Losing and Finding a Home

How to use the blog

This blog has been set up to accompany an ESRC-funded research project into ‘Multiple Exclusion Homelessness’ that is being undertaken by researchers from the Universities of Salford and Lincoln. The blog’s main purpose is to share with stakeholders and homeless people in Stoke-on-Trent information and findings that are emerging from the project. There may be other postings from time to time which talk about other aspects of the research such as the methods involved as this will give the general reader an idea about how we do our research. There may also be posts which discuss related news items and events which we feel may be somehow relevant to our readers. If you are new to the concept of blogs and blogging which we anticipate that many of our readers will be, then what follows is some information that will help you understand what it’s about and how it works.    

The word ‘blog’ is short for ‘weblog’ and can take different forms but most often as a publication of personal thoughts or as a journal. Researchers such as ourselves sometimes use blogs to document our progress and reflections on our work as we progress through it. What distinguishes blogs (as well as other social media tools) from traditional websites is that they allow a two-way channel of communication between the writers and the audience. Traditional websites are meant to be ‘read only’. As researchers, being able to share our thoughts on our work in this way enables us to discuss particular issues with our readers and gain valuable feedback from them.

The format of blog sites can vary and while some can appear quite complicated and confusing to those who are unfamiliar with them we have deliberately tried to keep this blog simple, clean and accessible. Across the top of the page are ‘pages’ which remain permanent as they contain information that is integral to understanding the context of the blog for first-time visitors. The main feature of the blog is the list of posts which appear down the centre of the page. By clicking on the title of the post, or the comments link at the bottom, you will arrive at a page on which you can find readers comments and add your own. You can also share the page using your own social media tools by clicking on the ‘share/save’ button. The column on the right hand side of the home page contains a number of additional features often known as ‘widgets’. You can use these to subscribe to the blog by e-mail or by RSS (more info on RSS), you can link to Gareth’s Twitter account (where there is often additional information related to the project which he ‘tweets’ about), you can search through older posts by their categories, and at the bottom link to other relevant websites and homelessness bloggers.

Finally, the blog works best and the most interesting discussions take place when readers comment on the posts. If there is anything that is written in the posts that inspires a reaction in you, no matter how simple or complex, or how short or long, then you are very welcome to share your comments and engage in the discussion. We are always very interested to hear what other people have to say about these topics and to learn from them.

We hope that you find the blog interesting and useful and if you want to get in touch with us about any aspect of it please feel free to leave a comment or e-mail Gareth at g.j.morris@salford.ac.uk. We would be happy to hear from you.