The purpose of the workshop is to demystify the PhD process through the recent experiences of Post-Doctoral candidates who work in the urban field. Furthermore, we will touch on the thinking of the leading Southern urban theorists, Ananya Roy, by listening to a recent lecture and exploring what the implications may be for the individual research projects of the group. From there we will draw on the long-term experience of another leading urbanist, AbdouMaliq Simone, on how he operationalizes his inventive theoretical approach to the field.

After lunch the workshop will shift in register and focus on the craft of writing a PhD. This will also be the over-arching focus of the seminar series in 2012. Each participant in the group will be expected to prepare a 6-8000 word article for publication during the course of 2012. Ideally this will be a chapter from the thesis in the making. These papers will be presented every month at the PhD Seminar sessions for review and constructive critique. The focus of this process will be both substantive content and the quality or effectiveness of the writing. The workshop will prepare us for this undertaking. After lunch we will hear from two Post-Doc candidates on how they have successfully made the transition to becoming academic writers. The final part of the workshop will be more practical. Each participant will be challenged to craft an abstract and outline of the paper they will produce during 2012. This will then be presented in small groups for feedback and improvement.

Edgar Pieterse will facilitate the workshop.