Mass Observation Directive themes

Who suggests themes?

MO correspondents themselves

Colleagues in Special Collections

Academic colleagues and students at Sussex University or Brighton University

People who attend meetings or conference where MO is being discussed

Academics from other institutions

Other external contacts eg from schools, local community projects, the media or museums and libraries

Who makes the final decision about the themes?

The final decision is made – at the moment - by the development Director, Dorothy Sheridan, and has been since 1990 when she took over directorship of the project from David Pocock.

Why are they chosen?

The theme needs to have at least some relevance to everyone who writes. The idea is to ensure that even if a correspondent is not directly affected they will have opinions on the subject so, for example, even if someone doesn’t smoke they might have thoughts and experiences to record on the Smoking Ban (Spring 2007) and indeed this proved to be the case.

The Domestic Violence Directive (Spring 2007) could have been relevant to a very small number of people but, in practice, it produced some important contributions from a wide variety of people on their views and experiences.

The Shopping Directive (Summer 2007) was relevant to almost everyone since most of us have to go shopping, and most people had something to say about gardens (Summer 2007) even those who were not gardeners. The NHS (Spring 2008) affects us all, so a good theme to stimulate everyone to write.

Family History (Summer 2008) was more restricted but we wanted to hear from people even if they are not at all interested in the subject. Global poverty (Winter 2008) by contrast is a theme we can all write on even if we have no direct experience.

What else counts?

Apart from trying to retain a wide appeal, we try to ensure that we do not repeat a theme we have covered in the recent past and also that there is a balance between more abstract subjects (politics, morality and so on which don’t necessarily call on personal experience) and more personal issues which invite people to write about their everyday lives. The themes should be varied enough to give everyone at least something to say. We also try to include a few current events although that can be difficult because we only do three directives a year.

Commissioned directives

What is a “commissioned” or “collaborative” directive?

Some of the MO directives are produced at the request of an outside researcher. For example, between 2000 and 2008, we sent out directives with 67 parts/themes. Of these, 27 (about 40%) have been produced as a result of collaborations with funded external researchers, most of them academics from universities but also including a collaboration with the National Trust. 

Some researchers contact us when they are applying for funds to support their research projects. They ask us to “carry” their research interest as a theme and they contribute to the costs of producing and mailing out the directive. Most of these researchers are funded by the academic research councils (the Economic and Social Research Council and the Arts and Humanities Research Council) or by independent bodies such as the Wellcome Foundation, The Leverhulme Trust or the Nuffield Foundation.

If the subject seems to fit with the MO Project, we agree to accept it and we then exchange drafts and discuss how their research will benefit from the way Mass Observers write back. Sometimes researchers and colleagues try to answer the Directive themselves to make sure they “work” and are do-able. The final version has to be one we all feel happy with and we try to ensure it fits with our “house style”. As we get better known and more people value the distinctive nature of MO material these requests may increase.

What happens to the replies to these commissioned directives?

They are filed away by directive theme in just the same ways as all other directive replies. The “commissioner” does not buy special access to the collection. They are simply benefiting from collaborating with us and from having access to the material you send in. This means that their fee (which can be as little as £50 to as much as £6,000) contributes towards the long-term running of a directive. We have calculated that it costs about £6,000 to design and send out a directive and then process all the replies and maintain the project over the four month period.

It also means that the material generated for their research theme becomes part of the Archive and is available for anyone else to look at immediately or into the future. Without this financial contribution, it would be hard for us to continue as we do. In fact we need to seek more external funds in future to help us index the huge collection we already have.