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Archive for the ‘Romance Writer Survey PHD’ Category

Update on mail out to survey participants

Posted in phd, Romance reader survey PHD, Romance Writer Survey PHD, tagged , on May 4, 2023| Leave a Comment »

Mailing out links to my thesis to survey participants is taking longer than expected. However, I’m now sending via Gmail BCC in groups of about 50 each, instead of one at a time when I get the chance.

My outlook/iinet would not let me send more than 25 emails in an hour, which was annoying and caused more work. I cannot use my newsletter service because of double opt in requirements.

So far I have sent links to 155 romance writer participants and starting yesterday with the BCC on Gmail 169 to romance readers. I’m getting quite a few bounces, mostly from the romance reader participants. I think this is to be expected as these details were provided in 2016 and 2017.

I have many hundreds of emails to send.

Another annoying thing. I developed a template, then corrected the template, but somehow in many cases the template message with typos went out. I’m sorry about this. I feel very stupid and actually can’t work out how that happened. For those getting the error free email you are one of the lucky ones.

As a rule of thumb, romance writers are downloading more than readers. However, I won’t be able to distinguish between the groups from now on as I’m sending to both groups at the same time.

If you participated in the survey and haven’t received a link in a week or two, then feel free to email me for it.

I am very grateful to the survey participants for their generous support and thoughtful survey responses. Thank you.

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I finally earned the bonnet!

Posted in phd, Romance reader survey PHD, Romance Writer Survey PHD, Thesis, tagged , , , on March 31, 2023| 2 Comments »

Yesterday, I walked across the stage as Dr Donna Maree Hanson. I had the gown, the hood, and the Tudor bonnet. I did not look as debonair as I was expecting but it didn’t matter because I was excited and happy. It’s been a long time coming. The pandemic played havoc, not just with me, but with staffing at the university which meant the last part took too long and it was very frustrating.

Rituals and ceremony are fascinating things. The permeate our lives-marriage ceremonies, funerals, graduations. For me, it was a closure thing. I didn’t have to do it, but I so wanted to. I wanted a moment to remember, to celebrate and share with my family. Not all my family unfortunately.

I found the whole thing a boost to my morale. I dressed up. I put on make up. I felt good. Yay me.

At moments like this I am expected to thank people who helped me. I have an extensive thank you in my thesis, but that’s not as easily seen or read. My supervisor was Associate Profession Tony Eaton, AKA Anthony Eaton, award winning author of SF and F and he propped me up when I was down, guided me when he could, challenged me and made me prove my points. He also was a great mentor for my novel component. It was a challenge that Tony wasn’t an expert on romance fiction, but he did his best as he is the genre guy and he asked the amazing, indomitable Dr Jodi McAlister to be on my supervisory panel. Jodi was a godsend from the romance academia perspective. Thank you Jodi. My second supervisor was Dr Jordan Williams and she was very good value when she had to mind me when Tony was away. She gave me some great feedback on my thesis and chatted to me and helped me refine my arguments.

However, it was Tony who zoomed with me every week and fortnight during the peak of early pandemic lockdowns and fear and who kept me going, listened to my ideas, encouraged me, He worked hard with me to drag, pull, push over the line. During that time I had no will to write anything, no creativity, I was blown up by a cannon ball of pandemic fear and family chaos. What really touched me though was Tony was feeling similarly. He was finding it hard. He had family, a job, PhD candidates and lectures and marking and he didn’t give up on himself or me. So thank you Tony for fighting the hard fight.

My partner, Matthew Farrer, was always quietly supporting me with love and advice and money too. My children who supported me and were proud of me, even if at times they didn’t get what I was doing. The romance readers and writers who I’ve met, the ones who participated in my surveys, thank you all.

People ask questions about being a Phd candidate. What’s it like? Why? What do you do? It’s a long process, years. For me even longer that the normal because I took a year off, I went part time and so on. I can’t deny there was a time about a year and a half in that I wanted to give up. There were so many other distracting things to do-like write books, devote myself to publishing and promotion. But I had completed a survey of romance writers and readers and I owed it to them to do the work, the analysis and so I did.

Most of the time you are working on your own when you do a phd. I can only speak here about my creative writing Phd experience. Other disciplines are different I think, particularly if you are on a science research team. At first I had to learn to read academic articles. I think those first days I struggled to read one in a day. First you have to find them, then read them, then work out if they are relevant (the abstracts help). Then in my case my brain got accustomed and I could read two, three or four in a day. You need to work out a way to keep track of your articles because if you want to quote from them or paraphrase from them, you need to be able to lay your hand on the reference, check the wording (I failed a lot at this) or even wave them about and say ‘But they say so!’ Meanwhile, all this stuff just accumulated in my head. Then, there was the creative piece which is linked, inspired by or part of your research topic. For a long time my was a general area Feminism in popular romance fiction. By the end, it was Romance as a bridge to understanding changing gender roles in society. One thing I really enjoyed when I could be on campus was participating in campus life. I tutored in creative writing among other things. I loved being part of the student’s journey, encouraging them, sharing with them the pros and cons of being a writer. The pandemic killed that for me though as I was a sessional and it was a rubber band snap off into the no more tutoring scrap heap, like a lot of us.

Any enough blabbing and more photos.

Matthew Farrer, my partner and me
The robes from behind.

My thesis is currently available for viewing at the Uni of Canberra research repository. Here.

I’m thinking of publishing the thesis and the novel component so it may not be available forever. I will start emailing survey participants who requested a copy with the link to my thesis over the next couple of weeks.

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Romance survey and PhD update

Posted in feminism and romance, Romance, Romance reader survey PHD, Romance scholarship, Romance Writer Survey PHD, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on April 27, 2017| Leave a Comment »

I am back on campus after sick leave. I was AWOL for over a month but all good now. This has put back my PhD project timetable unfortunately.

I thought I’d provide an update on the romance survey. It is still running but I will close it off at the end of May as that is when I am scheduled to deliver my confirmation seminar and be confirmed in my PhD. It’s a formality I have to go through. Then I’ll be starting the interviews. So if you are interested in completing the survey you still have time as a reader or a writer. Links below.

Looking at Survey Monkey today I have received 682 responses from romance readers. That is absolutely fantastic. It’s an international survey and I’ve received responses from Europe, USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, UK etc. Brilliant. I’m so thrilled.

The number of skips. Skip are where respondents abandon a survey or skip questions or miss questions. I haven’t done the analysis yet on which questions were skipped so I’m only giving total numbers here. The skips for readers vary from 14 to over two hundred and some questions it’s about 184 skips. From a quick scan a lot of the responses that required the reader to type a response had the highest number of skips. Overall I don’t have a problem with the skipping. Romance readers have been very generous with their answers and there’s very little abandoning the survey before finishing it.

However, if you are a respondent on the reader survey and would like to send me your thoughts on the survey and any issues you had then they would be most welcome. Overall, it’s an amazing response. Either reply or send me an email through the contact page or use Twitter or Facebook.

Survey responses from writers so far are 377, which is also amazing and I’m very grateful for these. Also international and that’s been mind blowing really. Writers though appear to have difficulty with the survey with a very high number of skips and people leaving the survey.

From what I can see about 136 people just stopped the survey just after the start and I don’t know why. The rate of skips is fairly consistent so the real response rate is closer to 241.

Early reports from respondents indicated that they had tried to use the survey on the phone and had technical issues. Some of those skipping have come back in and completed the survey but as I’m no tech guru I don’t know.

If there was a reason you as a romance writer dropped out of the survey please let me know if you can. It will help me to understand what issues there were and if I can answer your questions then you still have time to participate if you want. The survey can be completed anonymously. I only ask for contact details if you want to be included in follow up interviews. I will not be interviewing that many people so I can’t say who will be interviewed as yet.

The first part of the survey contains the compulsory questions I must include as this is an authorised survey through the University of Canberra, complete with ethics approval. You need to agree to me using the data you provide or you will be exited from the survey at the beginning. All data will be kept in accordance with the University of Canberra’s data retention and privacy requirements. I will not be using any email addresses or contact details other than contacting those volunteering to be interviewed. The only info I see is the IP address, which I’m no guru so I wouldn’t know how to identify you. No unselling or stuff like that. This is entirely aboveboard. There is even a complaints process outlined in the information materials.

So help out if you can.

Let’s see if we can get the overall response over 1000! Come on. We can do it!

Romance READER survey  link to Survey Monkey. Here.

Romance WRITER survey link to Survey Monkey. Here.

 

Couple Love Beach Romance Togetherness Concept

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The irony

Posted in phd, Romance reader survey PHD, Romance Writer Survey PHD, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on January 11, 2017| 3 Comments »

I’m back into PhD mode, currently working on the all important research proposal for my confirmation seminar. These confirmation seminars happen about a year in to the degree study and one can present (in theory) an indepth research proposal and get approval to do the PhD proper. It’s weird because you know I’m doing the PhD now, and I’ll be doing it after confirmation. It’s a formal part of the process to ensure I have something worthwhile to research now I have had a year looking into the research material. I get assessed and I get a drilling on my presentation and the topic. All good.

I’m at present beavering away at writing up the proposal and pulling together my literature review. It’s not quite structured properly yet but I’m getting there. I have really enjoyed the research part of this degree. Romance fiction, feminism, incomprehensible French philosophers are all so enthralling. I haven’t really been able to pull myself away from it to work on the creative work. But after the confirmation seminar in March, I will.

Part of my research, a very important part of my unique contribution, is the two surveys I am conducting at the moment (and when I do them this year, the selected in-depth interviews). I am surveying writers of popular romance fiction and readers of popular romance fiction. When I was putting the proposal forward for clearance the biggest concern from the bureaucracy here was how was I going to reach readers of romance fiction. These days that is easier than people think. I’ve read articles where the researcher couldn’t get sufficient readers to participate in their research. This was years ago before the big websites dedicated to romance, social media and even here the Australian Romance Readers Association (ARRA). I’ve had a really good response thanks to all those means, Smart Bitches Trashy Books, Dear Author, Twitter, Facebook, WordPress and ARRA (who have been awesome!). Authors have also been spreading the word to their readers. The response is so good that we could go for statistically significant for reader response so yes I’m still looking for readers of romance fiction. Please spread the word. Do the survey if you are a reader of romance!

The irony is that I’m sadly lacking in romance fiction authors responding to the survey, particularly in comparison to the reader response. I know there are thousands of romance authors out there. I am having trouble reaching them. Romance Writers of Australia has nearly a 1000 members, Romance Writers of America has over 10,000 members. You think it would be easy. But it’s not. I’m not a member of the Romance Writers of America for example and it’s not easy for me to wave the flag and say lookie here.

Not easy to reach popular romance authors, not easy to convince them to complete me lovely survey. Come on darlings, look over here. Look at my nice survey!

However, I’m not giving up. The survey continues.

See my previous post for details and links. HERE

me with glasses

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Calling romance writers and readers! Help!

Posted in phd, Romance reader survey PHD, Romance Writer Survey PHD, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on January 4, 2017| 4 Comments »

I am currently undertaking a PhD through the University of Canberra in popular romance fiction and as part of that study I have two surveys going.

I’ve got a great response rate so far but I need more. Yes MORE!!!!

If you are a READER of popular ROMANCE fiction can you help me out? The more readers who respond, the more valid the findings will be.

If you are a popular ROMANCE fiction AUTHOR your response to the survey will really help me out!

In both cases I’m after honest views.

Romance writers can be romance readers but I have questions on their romance reading  in the writer survey so you don’t need to do two surveys.

I think the survey can take up to 15-20 minutes to do.

It is mostly tick boxes but your free text comments are very valuable.

I am also going to select some people for a follow up interview only if the respondent is WILLING. There is space to indicate your willingness to be involved in this is the consent form. The consent form is the first part of the survey. I can only do follow up interviews a small number of people during 2017. NOTE; you can do your survey without leaving contact details if you wish. I won’t know who you are except for an IP address.

This survey is for my PhD, which is examining ROMANCE FICTION. Please help!

This is the link to Survey Monkey for Romance Writers

This is the link to Survey Monkey for Romance Readers.

Thanking you all in anticipation. Donna!

 

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The not so passive popular romance fiction

Posted in Paranormal romance, phd, Romance fiction, Romance reader survey PHD, Romance scholarship, Romance Writer Survey PHD, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on November 11, 2016| 3 Comments »

I’m back on the PhD with a vengeance lately. This means I’m reading some academic papers that get me angry with their generalisations.

‘the ideal heroine in a romance is passive…’ Mary Ellen Ryder

‘Romance’s generic requirement that the hero should be volatile in his affections and sexually intimidating…’ Doreen Thierauf

These are throw away lines in articles that have some good in then but the stuff mentioned above makes me scribble ‘bullshit!’ in the white space.

Ryder in particular made me growl this week.I get strange looks from other PhD candidates. Ryder read some Barbara Cartland. Each to its own I suppose, but her greatest flaw was saying that because Cartland published 24 books when she was 93 she obviously wrote to formula…’which means that examining just one of her books should reveal a great deal about the whole romance genre.’ For godssake, the whole fucking genre, really? I wouldn’t say one book from any author would allow me to talk about all their works, let alone the whole genre.

Her actual analysis of the text was really quite interesting but why put that tripe at the beginning of her paper?  And it was a gothic bloody romance to boot.

I pull my hair out and shout why, why, why?

Luckily there were some good articles, like from Mairead Owen and possibly Laura Struve (I’m still pondering it). I guess I’m learning to be critical. Step one for me.

Also, I find that when academics talk about Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey they lose their shit when it comes to romance. They may be blockbusters but that doesn’t mean they are the typical romance novel.

Actually, I don’t think there is a typical romance novel. There are key features of a popular romance novel but I won’t go into that. Others like Pamela Regis have already done that.

My current fiction reading though has run counter to what these people are saying about passive heroines and violent and volatile heroes. I’m reading some vintage, retro if you like, Amanda Carpenter. I’ve mentioned her before in past posts. The Great Escape (1984) and The Passage of the Night (1990). (Amanda Carpenter writes as Thea Harrison these days.). These book are examples of her early works. She’s a damn fine writer and I think has a great mind to boot. I can certainly tell she had the chops for paranormal writing in those early days. (I’ve read four of her books so far. They have been very different from each other!)

(possible spoiler)

The Great Escape features a 17 year old protagonist. She’s an heiress, unhappy but quite clever. She escapes from her guardians and is pursued by a PI, whom she outsmarts. In this book, she drugs the PI, she punches him, she seduces him and then after they fall in love, she gives away all her money without consulting him once about it. She hates the money. It defines her too much. If this book had been published later, I suspect it would have been a romantic suspense because someone is trying to kill the heroine.

So in this 1984 story, the heroine is not passive and has agency.

The Passage of the Night is also very interesting. The heroine kidnaps the tycoon hero at gunpoint, she drugs him and then takes him to a mountain top in Vermont. The reason she has kidnapped him is to save her sister, but the hero isn’t anything like her sister said he was. He’s angry at being kidnapped, of course, but he is never aggressive or violent. He chops wood continuously to ‘sublimate’. He’s not going to have her charged. He voluntarily stays with her and then she flies him back because she can’t justify her actions anymore. She’s a helicopter pilot and plane pilot and her family has a bit of money. She’s also loyal and brave.  He’s on seven figures. She sees his life and doesn’t like the long hours etc. She doesn’t demand he change his lifestyle but she’s walking out until he sorts his priorities. In the end, he gives up his job.  I think that about reverses the tropes.

I’m not done with the Carpenter read through yet. It’s fascinating.

Other fiction reading, Full Moon Rising, Keri Arthur. I’m sorry. Riley Jensen kicks butt. It’s urban fantasy on the’ boil the coffee over’ end of the spectrum but mmm…not much passivity there.

I’ve started rereading JD Robb’s …In Death series. I’m on book five so far (it’s been a week?) and there’s no sign of passivity there.

The In Death series is harder to peg. It’s futuristic urban fantasy with romantic elements or romantic suspense or just SF crime with romance. The heroine and the hero are the same couple all the way through (very well done by the way) and for me the series discusses child sex abuse all the way through, even peels it back to a very stark and dark root that makes me blanch. But I applaud JD Robb for doing it (JD Robb is Nora Roberts btw) and I think she’s brilliant.

In my reading of retro Mills & Boon, there are occasionally passive heroines and other times not. I’ve not read everything. No one will be able to. I’m not as well read in romance as people I know, but I know enough not to generalize about it.

But I’m happy to get angry at people who do and blog about it…maybe…

 

BTW I still have my survey going for my PHD study. If you write or read popular romance fiction, please check out my survey. I’d really appreciate the contribution. See blog post here.

Articles cited

Owen, M, Re-Inventing Romance: Reading Popular Romance Fiction, Women’s Studies International Forum, Vol. 20. No. 4, pp.537-546, 1997

Ryder, M. E, Smoke and mirrors: Event patterns in the discourse structure of a romance novel, Journal of Pragmatics, 31 (1991) pp. 1067-1080

Struve, L, Sisters of Sorts: Reading Romantic Fiction and the Bonds Among Female Readers, The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 44, No. 6, 2011.

Thierauf, D, Forever After:Desire in the 21st-Century Romance Blockbuster, The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 49, No. 3, 2016.

 

 

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Survey Time!

Posted in feminism and romance, phd, Romance, Romance fiction, Romance reader survey PHD, Romance scholarship, Romance Writer Survey PHD, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on October 20, 2016| 10 Comments »

Now that I’m back from Shanghai, I am back on the ball with the PhD.

An important part of my research is obtaining the views of romance readers and romance writers. I have been working on these surveys for a few months and they are ready to launch.

Now there are two surveys: one for romance readers and one for romance writers. Please use the correct link!

Yes. Romance writers can be romance readers but I have questions on their romance reading  in the writer survey so you don’t need to do two surveys.

I think the survey can take up to 15-20 minutes to do. I do it quicker but I’ve been looking at it many times. So do allow some time.

I am also going to select some people for a follow up interview. There is space to indicate your willingness to be involved in this is the consent form. The consent form is the first part of the survey.

This survey is for my PhD, which is examining romance fiction. Please help!

This is the link to Survey Monkey for Romance Writers

This is the link to Survey Monkey for Romance Readers.

Thanking you all in anticipation. Donna!

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