Jointly organized by Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Patna Centre (Bihar) Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Development, Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu and Centre for Social Equity and Inclusion, Bihar

Academic writing is an integral process of research and generation of scientific knowledge. The research scholars in humanities and social science in Indian Universities lack in the ability to prepare research reports and dissertations in a systematic manner and publish research papers in reputed journals owing to lack of adequate training in the research methodology, critical thinking and academic writing skills. The research scholars belonging to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes face the problem more acutely for a variety of reasons linked with the poor quality of schooling they receive resulting in academic and language barriers and learning disabilities imposed by the oppressive social structure. Unlike Western universities, in India we do not have writing centres in our universities, where students get training and resources to develop their academic writing skills. As such a system is not in place right now and this issue needs to be addressed by offering a special programme for research scholars in social sciences and humanities to equip them with the necessary academic writing skills.

In this backdrop it is proposed to organize a two-day academic writing workshop for PhD scholars belonging to the SC and ST communities. The objectives of the workshop are:

1. To gain an appreciation of what quality means in the context of academic writing;
2. To understand the nuances of writing different sections of the PhD thesis;
3. To develop the ability to appropriately frame and structure a research argument using evidence as per disciplinary conventions;
4. To understand the requirements of publication; and
5. To reflect upon the social issues that are prevailing in the society, use research as a tool to find out the empirical evidence and write quality report to sensitize the society.

Contents of the Workshop

• Challenges in Academic Writing; Difference between academic writing and other writings
• Writing PhD thesis: Introduction; Review of literature; theoretical framework;methodology; data chapters; conclusion
• Ethics of writing: Referencing/Citation/bibliography; Plagiarism
• Publication: Writing a research article for publication in journals

Methodology

The workshop would use a mix of instruction as well as hands-on-experience methods.

Number of Participants

The total number of participants will be 30.

Fee

There is NO FEE either for application or attending the workshop.

Residential Nature of the Course

The course will be fully residential so as to allow interaction among the participants and also to allow lecture over dinner and group work.

Selection of Participants

The workshop will be restricted to PhD scholars belonging to the SC and ST community, registered in any social science discipline  or Humanities under a University or a research institution located in Bihar. Applications will be invited in a prescribed format along with a statement of purpose (250 to 500 words) and necessary documents as proof of their eligibility. In case of more applicants than the number of seats, senior research scholars will be given preference.

A scanned copy of the filled in Application Form and enclosures can be mailed to our mail id: patnacentre@tiss.edu OR can be sent by post/courier to our address given below:

Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Patna Centre
Delhi Public School Senior Wing
Village: Chandmari, PS Shahpur
Danapur Cantonment
Patna – 801 502 (Bihar)

The last date of receiving application by mail or post is 30th November 2016.

If selected, the candidates will be asked to submit the following before joining the workshop:

1. For 1st yr. PhD student: (possible) research topic – title, statement of the problem, literature consulted, objectives, research questions and research methodology (approximately 1000 words)
2. Students from 2nd Year onwards: A preliminary review of literature consulted (minimum 1000 words)

Workshop Schedule: