Researching Sex and Drugs B - ARTS5042

This course equips students with qualitative research skills relevant to the study of sex and drug practices. Social theory understands these practices as socially and culturally produced. However they are also frequently constituted as personal, private, illicit or even shameful. This raises various challenges for the researcher, including questions of ethics, design, and interpretation of findings. This course will introduce students to a range of qualitative methods including interviewing, ethnography, focus groups, and research with cultural materials (including popular media and archives). Students will carry out a number of practical exercises, giving them experience in a variety of different research methods.