Juniorprof under Pile of Papers...

Nuff said..

Juniorprof trying to transition

I forgot that when classes end, service and grading don't. Another mile suddenly appeared at the end of the marathon, right when the mental buzz of all the summations of brilliance in class could have led directly into creative energy for my own writing. I am now suffering from lactic acid buildup in the brain. Any suggestions about how best to transition, when that last party, last graduation ceremony, last committee meeting for the year finally occurs?

Minority Issues

I was reminded recently how easily one can forget the peculiarities of minority life in the academy, even when one is a minority of sorts. Whether that minority status stems from sexual orientation or ethnic or racial identity, the academy is still built for white men. That is not to say that I don't have some lovely white male colleagues, but rather that the institution of post-graduate learning was structured for a particular exclusivity, one founded generations ago in the western expansion of Europe. Those walls are crumbling, but we fight different parts of them. I have my own battles, but I am more interested in yours. What is minority life in the academy like for you? What issues matter (when one gets through the idiocies of daily life)? What would truly improve your experience?

Academic Spring Cleaning

The air is full of pollen and the birds have become an inordinately early alarm clock. It's spring. My office is the next space to be cleaned. I can no longer see my desk. Peering out at students between large stacks of unfiled lectures, publishing fliers, conference announcements, student papers, drafts of yet-unpublished articles and book chapters, articles to read, etc. is starting to drive me nuts. So I am issuing a general call for all junior faculty to indulge themselves in a bit of spring cleaning. Good for the soul; good for the mind.

Juniorprof playing hooky

I'm supposed to be at a faculty event. But the sun is out, the birds are singing, and the Riesling is flowing. And I couldn't find a parking space. So, I'm playing hooky.

Playing hooky is a lost art for junior faculty. I have, for instance, discussed the nature of the superego, the poignant critique of Kara Walker's art, and the latest teen idol movie, which seems really for thirty-somethings.

Is anyone else playing hooky?

Is Tenure Liberating?

From Farley Katz in March 23rd's New Yorker.

Insomnia in the Academy

So I get really tired of dreaming that I am teaching.  I already have to spend multiple hours in the classroom and in preparation for being in the classroom, so why should I also have to spend the wee hours of the morning dream-prepping for a class that does not exist or trying to figure out why I have no trousers on??

I am taking a commiserative poll.  What's your best/worst teaching dream?

Do academics have image disorders?

WebMD defines "dysmorphia" as a body image disorder. No doubt standing in front of students multiple times a week can bring on bouts of self-alienation, but perhaps there is something more to academic dysmorphia.

First, the lack of publication parties suggests to me that we are not getting the most out of our Moments.

Second, the never-ending process that is academia has a tendency to reduce those Moments into moments.

Third, different fields have different time-lines for publication. In my field, two years is a normal wait between the submittable draft and the final beautiful product, which then takes another few years to get "digested" by the field. By that time I don't even remember what I wrote, much less have Investment in it.

If you looked in a "skinny mirror" that corrected academic dysmorphia, what would you see? Did you mail out copies of your articles and books to everyone? Including your dean?

Juniorprof taking the day off

A day off? What does one do with oneself? My secular approach to Easter has involved mimosas, a pastry that looked like a duck, new summer sandals, and some guilt about not grading that stack of papers. After the mimosas, however, I am feeling less guilty.

What are your strategies for taking the day off?

Notes From the Coffee House

Behind every good book is a good coffeehouse. (In my opinion).

Locating the best environment to support your writing endeavors is a must. Me, I like the coffeehouse, perhaps because I practically lived in any one of several hip coffeehouses as an undergrad and, being a modern nomad, nowhere else quite says "home" to me. This institution, invented as one scholar suggests in the meeting of virtuosi culture and popular consumer behavior, has all the ingredients of being an office (table, chair, wifi, coffee) without being an office (colleagues, students, bad coffee, requests of more work, etc.). Not that I dislike my office, but institutional settings are not good for my writing muses (except for the grant-writing muses, which for some reason live in my real office).

Every coffeehouse has a personality. Take the one I am currently sitting in: there are birds all over the walls, which I am finding somewhat disturbing, but which say "this is a trendy spot where local artists seek self-display." A pastor chats with a congregant about his future ("I am in the south after all"). The radio is tuned to NPR ("progressive") and I have the option of trying four different types of regular coffee ("we are not Starbucks"). I wonder if the personality of the coffee shop somehow makes its way into our writing, some sense of space that shapes our prose voice or rhythm?

The Grading Blues

I have the grading blues. Great papers and terrible papers are not my problem. It's those in the middle--that awkward sentence that I can't figure out how to fix, that slightly-off-the-mark summary that is sort of right, but not right, that structural issue that requires a lot of thinking to discern. It gives me a headache.

How many minutes per paper? How much commentary? Do you type your comments or write them at the end of the paper?

Help, help... I have the grading blues.

Bloopers

What Not To Do: Prof caught doing work for other class in class...

I had this brilliant idea. Use group work time in one class to tackle that HUGE stack of papers that was supposed to be done yesterday. I read four lines of one essay. Three students, in about as many seconds, inquired into what I was doing. I think they feared I was grading their papers, but I can't quite shake the look of surprise when they discovered they were papers from another class...

Sigh. So much for multi-tasking.

Winning Back the Class

So every juniorprof has a moment (or two or three) where the classroom encounter fails to produce that rosy meeting of the minds. The realities of being stared at for an hour or more crash into the misty-eyed expectations of erudite conversation and we look woefully out at the questioning (or sleeping) faces of our young audiences. On the one hand, this experience means that we will all have a fondness for Kafka. On the other hand, those of us whose graduate schools failed to include an acting class need simpler approaches to the all-important: How to Win Back the Class.

Some Strategies for Winning Back the Class (which need some work, please share!)

1. Bring Cookies
2. Group Work
3. Invent Stand-up Routines
4. Make liberal use of Youtube clips
5. Reference Family Guy or The Office
6. Read Books entitled "Conversation Starters"
7. Practice Public Self-Disclosure
8. Invite Public Self-Disclosure
9. Revisit the Big Questions