It's marking season at the moment, and so now, more than ever, do I appreciate one of the big pluses of this job - I get to read work that is analytical, intellectually substantial, and not about something I lectured on a couple of weeks ago. Generally, what I'm reading is on a subject I know little to nothing about. But if the writer tells me a story about their subject, then I'm hooked.

What do I mean by telling a story? All academic writing contains some kind of narrative, even if it is as simple as 'we thought this, so we did that, which made that happen'. Telling the story, to me, means using those narrative elements to convey your interest and passion for the subject with the reader. Use an active voice. Use clear and simple language. Don't be afraid to put in the people, the drama, the humour, the fascination. 

In my chapter three, which is lurking at home waiting for some rewriting later tonight, there are lots of little stories that I want to include: the six-month argument in the letter pages of Astounding Science Fiction over the scientific credibility of Lemuria culminating in a satirical short story with a punchline involving suckerfish; the struggle by science fiction magazines to survive the Great Depression, from altering print schedules and the grade of paper to running stories that fantacised about hidden gold mines; the invention of synethetic tapioca (why? why?). Some of these stories are a footnote, others a paragraph, others a section. But they all jigsaw together to hopefully pull the reader through another story - the larger story of my thesis argument.

Sometimes I think that my current job is about being paid to be an average academic reader. What is this 'average academic reader'?

The average academic reader is, ultimately, who we are writing to. That isn't to say that there aren't other audiences, and that they aren't important. In the early stages of drafting, writing for yourself - to find out what you know and think - is more constructive. Your supervisor(s) will be your most immediate audience, but the intellectual and emotion investments in the supervisor-student relationship, and their familiarity with your project, differentiate them from the average academic reader. Even your examiners will be different to the average academic reader - they've signed up to read the whole thing, and they are looking at it with a particular set of expectations and criteria in mind. (For the moment, I'm leaving aside the whole issue of writing for a general public, though I do think that is important.) The 'average academic reader' is a person who might pick up your published thesis or sections of thesis. They are also an abstraction of the broader scholarly community that research students are entering into dialogue with.

From the mere fact that the average academic reader has bothered to start trying to read your work, you can assume that they are in some way interested in it, and want to hear about your research. It's in your best interest to encourage that engagement and not to push the average academic reader over to the darkside (and when academic readers go darkside, trust me, it's all bad). Being consious of this reader, especially when you are at the revising and editing stages of your writing will help make your writing more appealing to its final audience.

So I'm starting off an occasional series on the average academic reader: likes, dislikes, natural habit, etc. I'll take requests and suggestions from the (vitual) floor.

For now, I'll start with one simple aspect of the average academic reader - they prefer the title (or subtitle) of a piece of work to match up with the contents!
 

The PSA Research Careers Week (held 10-13 Sept) was a cornucopia of information for research students at any stage in their degree. From designing your thesis, to managing supervision and the mid-thesis doldrums, to examinations and what distinguishes a PhD, there was something of interest no matter where you are up to in your studies. There was also a focus on life after the degree: how the generic skills that you develop - as well as your expertise - can set you up for careers in research, academic or industry.

Even better, the Week is now a virtual cornucopia - with PowerPoint slides and Lectopia recordings up on the PSA website. Check it out! 

My thesis came to me last night in a dream. My thesis incarnate, I should specify, unlike other dreams about extra chapters in thesis related books or dreaming about the chapter I was writing. Somehow my thesis had taken on human form and was trying to talk to me. She looked like the Empress Jadis, from C.S. Lewis's The Magician's Nephew, and the assassin statues on Dr Who a few weeks ago, coming closer and closer. I couldn't hear what she was saying.

I'm pretty sure this is a sign I need to get this thing finished and handed in. 

Today - Tuesday - has been filled with information on developing a careers in research.

The logical place to start is Robyn Owens' talk on 'Developing and Maintaining a Research Degree' which took an abstract and reflective approach to the topic. My summary is going to be radically inadequate in capturing what was a fascinating and informative account, so I'd urge people to listen to the Lectopia recording when it goes online later this week or early next week. However, here the summary goes:

3 Aspects in Developing a Research Career

1. Strength in research methods: knowing your discipline deeply and broadly, and having a high level of skill in the tasks required in your discipline of research
2. Communication: both formal and informal, written and oral. Also being able to understand community needs and communicate how your research meets those needs.
3. Professionalism: understanding the framework in which you will work - universities, government, funding agencies - and appropriate behaviour in terms of things like ethics and team work. 

3 Phases in Research Careers

1. Early (PhD + 5yrs). Note special funding and opportunities available to Early Career Researchers. Often characterised by short-term jobs and moving around.
   
2. Middle. Need to build a support structure and research team (including having students/taking on a supervisorial role). Chances to think about bigger scale projects at a higher level of abstraction.
3. Later. Leadership, policy and administrative roles. Review phase - thinking about your body of work and trace in the discipline field. 

Know Thyself

• Splitter (details, analysis) or Clumper (synthesis, creative)?
• Risk taker (creative, potential failures) or Risk Adverse (fewer mistakes, less creative)?
• Social or Solo operator? 

Know how you work, learn how to work with people who have different or opposing styles. 

8 Tips for a Long Life as a Career Researcher

1. Publish 
2. Get a reputation for quality (don't go for quantity over quality). Think about signifiers of quality (high impact journals, citations, strategic co-authorship, winning grants, awards, prizes).
3. Be humble
4. Be confident
5. Build networks
6. Build a team and think about your lineage in the area
7. Be a global citizen
8. Have respect for others 

Why?

• Gain other perspectives on your research
• Make a difference on a world scale
• Build your career, get exposure
  
• Get access to data/equipment/research expertise
• Collaboration can enhance productivity 

How To

• Post-docs: don't wait for them to be advertised, get in touch with people and write yourself in on grant applications 
• Make contact with people: conferences, follow-up emails, phone
  
• Bring people here: be a good host
• Awards and exchange programs: Fulbright, Churchill etc. Get people outside your discipline to read applications.
• Show how your research adds value to the people who will host you
• Set things up in advance: lay the groundwork in advance
• Have a plan for what you want to achieve

Life as an Academic

One of the main themes of this session was that 'life as an academic' is not a homogenous category. The experiences of an academic who teaches and researches will different to those who are primarily research orientated. Even as you might move through different stages of academic life and life outside academia your focuses and experiences will vary. For example, starting a teaching/research job will demand a lot of time on teaching as you deal with new courses; small grants and teaching relief might allow more of a focus on research.

The audience was very interested in transition from postgraduate to academic: managing a shifting sense of identity, dealing with changing collegial relationships, the different skills required (like grant writing) and researching without the framework of the PhD and supervision. Dr Tanya Dalziell, the presenter, emphasised that the pleasures and passions of an academic life risk overwhelming 'having a life'. However, there is increasing institutional support for work/life balance and working as an academic enables you to pursue ideas and intellectual exchange in a way not possible elsewhere.

At the moment I'm procrastinating over two workshops that I need to prepare. I hate preping workshops and will spend days trying to prep and simultaneously avoiding it. On the other hand, philosophically and practically, I like workshops as a mode of teaching and learning. So why the disconnect?

Part of the problem, I suspect, is that for me workshops are about being in the moment: responding to the needs of students and their ideas and problems, and to do so requires a deep engagement with what is happening there and then. Coming up with a highly planned structure is the antithesis of being in the moment. Yet (of course) having a plan, and having the materials, and having the conceptual tools is what makes that 'in the moment' mode possible. It is easier when you have a sense of the group you will be working with, which in these cases I don't. Still, I'll try to come up with some activities and then see where that takes me. 

I hate being unwell. It might be my meglomanic conviction that the world will fall apart without me, or internalised childhood guilt about days off, but mostly I think it is the sheer misery of being overwhelming conscious of embodiment.

Now, with my academic hat on, I'd argue for the importance of embodiment: that the mind/body split impoverishes both these aspects of existence, that body and mind inform one another, that to ignore or supress the body has an intensely dubious history of power, priviledge and exploitation. Lying on the couch on Tuesday, focusing on breathing with Dr Phil on TV because that was as much as I could engage with intellectually, all I wanted was transcendence of the body.

A few days later and feeling better, I'm more aware of the taken-for-grantedness of my healthy body - that getting up in the morning with energy to do things isn't always the case. I'm also aware of the irony of one of my first reactions to feeling better, which was planning how to discipline my body to work harder, more efficiently and more healthily. Being told that you need to take better care of yourself (thanks mum) as yet another set of chores to add to a long list still feels, at the moment, like weight on the transcendence side of the argument.

I'm giving a lecture in an English unit later today: I've taught in this unit in the past, though this time I'm just doing the one guest lecture. I think that I'm coming down with the flu that is going around (I'll blame Sanna, despite the fact my sister is the more likely culprit!), but I'm taking drugs and have a box of tissues on hand, which might be enough to get me through the day.

Guest lecturing is a strange position, I'm finding. This lecture, in particular, is a convenient way to think about my development as a teacher and lecturer; it was my first ever lecture, inherited with one week's notice when the person supposed to be delivering it was unable to do so, and I wrote it out word for word, down to 'Hello, I'm Karen'. Looking around my computer yesterday for notes, I found the transcript for the second time I did the lecture. More emphasis on the headings and subheadings, with strangely incomplete half-sentences and paragraphs - moving away from the word-for-word but still clinging to its reassurances. I was surprised at how the arguments for the first remembered version had mutated, shifting from a perhaps for simple attempt to build a sustained and convincing argument about the topic to starting to think about that argument as a way to model ways to engage with the topic.

For this third, and hopefully lucky, version, the text I'm lecturing on has been changed (a different part of a series) and so much of the old material, centered around a close reading of one passage, is no longer directly relevant. Having looked over the text on Sunday morning, I pottered around for a few hours letting the ideas simmer away subconsciously. There is a lot to say, one central thing being that the structure of the text doesn't match the thematic drive. This structural mismatch for some reason also seemed to make it hard to conceptualise a clear lecture structure. In the end, I've made the tension between structure and theme the key to the lecture, and am running a deliberately provocative reading to the text, only gesturing to alternatives. I feel a little uneasy about this reading - not because it isn't valid, but because it is partial and I know exactly how to pull it apart. Still, all reading are partial and the way I want to perform this lecture is to make that point about the inadequacy of a single reading. This time, I'm working off a set of powerpoint slides, video clips, and one sparse page of handwritten notes (words and phrases).

As a guest lecturer, I'm conscious of how the lecture I've designed plays to an implied audience: I'm relying on the students having a particular set of interests and knowledges that I can guess from past experience that they are likely to have - but I don't know them, I don't know that for sure. One advantage, perhaps, of minimal preparation is that I'm less wedded to an exact content and can shift a little according to audience response. On the other hand, as a guest lecturer I can hope for some novelty value and the freedom to deliver the lecture and walk out without having to then worry about the next tutorial. Compared to the earlier versions however, pedagogically I'm now more interested in what students will do with the material I'm giving them - the connections that they will make not only within the context of the unit, but outward, in terms of vocation and skills and critical thinking and engagement with a subject matter that goes well beyond the academy.
 

Successful presentations at conferences require planning and practice. This workshop – specifically for Arts, Humanities and Social Science postgraduates – will cover topics including defining a topic of suitable scope, conveying your argument clearly to the audience, using powerpoint effectively, and general public speaking skills. The workshop will help you to gain confidence and perform well at conferences: useful skills with the Social and Cultural Studies Graduate Conference coming up (and the chance to win prizes for presentation skills).

The workshop will be held on Friday 7 September, 2-4pm, in Guild Seminar Room 1. Register to attend.

That's the official blurb, anyway. More informally, this will be a workshop for all those people who think that a conference presentation should be more than regurgitating a series of powerpoint dot points, who want to give a vibrant and engaging presentation even if the norm in their area of study is reading out written papers, and who generally want to share their interest in their topic with an audience!  

Want to set yourself up with some mad research skillz? The Research Skills workshops, starting Friday 10 August, can help you get start and continue to make progress in your PhD and Masters research. There are four session, each running for three hours - with tea, coffee and chocie bikkies included! 

Details about the workshops are available here, and also over on the myResearchSpace forums. You can register for the workshops here. 

Any questions? Leave a comment. 

In the quest to find some way to balance the job-thing and finishing-thesis-thing while maintaining some shreds of sanity (don't laugh!) I've decided that the key is good habits. There is no point in pretending that I can manage to live on sugar and caffiene for the next five months, just writing and not sleeping, and doing well at either of the things. So I am aiming for sustainable but solid work practices and balance. So here are my new habits:

1. Going to the gym again. Having fallen into a gym slump in the absence of my gym buddy - because gossip can motivate me to get out of bed, but machines of torture aka circuit and pump classes cannot - I'm trying to reverse the trend and get to the gym 3 times a week.
2. Restricted TV watching. As some of my previous frivolous posts might have shown, bad TV has to get pretty bad indeed to stop me watching it. My current scheme requires me to register with Housemate Sister a weekly roster of shows I am allowed to watch, while she has total control of the remote and permission to be Official TV Doorbitch.
3. A tidy study desk, with all the resources I need on hand. Any junk that tries to move onto the desk has to go to a proper home or the bin.
4. Blocks of time. Thesis writing time is two hours each weekday evening. That means the two hours have to be done, but also that once they are done I can switch off the computer and go to bed. 
5. Rolling Things To Do List. All the steps that need to be taken to get the thesis done get written down, and eventually crossed off. At the end of each evening's writing time, I select that tasks for the next day from the list. For example, tonight is two paragraphs of writing for Chapter 5, where I've blocked in the topic but haven't written the content, and one paragraph for Chapter 6. Small steps and attainable goals, that's my mantra.
6. And in a confession of potential New-Age wackiness, I've found that using an oil burner at my desk can help me get into writing headspace. I guess it is a sensory signal to myself to get to work, plus having the candle burning makes me feel like I shouldn't leave the room. 

Mathematics, Physical Science and Engineering

Award
Ajmal Mian (School of Computer Science and Software Engineering)
‘Three-dimensional model-based object recognition and segmentation in cluttered scenes’ in IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis & Machine Intelligence

Special Commendation
Desmond Lascelles (School of Earth and Geographical Sciences)
‘Black smokers and density currents: A uniformitarian model for the genesis of banded iron-formations’ in Ore Geology Reviews

Timothy Hillman (School of Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering)
‘Microscopic particle discrimination using spatially-resolved Fourier-holographic light scattering angular spectroscopy’ in Optical Society of America

Biological Sciences

Award
James Underwood (School of Animal Biology)
‘Multiple scales of genetic connectivity in a brooding coral on isolated reefs following catastrophic bleaching’ in Molecular Ecology

Special Commendation
Vanessa Bussau (Human Movement and Exercise Science)
‘The 10-s maximal sprint: a novel approach to counter an exercise-mediated fall in glycemia in individuals with type 1 diabetes’ in Diabetes Care

Humanities and Social Sciences (Qualitative)

Award
Elizabeth Newnham (School of Psychology)
‘Evaluating the clinical significance responses by psychiatric inpatients to the mental health subscales of the SF-36’ in Journal of Affective Disorders

Special Commendation
Bradley Farrant (School of Psychology)
'Specific language impairment, theory of mind, and visual perspective taking: evidence for simulation theory and the developmental role of language’ in Child Development

Humanities and Social Sciences (Qualitative)

Award
Wee Song Ernest Koh (School of Social and Cultural Studies)
‘On the margins of the “Economic Miracle”: Non English-literate Chinese workers in Singapore, 1980-1990’ in Tonan Aija Kenkyu

Special Commendation
Nicholas Herriman (School of Social and Cultural Studies)
‘“Sorcerer” killings in Banyuwangi: a re-examination of state responsibility for violence’ in Asian Studies Review

Clinical Medicine and Dentistry

Award
Angela Ives (School of Surgery and Pathology)
‘Pregnancy after *** cancer: population based study’ in British Medical Journal

Special Commendation
Gareth Baynam (School of Paediatrics and Child Health)
‘Parental smoking impairs vaccine responses in children with atopic genotypes’ in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology

Creative Works

Award
Marcella Polain for The Edge of the World (Fremantle Arts Centre Press)

Special Commendation
Terrence Dowling for Basic Black: Tales of Appropriate Fear (Cemetery Dance Publications)