The Executive Secretary, National Institute for Cultural Orientation (NICO) and Course Lecturer, Research Methods in Theatre and Cultural Studies (TCS 701) of the Post Graduate Diploma in Cultural Administration (PGDCA) Programme, NICO Training School, Abuja Study Centre, Assoc. Prof. Barclays Foubiri Ayakoroma, has said that, the teaching of research methodology was to keep the students abreast of current trends in carrying out an academic research work and do proper documentation.

Prof. Ayakoroma stated this in a lecture while teaching the new batch of students of the 2016/2017 academic session of the NICO Training School, Abuja Study Centre, at the Institute’s Headquarters, No. 23 Kigoma Street, Wuse Zone 7, Abuja-FCT, on Tuesday, 7th March, 2017.

His words: “One of the prerequisites for this programme is a submission of a long essay, a thesis at the end of the training programme. So, we would be looking at research and will go through the aspects of research writing, because we are talking about Cultural Administration. More so, you need the training because not everybody in this class studied culture-related courses like Theatre Arts, Archaeology, etc. The course is to expand your horizon and make you an authority in the culture sector, as well as help you to write a seamless project, which every project supervisor would be willing and happy to look at”.

The lecture started with a question-and-answer session on the conceptual framework of research, after which the astute lecturer opined that, a research work is “a process of investigation, inquiry, close scrutiny, discovery, exploration, communication and a test of personal writing”.

Prof. Ayakoroma further dwelt on the need for research and reasons for carrying out a research, which could be academic requirement, job requirement, personal interest, to correct a wrong impression, to fill a yawning gap, and to contribute to knowledge, among other reasons, informing that research works could be from primary sources (oral tradition, personal interviews, film previews, theatre performances, etc.) and secondary sources (books, theses, journals, internet materials, etc.).

On the sources of cultural research, the ES informed that emphasis in the class would be on oral tradition (which is categorised into oral tradition and oral history), material culture (which constitutes the tangible cultural heritage of a people), historical linguistics (which is a study in the changes in the language of a people and the factors that brought about such changes); and writing.

Interestingly, the ES used well designed PowerPoint slides in his presentation to graphically and gradually share his ideas with the students, who are drawn from various Federal Cultural Agencies.

Njideka Dimgba

Office of the ES

NICO HQ, Abuja-FCT