New Media Working Group

Professionalization Workshop with Gail

23 October 2014

ANSWERS

Managing StressFrom Your Heart’s Desire by Sonia Choquette (yes, a

psychic): Rule #1: Travel Lightly.

“Don’t burden yourself with useless notions, secondhand opinions, or ‘reality’ as other people have explained it to you.”

Rule #2: Take Responsibility for Your Dream.Decide what you are going to create. Your creativity

has made manifest many things in your life already.Don’t waste your emotions (worrying, being upset).

Don’t surrender your creative power to others (anger, blame, etc.). “They will not use it to make you any happier.”

The worst case: “Even a horrible scenario holds the potential for you to tap the most profound genius in yourself.” Believe that you will figure out what you need to do.

Managing Stress (cont’d).Rule #3: Don’t Be a Control Freak!

There can be no guarantees ahead of time. “The kind of assurance the control freak wants is an earned gift, the product of courage and risk, which cannot be attained in advance.”

“Wanting the promise of a certain outcome means that you limit what you give and in turn diminish what you get. Finally, avoiding disappointment means avoiding life itself, because disappointment is a necessary teacher to let us know when we fall off our path and need to take a new direction.”

Managing Stress (cont’d.)Physical exercise: yoga, walking, dance

Reflection/Connecting with yourself and higher spirit: journaling, meditation, prayer, retreats, travel

Connecting with others: Tell your partner(s)/friends wht you really need. Be honest with yourself and them.

Build skill in experiencing your emotions, setting healthy limits (this includes finding balance), and getting perspective Gail recommends:

EBT and Wired for Joy! by Laurel Mellin Loving What Is by Byron Katie

Managing Your Time and Multitasking

Research First.* Acknowledge the priority of research mentally. Give your research all of your time when you can. Even when you cannot give your research time, give it

your focus. (Do “everything else” using 10% of your brain power/energy.)

Research Always (in little bits, if need be).* If you have 5 minutes on BART, good. If you have 10

minutes between meetings, great. “I touched my project for 30 minutes today.” #writingsprint writing groups, support groups

*Applies only if your true Heart’s Desire is an R1 job, which it may not be. However, you are at an R1 institution now and doing great research and scholarship is your priority now.

Managing Your Time and Multitasking

Balancing and managing your tasks and your brainpower/energy and the different arenas of your work (research/teaching/service) may mean understanding the two Quadrants.

Stephen Covey’s Quadrants of Time

Management

The Quadrants of Mastery

Publishing Your Work in Journals

Famous journals

Respectable journalsLegit publisher (univ. press preferable but others

also ok)Famous editorial board members

Probably journals in two fields

CFPs

Network

Service, Conferences, and Networking

Do service. Service is very, very important. Interview like an Assistant Professor. At the least, help yourself by building your service

skills.

Organize talks/visiting lectures/conference panels with your favorite scholars “I’m a huge fan of your work. I’m using your

idea/theory of X in my dissertation chapter on Y.” “I’m writing about Z right now. One of my major

inspirations is your work on A.”

Publishers who want to meet with you at conferences: BE CAREFUL. Do not sign any contracts unless it is your dream press.

Which Conferences?Film Studies, TV Studies, Media Studies, New

Media Studies: SCMS, [MiT]

TV Studies, Fan Studies, Cultural Studies: Console-ing Passions, Flow, [Transmedia: Hollywood]

Digital Humanities: HASTAC

English, Comp Lit, any language/literature department: MLA, ACLA

Theater, Dance, Performance Studies: ATHE, PSi

How to pick others? The other people going (senior scholars or a great network).

DissertatingResearch First

Finding the cutting edge: try your “pitch” out lots of times

Dissertation vs. publishing articlesDon’t publish too much of the dissAim for two publications, at least one in a peer-

reviewed journal, besides the dissThe diss is the main thing the job search

committees will look atBut articles can be great second projectsAND you need to publish something

Book reviews can be good but don’t count as journal pubs

Managing UpBe a buzzing bumblebee, not the quiet mouse hiding

in the corner!!

How good are they at managing their time and tasks? Ping them Weekly/Daily reminders for deadlines

Ask your diss advisors how to progress from lit review to interesting/important/new/original intervention.

For that matter, ask them how to do an effective lit review.

For that matter, ask any time you have technical questions about your research and writing, as well as when you have ideas to bounce around or writing to show them.

Handling/Navigating Writing Critiques

Read Ann Patchett’s This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage (the chapters about writing).Hard to hear feedback when it’s you, easier to

learn from others getting feedbackLearn when to listen and when to ignore feedbackDevelop your internal editor’s eyes, ear, and voice

(use this voice only after you’ve completed some writing, not before or during writing)

Develop your gut instinct about what to change and what not to change, what advice is worth following and what not

Writing projects always feel better as ideas than as writing. When you write something down, you kill the idea and make something real. This can feel very, very hard.

Learning to write good/great scholarship

takes time and frequency and practice:

Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000 hours. Yoga Ann Patchett’s story-due-every-week It’s not about your innate value or your moral worth. It is

about mechanics. When you have the mechanics in place, the art comes. Turn down commitments, protect your time Short bursts whenever you can, long stretches whenever you

can Every day Accountability Where do you write well? “If you are going through hell, keep going.”

What is your process? (Mine is usually: two drafts and then a LOT of rearranging, and then revision.)

Choosing & Positioning Yourself for Future

DepartmentsProbably pivoting between two major fields

Does not mean that you will get a job in a department with these fields’ names in its title

Deciding and naming QE fields

Defining yourself through conferences/journalsAffiliation with senior scholars

RecommendationsOr simply your own genealogy, the “school” you are

working in

The Academic Job MarketChronicle.com, H-Net, HASTAC

Gail’s rules:You and your partner(s) rank jobs independently of

one anotherCustom job letters (not scattershot approach)Managing up in terms of letter writing

Prep intensively for, and role-play, your interviews (Skype, in-person prelim, campus visit)

Jobs Outside Academia Think about non-faculty jobs inside academia, also – or

research jobs at not-for-profit institutions

HASTAC, Indeed.com, LinkedIn

TBH, a Master’s would suffice for most

You cannot prep for both at same time but you can keep a hand in a former life or cultivate professional network and skills in a future one Weekend and summer jobs Consulting and project-oriented work-for-hire jobs

More school (I know, I know)

Be the A+ person, that means hunger

OR get “just” the paying gig and work towards your dream job

Academic Jobs Adjuncting/lecturerships are not the end of the world

anymore Road to T-T Permanent lectureship

SLACs can be hard

R1s can be hard

The best would be a postdoc, but could mean 2 or 3 moves

Why people don’t get tenure: No book (quantitative underachievement). People don’t get your work, don’t recognize/value its importance

(qualitative underachievement).

You definitely have to want it more than anyone wants you to have it. (They may want it for you, too, but not as much as you want it for yourself.) The Hollywood movie star thing.

Motivating Yourself Personal mission, calling, destiny

Yoda

Mantras, prayer, creative visualization, Heart’s Desire, theme songs, name your journey

If you fail, so what? Milton’s failure The lesson of life disappointments

But if you fail to fulfill your personal mission, it’s far worse. (Not everyone’s mission is work-related but you can’t do a job that you despise forever and ever.)

When you succeed at your personal mission, there is nothing better. (It’s never easy, but it can be good and hard.)

Think about that a**hole from Harvard interviewing for the same job as you: Don’t let him get your job!!!