Tutor. Ran a public house for eleven years before turning to research, and teaches the observation methods the Rounds depend on.
- Role
- Tutor
- Affiliation
- Slop University School of Invented Disciplines
- teo.ballantyne@slop.university
- Contact
- Ask me during a Round — that is what the Rounds are for. Email if something cannot wait until Thursday.
I kept a pub for eleven years. I could tell you who would be in on a Tuesday at half four, what they drank, whose marriage was failing and who had nobody else to tell. None of that was in any training manual. Oldenburg calls it a third place; I called it a job, and I got good at the part of it this course is about — noticing who is a regular, and what a room does to make someone become one.
I take the Rounds and mark Field Notes. Most of what I will teach you is how to watch a room without changing it, and how to write down what you saw rather than what you expected to see. Those are different skills and the second one is harder.
Consultation: In the field, during Rounds, or Thursdays after the visit.