Time flies! I can’t believe summer is ending and another academic year is rolling closer. For much of the past few months, I’ve been alternating between intense academic focuses (e.g. conferences) or trying to cram in family time. Whoever said academics were lucky getting a long summer off clearly weren’t doing a PhD. It certainly hasn’t felt restful! Since I accidentally disappeared from this blog for a couple of months, I figured now is a good time for updates on life, research, and what I’m doing.
Academic Updates
A bit of a different layout than my usual goal setting pages! As I am approaching the end of drafting and moving more into editing mode, this tick-box list will hopefully give me some direction. I basically have the whole thing done – the discussion chapters are written, I know what is happening where – but there is a lot to perfect. The introduction/literature review section detailed above a re-write of previous drafts written in 2019, aiming to help the reader understand the context of my research and what it builds on. As the project has gone on, my angle has changed and new threads emerged, so I have quite a bit to do in this area. But it has brought up some interesting points I might explore further in future!
Author/Storyteller
What is an author? I’m becoming more and more like my primary supervisor with these questions. At least I now get why he pestered me with the ‘what is a book?’ question for a year! (Note to supervisor: this is not an invitation to bring that question back) It seems like such a simple question – we know what an author is! – but then when you actually dig into it… So much of our definition of authorship builds from the Romantic genius built up for copyright and publication purposes. But such a definition, or any definition really, is shaped by the context in which it is created. Our current context is somewhat different.
In trying to nail down my own definition, I’ve done a LOT of reading. So many scholars either responding to the Romantic author we’re familiar with or Barthes and Foucault‘s questioning of the relevance of the author. My attempts to minimise the role of Foucault in my dissertation: thwarted. Looking further back in history to think about how we went from oral storytellers to text-based authors has been more fun though. What is the difference between an author and a storyteller? Nowadays, not so much. So many of the traits that can be used to differentiate the Romantic author from a storyteller now also apply to contemporary authors. I feel like there’s a future research project here!
The Individual Author
Another really interesting connection that has come up as I’ve been diving back into the history of the author is the idea of individuality in society. I read an interesting article about identity at one point that suggested our perception of identity has gone through phases. In pre-modern times, kinship was key. You could tell someone’s social class, where they came from, and maybe even their profession just by knowing their last name. Their identity was shaped by the world they were born into. As society became more capitalist, social mobility became easier and thus kinship was a less predictable marker of identity. Identity could be shaped by the individual.
Interestingly, this roughly matches up with when the notion of author as original, singular genius comes about. Books needed an owner, an originator, to facilitate copyright, but it’s interesting to me that this also aligns with the changing cultural perspective around the individual. It really emphasises the way our definitions are shaped by cultural context!
Author Updates
The next wave of Shifting Sands will come on the 17th of September! As always, if you’re signed up to the newsletter, you’ll get access to various filetypes via Google Drive. If not, use the above link. It’s taking me longer than I hoped to get the next book ready – PhD, you know? – but hopefully I’ll get there sometime soonish. Probably not before I finish though. Sorry everyone!
Other than that, I haven’t really been feeling very author-y lately. Again, it’s the whole salinity of identity thing. Research is currently my central focus and so other aspects of my identity take a back seat. If I was an author full-time, or worked a clearly delineated 9-to-5 job, maybe I’d be better at juggling both. Other authors, any advice? I’d love to hear other people’s experiences!
Life Updates
Looking back at the goals I set at the start of the year, I’ve done pretty well on the academic front. Even outside of the dissertation itself, I’ve got a few successes under my belt. I presented at this year’s SHARP conference, which is the biggest in my field. Due to major technical issues, it was a small audience, but I have stayed in contact with the other panelists, which is nice. I’m giving a guest lecture at the end of September (nervous!) and have another conference at the end of the year. And, after so long working on it. I finally have my HEA Fellowship. Yay! (For those who don’t know, this is basically a teaching qualification for Higher Education)
Outside of the successes, I’ve been having some health struggles that have impacted both my academic and author updates. I’ve spent the better part of the last two months needing to sleep all the time and feeling like my bones are lead weights. Not great for getting things done! It also really disrupts my preferred delusion that I am a brain floating in space. I could whine a lot about this, but the TLDR is just generally avoid Covid. I got it in 2020 and I’m still having issues in the aftermath. So, if you’ve been wondering why I disappear for stretches of time, it’s usually because I have turned into some kind of koala. At least I look cuddly?
So, that’s my updates. How are you all doing?
