A one day colloquium organised by the ESRC’s National Centre for Research Methods Networks for Methodological Innovation.

Increasingly, social science researchers are pointing to the central importance of affect and affective communication to understanding the dynamics of flows and networks, particularly with reference to embodied, nonconscious processes in group dynamics. Clearly these issues are extremely important for social science, but currently, much writing is resolutely theoretical and it is unclear how it might be possible to go about researching affect. This day colloquium is for social scientists to explore ways of researching affect. It is the result of five meetings undertaken by a group of social scientists over the last year. In this colloquium we are offering workshops exploring a variety of methods and issues and presenting a discussion about theories and methods for researching affect, discussing what we have learnt from the seminars and discussions that formed the network.

The day contains presentations and workshops which illuminate methods for researching affect and include:

1) Affect and writing workshop
2) Keeping the vitality in data analysis through the use of affect
3) Methodological implications of attending to rhythmic forms of communication
4) Dreaming the social
5) Workshop for PhD students run by PhD students to explore researching affect and affective experiences in the PhD research