Into the Wild: Modern Hunter-Gatherers

This is Michael Caine, not Michael Kleine. Source: CBAMB

Alright, so Professor Michael Kleine, not the actor with the similar name, has written an article titled “What Is It We Do When We Write Articles Like This One?”, which goes on to describe those writing and researching as individuals who alternate between being “hunters” and “gatherers” (Kleine 25). The idea is that research can be roughly composed into four stages and two parts.

Source: K. Harada

But today I’m going to leave behind the words shown in the gif above (mostly because I think that other posts like this or this have covered the whole research pattern dealio well enough) and instead I’m going focus on the two parts: hunting and gathering. Or, more like how Kleine’s hunting and gathering relates to me.

For the most part I feel like my research process is a lot like the one that Kleine describes – I can usually find myself alternating between ‘hunting’ with a purpose and gathering broad data only to discover information that can change the purpose you were searching with. Whether in a database or through a google search, I take care to word my searches specifically with a purpose in mind. So as a young millennial (or Generation Z as some people are calling my age group today), I’m hunting down certain information on the world wide web. However, within that purpose-driven search, whether I want it or not, I also gather related information that is broader in focus than my initial search, which  can then lead to revision of either my ideas or my research.

Now, as for how Kleine’s process doesn’t reflect my own experiences, time is probably the biggest difference. Mostly because Kleine, while he does talk about students the what I’m going to call “the essay system” (aka, how students often find themselves turned into essay writing machines), he doesn’t take into context the time frames research typically needs to be condensed into. I mean, yeah, my research isn’t going to be of the highest quality of if I have week to both do my research and write my paper, while doing a similar amount of work for approximately three other classes within the same time frame. But, that’s my only real beef with what Professor Kleine has to say.