenomenon is not well documented, it applies to many earning a living in the arts.

Doctoral Research methodological approaches
Qualitative, interpretive, socially constructive, narrative

Keywords
art management, artist labour, cultural economy, identity

Supervisors
Professor David Stevenson, Dr Anthony Schrag

Doctoral Research topic: Understanding how English-speaking expatriate nurses work with United Arab Emirates citizens with drug dependency:  

Doctoral Research methodological approaches: This research adopts the interpretive phenomenological methodology using van Manen's methodology approach.

Keywords: Experiences, English-speaking expatriate nurses, drug dependency, UAE citizen.

Supervisors: Dr. Karen Matthews, Dr. Alison Wood.