The View From Kalamazoo

Exhibits Hall to a medievalist is a lot like a candy shop to a chocoholic.

Now I gots:

Bremmer, Jan N. and Jan R. Veenstra, eds. The Metamorphosis of Magic

Broedel, Hans Peter. The Malleus Maleficarum and the Construction of Witchcraft

Elliott, Dyan. Fallen Bodies

Edwards, Kathryn A. Werewolves, Witches and Wandering Spirits

Green, Monica, trans. & ed. The Trotula

Griffiths, Bill. Aspects of Anglo-Saxon Magic
Maxwell-Stuart, P.G. Witchcraft

Rose, Elliot. A Razor for a Goat

Toth, Emily. Ms. Mentor’s Impeccable Advice for Women in Academia

And ordered three more on the spot to get the free shipping – hopefully will get them shortly and will report back on them later.

[I’ve run out of shelf space, and floor space to bring one of the bookshelves up from the basement. Erg.]

Plus I bought a book (one of the castle stories) to donate to Emma’s classroom from Usborne, and the bound collection of castle stories for home for the kids. I need to get a card for Em’s teacher to go with the amberlicious gift I’ve gotten, and I don’t know if I also want to get her a GC at the Teacher’s Center or something – she’s really gone all out and has likely gained a sizeable amount of gray from the experience. I’d nominate her for sainthood if I could. I also need to figure out if I should (and what to get) get something for the teacher down the hall Em’s been spending some afternoons with for reading help and her teacher consultant, since they’ve only been on the scene for the last few months, or will a card do.

Dunno.

I want to make an additional reply to a specific point in Dorthea Salo’s reply to Not letting the door hit us on the ass on our way out… but it’s a response I don’t want to get lost in the land of Discussion so I’m tossing it all back on the front burner.

She writes “I also think Drout mischaracterizes what the dream *is*. The Ph.D is NOT NOT NOT the terminal goal for (I would argue) 95+% of those who enter Ph.D programs. THE TENURED JOB IS THE TERMINAL GOAL. If that goal is out of reach for a substantial percentage of those who try for and/or achieve Ph.Ds, then Drout and his ilk are doing them a hell of a disservice, wasting a lot of their lives on a lie.”

Certainly this is a good point – there is simply not a tenure-track position for every Ph.D. produced. I don’t think this is necessarily the problem. My ultimate goal is that elusive Good Faculty Position I’ll readily admit. Given my experience there are a variety of non-faculty positions that I might consider and that may be a good match that I simply cannot be considered for without a Ph.D. Positions within university administration that may or may not have teaching responsibilities, at university presses, and with any number of libraries and museums are filled by people with doctorates who may or may not ever had the Great Offer. And these people are happy, active professionals within their fields – I work with great examples. If I just roll over now I can’t ever hope for anything much beyond the clerical morass because I will not be qualified on paper for any position I may be qualified for based on experience without the Ph.D. Community colleges that used to hire M.A.s to teach are now looking for Ph.D.s – the adage that what once required a high school graduate now requires an applicant with a bachelors filters up from there.

Perhaps part of the problem is that when discussing graduate school, when discussing the great professional hereafter, I hear (both from people giving me advice that they think is in my best interest, and scores of online sources of discussion) tenure-tenure-tenure – the response from the adjunct left out of that scheme, the abuses of that system and of graduate-level instructors. I hear very little about good professional opportunities that will utilize the Ph.D. Not everyone is a born teacher – and not everyone is a born administrator. The best I’ve found of one I’ve only in the rareest instances found were also skilled in the other. There is a place for bright, well-educated people who can’t or not otherwise inclined to find themselves in long-term faculty positions.

Yeah, the job market sucks – it sucks all over. It really sucks if you’re only looking at faculty positions in choice schools in attractive areas of the country. There’s more out there. There’s more to being an academic than academia, if you will, and there’s more to academia than the tenure-track position. To cull the herd also means to take some of the best and brightest away from positions at the Getty and other institutions, away from presses and publishing houses interested in academics with skills beyond the classroom, away from administrative positions that, frankly, a whole lot of university folks may want to avoid, anyway.

Library of Alexandria discovered

So. This afternoon the boss suddenly announced to the office that we should write a limerick that included the rhyme flotilla and Totila.

Seriously.

So this is what I came up with (note I was the only one who did as bidden…). He has suggested I do 5-10 in Leavenworth for impersonating a poet, ’cause it didn’t start “There once was a…”, but I think it’s pretty darn good considering I don’t do Goths (or anything else that early). So there.

The 6th century Gothic flotilla

sent by that plunderer, ol’ King “Totila”,

would take Greece (he thought),

but a eunuch he got

so that was the end of Baduila.

Everyone’s a critic…

5-10. Bah.

I got this joke from a 20-something with ADD. It’s very funny if you live with ADD/ADHD in some way. It’s Emma dead-on.

Q: How many kids with Attention Deficit Disorder does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: Let’s go ride bikes

I’ll post more about my last week later – it’s time for a little catching up with commentary and more navel contemplation. For those who are following along at home the result of my ingesting many empty calories and suffering under the yoke of fried foods in the caf was my weight holding steady despite my brief interlude last night with Ben & Jerry. I’ll write it up, call it the Guinness diet, make millions. Considering where I am and where I’m not it may be a viable career option, hm?

I already posted a bit about the recent and dire Village Voice warning and acknowledged the departure of IA from both academe and her oft-read blog. Since the point I stopped having much time to catch up with the blogs I read IA has been joined by Erin O’Connor of Critical Mass. Lots of discussion all over, including Easily Distracted responding to last Wednesday’s entry at In the Shadow of Mt. Hollywood , and a reaction to it all at CM. Lots more out there, I assure, you, I’m just not linking to it all.

This all doesn’t begin discussion of the Issues Within the Profession – the same problems invoked in the last week are the same blogged about for months and months before at these linked, and other, academe-focused blogs. I admit I had reacted sharply when Erin O’Connor commented in her announcement “It is agreed that there is a massive overproduction of Ph.D.’s, and that departments that are contributing to this massive overproduction of Ph.D.’s are grossly irresponsible toward grad students even as they serve their own needs very well (they get the cheap labor they need to get freshman comp taught, and they get a pool of smart, interesting students to whom faculty can administer narcissistically gratifying graduate courses).” The academy is a mess. Tenure is clearly (no argument from me, at this point, whether this is a good thing or a bad thing) on the way out. Michael Drout at Wormtalk ain’t kidding when he responds: “Sometimes we should be a little Foucaultian about ourselves: reducing the “overproduction” of Ph.D.s makes guiltless 22-25 year-olds suffer the loss of their dreams for the benefit of other people. Fewer Ph.D.s would make for better lives and better remuneration and better prospects for those who already have them: as Foucault points out, self-interest dressed up as humanitarianism has a particularly bad record, historically.” I am feeling the pain of being crushed between that particular rock and that particular hard place. Does my drive to move forward in the face of this mess, in the face of a job market that’s truly heinous, despite advice (or veiled commentary) to [insert scary voice here] “Go Back Before It’s Too Late!” and witnessing the jumping ship of a lot of sharp folks a heckuva lot more brilliant than I a sign of dedication or stupidity? Is it sadism to read regularly about the abuse I will suffer and still have sent out all of those (fruitless, in hindsight) applications?

I read Should you go to grad school? by Tim Burke . His short answer is no, and his long answer sounds a lot like no, as well. He’s happy, he’s successful, he’s certain that grad school leads only to despair so please ignore the man behind the curtain.

Square one.

It’s the last day. For this and strong coffee and many other things I am grateful.

Made it through the Great and Glorious Saturday Dance intact. The DJ played I Wanna Be Sedated for me, as always. ‘Cause, you know, I did. (Hell, I do now.)

I shook my fat ass.

There were witnesses.

Now, of course, like every Sunday-of-Congress I feel wrecked. The dorm bed is awful, I get next to no sleep, and have been working at such a high stress level that I feel wrung out.

I made it to a couple of sessions, a few receptions, had lunch with TG (an honor at this point – there are a lot of draws on his time) and caught-up and that was Very Good. Had a lot of Good, Important, and Fruitful conversations and I appreciate the professional generosity of many. I bought many books. I no longer have any excuses to put off working on my June paper. (I’m the first of the first day of non-concurrent sessions. No pressure.)

Lots of nice folks have wandered by and told me they’ve had a lovely time and offered many thanks. It’s helpful to have positive feedback for the obvious reasons, and a little injection to sprits sinking low the face of crises and crabbiness and sheer exhaustion.

I’ve also been yelled at, emoted to, and accused of insensitivity beyond the bounds of the moons and stars. Yes, the construction is All My Fault. So is the weather, a paper cancelled You Really Wanted To See, and your watch set to central instead of eastern time. Despite the fact that the Program states that badges are required to attend the dance (page vi), the shuttle to hotels with special blocks for the conference is limited (page vi-vii), and we must have firm cut-off date for cancellation with refund, anyone inconvenienced by these and unhindered by foreknowledge of these through a cursory reading of their Program should blame me for these things, as well.

Next year I’m getting a t-shirt made up that states, clearly, “It’s All My Fault.” That will save the inconvenience of having to inform me and free up schedules otherwise bogged down by the responsibility of clueing me in.

I receive all sins. I will be slaughtered for the good of the community Sunday afternoon.

I’m glad it’s over – I always am. It’s a lot of prep and anticipation and planning, it’s here, and then I’m glad it’s done. We’ve already started on next year, so apart from the aftermath and post-mortem meetings I can look forward. I think I’ll not submit a proposal to organize a special for next year – maybe I’ll try to give a paper again. Or not – despite the cost I rather like going away to give papers. I think it’s easier to take a person seriously when they aren’t also the person you complain to when the men’s room is out of paper towel.

And the beat goes on.

Making copies. Many, many copies for tonight’s concert.

Will report more later, but things are Nuts. Crazy. Hectic.

And I need more sleep. And a beer tonight.

Topic of discussion that has come up: a lot of people who I would think may barely know of my existance know of this blog. Ok, entirely possible that it’s more than lot. I blogged about this question before, but I will have to ponder longer. Did any committee use this bit of electronic boredom to weed me out?

Opinions from any of you unknown-to-me readers out there? Bueller?

Ok, back to copies. Toner, ho!

Epact: Scientific Instruments of Medieval and Renaissance Europe

Epact is an electronic catalogue of medieval and renaissance scientific instruments from four European museums: the Museum of the History of Science, Oxford, the Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza, Florence, the British Museum, London, and the Museum Boerhaave, Leiden. Together, these museums house the finest collections of early scientific instruments in the world.

Thanks for Mirabilis.ca for the link

Vatican goes wireless