How to be Original

How to Be Original: Transform Your Assignments and Achieve Better Grades (London, Sage),

published September 2023

Originality is the key. It opens doors: to making a difference; to excellent marks, to success. Yet it is not taught or even explained. Originality is one of the last redoubts of mysticism: it is imagined to be innate, ineffable, the gift of the Gods. It isn’t. With a little guidance anyone can be original

CONTENTS

Introduction
Why? Originality needs justification
Your allies
How to use this book

Chapter 1: Preparations

Introduction
The three stages
Reading and generating ideas
Focusing and anchoring
Planning
Originality for different assessments
The politics of originality
Conclusion


Chapter 2: Six Ways to Make Your Work Original

Introduction
New places and periods
New places: Taking your topic elsewhere
New periods: Taking your topic to another time
New themes
Minor to major
New disciplinary contexts
New theoretical contexts
Listening for absences and turning things around
Conclusion: How to choose?


Chapter 3: Original Words
Introduction
Working with innovative key words
New theories and topics
How do you recognise new key words?
The value of ‘post’
Using ‘beyond’ and ‘after’
New fields
Language tips for original thinking
Metaphors and original thinking
International languages and original words
How to work with international words
Inventing your own words
Conclusion

Chapter 4: Original Methods
Introduction
Three ways of making your methods original
Engaging with innovation in your field
Bringing in a method from another area of study
Mixing methods as innovation
Critiquing method
Methods: An incomplete list
Innovative methods for different types of written assessment
Dissertations
Examinations
Essays
Conclusions: Don’t be put off


Chapter 5: Creative Practice
Introduction
Arts-based practice: A student’s guide
What is arts-based practice?
Who creates?
Can I incorporate arts-based research in my discipline?
Style and form
Illustration
Voice and reflexivity
Examples of arts-based practice in the research process
Arts-based practice: Critical questions
Originality in the creative disciplines
Conclusions


Chapter 6: Presentations, Group work, Dissemination and Impact:
Opportunities for Originality
Introduction
Presentations
Posters
Podcasts and other recordings
Group work
Dissemination and impact
Conclusion


Staying Original
Notes
Index