Epistemographer

Several years ago, the faculty in my department decided that the length of time between the dissertation defense and the actual filing of the dissertation was far more than preferable (in some cases, stretching up to a year or more). With that in mind, they instituted a sort of gatekeeping mechanism, a “pre-defense” that would ensure the quality of the dissertations as students got to the defense proper.

Initially, many grad students were dubious – “What the hell, this is just one more hoop to jump through!” The pre-defense, however, has grown into a really useful aspect of the graduate experience; discussion of the actual mechanics of the dissertation gets shifted to the pre-B, freeing the defense itself up for a discussion of the broader issues and implications of the dissertation.

So, my pre-defense was today. I spent about two hours in a room with my advisors this afternoon, and I can honestly say that I haven’t thought that hard in months (if not years). There are a few aspects of my dissertation that I need to explain better, but for the most part the general structure is sound – the general work-to-be-done seems to be on the order of adding more depth rather than fundamental reorganization. This is good, and reassuring.

That said, it’s back to work for me. A defense date has been set for July 30th, and I’ve got a lot to do before then. That in mind, however, the end is most definitely in sight.

As for what’s next, there’s news a-coming (I’m waiting for final confirmation before announcing it here)…

Not much to report here – drove to Ithaca last night, managed class this morning (can’t say that I taught really, since peer review of my students’ research papers was on the agenda), and spent the afternoon just chatting with students and faculty around the department. Still no job news yet to report, and the dissertation is out of my hands for another week and a half yet.

The exciting bit, though, is that I currently have all sorts of weird things running through my bloodstream – today, I got vaccine shots for Hepatitis A, Yellow Fever and Tetanus/Diptheria, as well as the beginning of an 8-day oral course of Typhoid vaccine. All this so that I can safely spend a few weeks in Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands, where I also have to be careful about mosquitos (to avoid malaria and other nasties) as well as unpeeled fruit and drinking water (cholera, among others).

In general, I’m all for pushing one’s boundaries through travel, but there’s something deeply unsettling about the extent to which my body needs to be prepared for this trip. Thankfully, the only side effects of all these foreign substances coursing through my veins are a growing soreness in my arms and a sleepiness that seems to be setting in far earlier than my usual 3-4am bedtime…

So, I’m back in Brooklyn, where the sky is blue and the air is crisp – this was always my favorite time of the year weather-wise, though the specter of seasonal allergies cast a long shadow of my enjoyment of Spring until recently (thanks, Claritin/Sudafed/allergy shots!).

For the first time in at least a year and a half, I left Ithaca on Thursday taking no dissertation research whatsoever with me. A several-hundred page stack of paper is sitting in each of my advisor’s mailboxes, and though it’s far from perfect (or complete, really), I feel satisfied enough to take a few days off and actually relax. The thing I need most right now is distance from my writing so that I can engage with its flaws without knowing what I meant to say, so I’m doing a little freelance programming for the next week.

Even more, I’m going to read something. I grabbed Jonathan Lethem’s The Fortress of Solitude from the Cornell Library, though I haven’t started it yet. Also, volume 2 of Neal Stephensen’s Baroque Cycle, Confusion, just hit stores, but I don’t think I can justify taking on that sort of reading project just yet (I’ll save it for the summer).

Via Creative Commons:

We are very excited to announce the launch of the Science Commons exploratory phase, for which we recently secured funding.

The process will build upon Creative Commons’ work in the sciences (e.g., our licensing of Public Library of Science publications). But, crucially, Science Commons will delve into both legal areas (patents, data) and subject matter (biomedicine) outside the scope of our current organization.

This is just wicked cool, and they’re hiring an executive director…I wonder if they’d like a live-in sociologist/historian of science once they open an office?