Life in Thesis-land : ac(k!)ademia

Virtual Research Week

Karen.Hall — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 01:42:00 GMT

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!

Liveblogging Research Careers Week

Karen.Hall — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 01:11:00 GMT

I'm currently sitting in the foyer of the Tattersall Lecture Theatre, waiting for the PSA Research Careers Week to begin. Friday was a little bit crazy with all the last-minute preparation, but here we are now ready to go. The first session - right now, if you are reading this in real time - is on 'Life as an Academic', but there will be things happening all day, so come on down!

Be My Guest

Karen.Hall — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 01:44:00 GMT

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.

The Wait is Over!

Karen.Hall — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 08:25:00 GMT

I blogged a while ago about things I was waiting to hear back on: the news is that my crazy week of application writing paid off! This week I've begun a six-month position as Graduate Education Officer here at UWA and I've also recieved a Whitfield Fellowship - a six-month, 0.5 role - that will begin after the GEO job finishes. In terms of the thesis, this means that I have six months to get it done and in - a slightly overwhelming prospect, but I'm trying to spin it to myself as an exciting challenge. (This is also a partial excuse for my recent blog silence).

What does this all mean for this blog space? A few different things, I think. Firstly, I'll need to articulate and post my 'ethics of blogging' because while considerations of professionalism, privacy and appropriate topics have always informed what I've chosen to put up here, this job means that I could be read as not just speaking for and about myself - even if that is all I'm planning to do. Secondly, I plan on using this blog as a reflective space to talk in particular about issues to do with thesis research and writing as part of the job. And finally, I guess it means that you'll still be hearing from me for another year, as I make the transition to early career researcher - so hopefully you the reader aren't sick of me yet!

As long as a piece of string...

Karen.Hall — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 03:59:00 GMT

After Wayne's post on waiting for responses, I thought I'd share my current state of waiting with the blogosphere. At the moment I am waiting on:

any news about the edited collection I've had a chapter accepted for
to find out when the one-off editorial job is ready to go (because despite the mountain of typos in this blog, I can proof when I have to) [And in a stunning example of blogging the lost, I've just been emailed about the job - cosmos, can I please find my silver bracelet?]
any news about the job application I put in last week (have I mentioned I hate writing selection criteria?)
and a fellowship application as well

Unlike Wayne, I'm mostly content to put these things out into the universe and not think about them till they come back: after all, there isn't much I can do at this point. (My attitude may change, of course, when I hit serious job-hunting time). Instead, I'm focusing on the immediate return I get from constructing the things to send. The job application forced me to articulate my feelings on what a postgraduate education should do, and how the university can enable this doing. I also got to come up with a response to the criteria of 'excellent communication skills and teamwork' that was better than 'I shower semi-regularly and ask permission before punching colleagues' - honestly, what do they expect to hear? And the fellowship application has put in place the foundations of my five-years to world domination and/or an academic job plan.

Now I'll go back to waiting. One a side-note, I got a rejection letter from a previous job application about three months after applying - by that stage I'd figured the rejection out already.

Heading Towards the Light...

Karen.Hall — Tue, 29 May 2007 04:43:00 GMT

I've been heading towards the light (ie, completing various tasks that having been taking over my life) for the last few weeks - hence my virtual silence and in-person whining. I like the 'light' metaphor, not only because it insinuates the semi-comatose state I've been in at times - almost oversleeping the bus stop when going to pick up my car on Monday was not a good sign! - but also because it is vaguely optimistic. Volume 13 of Limina has been launched, only one week of teaching left with the marking edging towards done, and maybe someday soon my current chapter will finally link up into coherence. So if you see me wandering around campus looking a little out of it, maybe it means I'm headed for a better place: head down into the final chapter in the semester break.

Communities of Research

Karen.Hall — Tue, 15 May 2007 02:54:00 GMT

I'm always fascinated by acknowledgement sections, in books and in theses, as a textual trace of the narratives and experiences underlying the formal, often disembodied, academic writing following that introduction. Seeing the acknowledgements section from a friend's recently submitted thesis emphasised to me how the acknowledgements section is one space where we can talk about the communities of scholarship we participate in, in an affective as well as intellectual way. Another reminder - for me anyway - that research is always embedded in a human context.