Investigating the City: Hands-on Research Methods for Urban Analysis

Catalog description

This course encourages students to take the study of cities into their own hands. At the start of term, students will pick their own field site within the city of Providence and will examine that field site through the lens of both qualitative and quantitative research methods. The class will consist of both hybrid lecture-discussion meetings, where we will examine case studies of urban research to give students a foundational understanding of a variety of methodological approaches, and hands-on workshops, where students will gain a more practical understanding of how to collect and interpret original data and successfully communicate findings. The course will culminate in a final mixed-methods research project synthesizing the data students have collected throughout the semester at (or related to) their chosen field site.