The End!

It's all done!
Doing my PIP has been very rewarding and has provided me with lots of insightful information surrounding social justice and social media. It has resparked my enthusiasm for social justice, and has made me even more passionate over certain causes!
In hindsight, it would have been beneficial of me to not leave so much towards the end, and have a more sustained writing process. It also would have helped me to not pursue new areas of research so late on in the piece, but I believe that they would have benefitted me overall.
Thanks for all the feedback and have fun marking :)

Questionnaire

So this afternoon I made up my questionnaire online on SurveyPlanet. It's the same questionnaire as the paper one I handed out last term that you edited (thanks, by the way!).
So, armed with an URL and a description of what my questionnaire is about, I posted it on my personal Facebook and Twitter page. Mum also shared it on hers.
Moreover, I posted the questionnaire and direct messaged organisations through facebook. The organisations and pages I targeted are:
- World Vision Australia
- 40 Hour Famine Australia (who have already responded to me and a representative completed my survey! They said they'd get back to me with any resources that could help me with my PIP!)
- Sutherland Shire Amnesty Group
- Amnesty International Australia
- Oxfam Australia (post to page only)
- Eurovision Song Contest (post to page only)
- Amnesty International (international page, post to page only)
- Plan Australia
So hopefully I hear back from these groups, and get some great responses to add to the collection I already have from my focus group!

Focus Group - 19/6/15

I'm back!!
It's taken me a while, but now is the time to get back to PIPing and blogging :)
So, late last term I organised (through Leonard) to do a focus group with Yr 9 International Studies. I had big plans to get some great discussion out of them, and I did by the end of the focus group, but it certainly took them a while to warm up to the idea of spreading their ideas about social justice!
After completing my questionnaire to start with, the discussion opened up on digital social justice. With some explaining of what I meant by digital social justice, the kids were pretty knowledgeable around the two examples I gave (Kony 2012, #bringbackourgirls) and some excellent discussion arose from this. They unanimously agreed that the examples I gave certainly did not cause much change, however when I asked if they could think of any that did cause change, no one could give any. I think this probably had to do with not much exposure on the successful ones, and that they were still warming up to sharing their own ideas, and not just reiterating my own. I certainly could have improved this by posing more open-ended questions to the kids.
The next round of discussion centred around Eurovision. When asked if they have ever heard of it, 9 of the 11 participants had, and most had a general idea surrounding what it is. Then I posed to them the question of whether Eurovision had caused any change, most believed that it did not cause any change whatsoever, one participant commenting that it was a "glittered chaos". However, when one student raised Conchita Wurst, Austrian drag queen and LGBTQI icon, most participants beleived that she had brought some change to the acceptance of LGBTQI people across Europe. While playing 'Rise Like a Phoenix', some students were quite shocked by Conchita's appearance, and this was reinforced by some discussion after around whether it was her song herself, or her image which pushed for change, one commenting "if it was someone else up there, they wouldn't give one [care]". Most of the students agreed that it was a combination of the both that helped the LGBTQI acceptance across Europe. The students were also quite engaged with the clip, so having the multimedia quite helped with engagement into discussion.
Moving onto USA for Africa's 'We are the World', they were no where near as engaged with the clip - probably due to the less of the shock factor with it. However, they believed it caused much more literal change than Conchita due to the financial benefits associated with the selling of the cassettes. Most did agree that the financial benefits of this method of social justice did cause change in Africa.
Finally, I posed to them the discussion of social justice in school. Most agreed that our school does a great job at promoting social justice in our school, through the multitudes of things we do, Wear it Purple being the first one they brought up. However, they noticed that some social justice programs in school were promoted really well, and others were it was just a mufti day (not WIP though) did not promote any desire for change within the wider school population. Some of the students who were in SRC noted that the conferences they attended as part of SRC certainly urged them to pursue change, and made them believe that they could cause change. However other events where they just donated money, they felt as if they were not helping out as much with causing change. This reflects my hypothesis of how participating in more grassroots, personal social justice causes made them feel as if they were causing change.
So overall, the focus group went really well! However, for my next one next week, I certainly need to focus on posing more open-ended questions, and have a bit more control over them so the discussion doesn't go on irrelevant tangents.

Primary Plans

The time has come to start planning and conducting my primary methods of research for my PIP. 

So far, through reading the sheet we got in class, I have narrowed down my primary research to four possible methods. 

These include: 

1. Questionnaires

These would include me composing a paper questionnaire to hand out at school, MMB, etc. addressing how the respondents engage with social justice. I plan to make a digital questionnaire as well that I will make available via social media, so I can get responses from all around world and from many age groups.

2. Focus Group

This would involve me conducting a focus group with the EHS Human Rights Group, posing them with questions about engaging with social justice, and what they believe causes most change in the world. 

3. Content Analysis 

To address the aspect of my PIP looking into Eurovision, Band Aid and USA for Africa, I plan to analyse several songs that cover and push for social change and then see if they really aided in any change occurring. 

4. Interviews

With any luck, I hope to be able to email some representatives from NGO's such as Amnesty International, World Vision and other groups our school has connections with to ask them which method of social justice works best in causing or aiding in change in their respective organisations. 

Hopefully these methods of primary research will give me some fascinating insights into society's attitudes to social justice and how they engage in it. 

Stay PIPing!

Hypothesis Development

So I just realised I haven't made public what my hypothesis is (well, what it is now) for my PIP. Here it is:

An investigation into grassroots social justice campaigns in comparison to global social justice movements and events in their effectiveness in causing change

And some points to delve deeper into (these have changed from my original ones):

1. How does society engage with social justice campaigns? 

2. The Impact of Technology 

3. The #Hashtag and Social Media

4. Eurovision, BandAid, Occupy, and other global movements 

5. Social Justice in Education 

6. The Impacts of Small Groups and Organisations 

Hopefully these will be successful into providing an insight into something I am so passionate about, and whether I am really helping any change to occur! 

Stay PIPing!

Research Limitations #1 & Eurovision

Upon conducting my secondary research, I have discovered one main issue with a major aspect of my PIP:
I HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO FIND MUCH SECONDARY MATERIAL FOR GRASSROOTS SOCIAL JUSTICE PROGRAMS...
Secondary material makes up quite a large proportion of the research conducted for a PIP. And with not many secondary sources for this major part of my PIP, this is now a factor I have to consider when it comes to writing my PIP and answering my hypothesis.
Thus far I have found three sources, one courtesy of Ms Waygood and one of her Year 12 students PIPs. Two of these sources are about the use of poetry in projecting social justice causes, and the third is about how purchasing products from social justice campaigns has become mindless buying.
Currently, the plan is that through primary research (I will explain later in a future blog post) I will be able to form my conclusions about the effectiveness of grassroots social justice campaigns.

Conchita Wurst

Nevertheless, I will still be scouring the corners of the internet, research databases, and wherever I can get secondary material to make some more conclusions answering my hypothesis.
One another note, I have now decided to incorporate Eurovision into my PIP. After watching this year's Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna from the comforts of the lounge room, I have come to the epiphany that Eurovision is one giant pro-LGBTQ, anti-war, peace and harmony loving contest. And as as it is a global event, I can look into its effectiveness of causing change. I think it's time to delve deeper into the sixty year history of Eurovision to track any changes it has made to the world (well apart from making ABBA, Celine Dion, and Conchita Wurst [the bearded drag queen played by an openly gay man] famous and bringing them into the wider world!).
Also, I have decided to now close my blog posts with:
Stay PIPing!

Secondary Research

So far, the focus of my PIP development at the moment has been finding secondary material. The material I have found has been wide and varied in its mediums, going from segments of TV shows to newspaper articles, websites, and journal articles. Currently, most of my sources have been about the globalised aspect of social justice looking at the influence of technology on the social justice. However, there are have a couple articles looking at the influence of poetry in reflecting major social justice movements such as civil rights.

The first yet brief source I found was a segment of the ABC show Q&A[1] (I thought I may as well trial footnotes in this) where a question was posed to the panel discussing how hashtags (#) are undermining social issues and terrorists. It provided an interesting insight into the varying views of the topic. One of particular interest was that of newly freed journalist Peter Greste who argued that it was for the better of society as it enabled people to be instantly up-to-date with what’s happening around the world. However, it didn’t look at much of the social justice side as the question was hastily dominated over by another arising topic that was raised during Greste’s response.

I found another great source that looked at the influence of mobile phones in social justice campaigns. Titled ‘Thank God for Cellphone Cameras’, this source looks at the influence of filming social justice events, and reflects how mobile phone cameras have enabled people to instantly record what is happening, stating “the most significant images in the criminal-justice reform movement have not been shot by professional photographers… but by ordinary people, wielding only their phones” [2].This source has shaped my PIP to look at the influence of mobile phones in the social justice cause, and whether filming it and not intervening is really helping the cause.

Another fascinating article called The #Hashtag Revolution[3], by Bernadette N. Lim, looks at the influence of hashtags in the social justice movement. Moreover, Lim analyses the movement #YesAllWomen, presenting the need for change in violence against women.

I also found articles about the influence of poetry in presenting social justice causes. The two articles very, very wordy and were targeted at using poetry as a means of teaching social justice in schools.

There were also several books I found that looked at social justice in education, but these weren’t very helpful in looking into the change caused by these movements.

As you can see, through my secondary research it seems as if my PIP is moving towards the impact of technology and the digital world in social justice movements. It’s certainly been a lot easier to find articles on this aspect than grassroots social justice. So I may be changing my PIP topic to suit this. Time will tell!

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[1] Q&A (13 April, 2015) 47:01 – Peter Greste, Mitch Fifield, Alannah MacTiernan, Su McCluskey. Accessed on 1/5/15 from http://iview.abc.net.au/programs/qanda/FA1407H011S00

[2] Robinson Meyer: ‘Thank God for Cellphone Video Cameras’ (29 April, 2015). Accessed 1/5/15 from http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/04/thank-god-for-cellphone-video-cameras/391688

[3] Bernadette N. Lim: The #Hashtag Revolution (17 July, 2014). Accessed 5/5/15 from http://www.thecrimson.com/column/media-justice-movement/article/2014/7/17/hashtag-activism

The Beginning...

What is the PIP?

The Mini PIP: the precursor into the research task that dominates a Society and Culture students HSC, the PIP. At present I understand the PIP as being a personal interest project in which a Society and Culture students investigate and report into a topic of interest to them, which has relevance to their own life: their micro. It takes several months to complete and incorporates a wide range of both primary and secondary research, theorists, concepts, and tonnes of evaluation. Primary research has to be conducted, thus engaging students into their world, and by means of questionnaires, interviews, focus groups and content analysis, gives them answers to their hypothesis. Basically, the PIP is a big research task, that takes lots of time and lots of effort, but is rewarding, fascinating and engaging; and most importantly, if you pick the right topic, you will be actually interested in doing it!

The Domestic Violence PIP

Overall, this PIP has been really good (no wonder it got 40/40 and a Band 6!). It is clear and precise, with not much blabbing on, and is really engaging; which I find great! It fluently incorporates hundreds of concepts, and has excellent inclusion and integration of secondary research. The results of primary research are easy to understand, and give an excellent insight into the society this PIP is analysing. Also, the PIP is very humble, with excellent personal reflection and really does answer the question well.

The only issue with this PIP is that I find that the evaluation to be lacking, or is not explicitly clear. This is not to deny that this PIP has good evaluation in it, it just needs to be more explicit in some paragraphs.

My Mini PIP

I have decided to run with the idea of looking at social justice. Specifically, grassroots social justice versus global social justice campaigns and their effectiveness in creating change. It fits into the concepts of society, persons, environment, time, globalisation, technology, power. It fits into my micro as it looks into grassroots social justice campaigns, such as what I am trying to achieve in my Human Rights Committee (HRC) which I run, and how effective they are in comparison to global movements such as #BringBackOurGirls, #KeepHopeAlive or even BandAid. I am hoping to find out which form of social justice campaigns work out the best, and also which ones actually make some change on society. Methods wise, the current plan is to conduct a focus group with the HRC and even possibly the SRC (time permitting) and find out their stance on social justice, and the ways in which they engage in these campaigns. I also hope to conduct a questionnaire, aiming to get a wider understanding of the ways in which society connects with social justice campaigns, and whether they believe they are contributing to change by these methods. Also, if at all possible I would like to interview a representative from a NGO such as Amnesty International on which campaigns they find more effective in creating change. Hopefully the findings will be interesting, different to what I’m expecting and that this PIP topic can lead me into the big PIP easily.