On academic in between-ness
Or what a Fall term looks like for this recent graduate. What I am doing, how are my podcasts going, what I am reading, and what I am listening to.
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What I am doing and how I am doing
Hello, all you happy (and not-so happy) people!
Here in Scotland we are approaching Week 4 of the Autumn Term, which means that every grant application was due yesterday and that class prep must co-exist with job applications that inevitably all use different (and differently confusing) archaic submission portals. Also, in my case, I am signing teaching contracts while trying to figure out the correct paperwork to send to HR so that my pay grade may reflect my new “Dr.” status and simultaneously working out if my mother should travel to attend my graduation ceremonies.
First things first: being busy in academia is generally a good sign and I am very lucky to be employed. Second things second: This business is still a mix between part-time, limited-contract employment and hours of labour poured into begging for grant money that may never come. I believe it’s important to keep the cyclical industry frenzy into perspective, both for those of us who work within academia and those who encounter our narratives about work, overwork, and burnout.
“Ok, thanks for the disclaimer”, you say, “but what now?”. What now indeed. Every newly-minted PhD I have talked to has a different experience of their time post-viva, from deep depression, to overwhelming relief. Some people start tackling the academic job market immediately and more and more of us are aiming straight for the non-academic work world. Then there are people like me, who are in between. Part-time teaching assistants, part-time research assistants, co-applicators on grants: we are betwixt the status of student research and… anything, really. There is no time limit on this status of Betwixter. Some people live in this precarious limbo for years until they either land a more stable academic job (the 3-5% of new PhD graduates) or abandon this pursuit and find work elsewhere (the 95-97%).
“Cool statistics. What does this mean for you?”
Well, in my case it means working two additional part-time jobs in addition to my teaching contract. One of them I have mentioned before, my research position on the forthcoming Scottish Institute for World Philosophies. The other is a job as a project assistant for BEING Studio, a non-profit organisation that serves artists with developmental disabilities in Ottawa, Canada. My role is to coordinate the teams working on season 2 of the podcast SPEAK, the online publication CLICK, and the documentation of the Studio’s archive. I am so excited to be working with a dynamic group of people and to get to develop my podcasting skills while amplifying the voices of disabled artists to help them share and sell their art worldwide.
If you want to hear what SPEAK is about, here is one of my favourite episodes from season 1:
On my podcasting front
Production for season 2 of Philosophy Casting Call is under way and I’m just looking for one more guest. So if you want to suggest someone (including yourself) as a guest, please contact me at philosophycastingcallpod (@) gmail.com. In the meantime, feel free to (re)visit season one, perhaps with this episode on going from finance to philosophy and teaching critical thinking in jails:
Season 1 of Bookshelf Remix, however, is still in full swing and I am especially proud of our latest episodes on The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi. You can listen to Part 1 here where Sophia and I discuss the role of normativity in this novel:
I wrote a thing
Check out my review of Carmen Maria Machado’s collection of short stories “Her Body & Other Parties”, available to everyone on the Bookshelf Remix Ko-Fi page.
What I’m reading
Anyone who knows me is aware that I always have on average 20 books on the go because I’m always juggling multiple non-fiction books with novels and short story collections. But here is a selected list of what I am more intensely reading right now.
A stack of five books on a windowsill
“The Disabled Contract: Severe Intellectual Disability, Justice and Morality” by Jonas-Sébastien Beaudry
So far, this has been a fascinating read for the social contract critic in me and I look forward to publishing my review on the BIOPOLITICAL PHILOSOPHY blog. Thank you to Cambridge University Press for the review copy.
“Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present” by Harriet A. Washington
This book kept coming up as a classic of intersectional histories of eugenics in North America and so far it does not disappoint.
“The House of the Spirits” by Isabel Allende, trans. Magda Bogin
Sometimes the internet is a magical place where one can find kindred spirits. While going about my business on the Bookshelf Remix Instagram, I started chatting with Eva of @windup_book_chronicles and we decided to launch an #AllendeReadalong with this book. So far, the discussions in the group chat have been lovely and generally the experience is bolstering my faith in humanity.
“Kukum” by Michel Jean
This is one I am buddy-reading with my sister Emma. She is my source for all things franco-Québecois literature, and this book about an Innu family living around Pekuakami (Lac St-Jean) is caressing the part of my soul that deeply misses the woods and lakes of my youth.
“Your Silence Will Not Protect You” by Audre Lorde
I have been stretching reading this book over months because I want to give myself time to reflect on each essay. And now that I have gotten to the poem section, I am taking even more time to savour everything. This will definitely make its way into my teaching and writing.
What I’m listening to
Lately, I have begun to crave more investigative-type podcasts and have returned to old favourites like Death, Sex and Money (Anna Sale = interviewer goals) and Ear Hustle, especially because I can’t wait for my pre-order of the This is Ear Hustle book to arrive (don’t worry, I will review it here).
But I have also discovered Maintenance Phase, a podcast that analyses and debunks health and wellness trends and products. Hosted by Aubrey Gordon and Michael Hobbs, this is pure nerdy joy in my ears and I recommend it to anyone who is even remotely interested in disability justice. Thank you to the Worst Bestsellers Discord community for the recommendation! (Also, go listen to that podcast because it is amazing.)
And that’s it for now! Stay tuned for my eventual surprise reveal in the next post…
My parting gift is to recommend listening to this album on repeat: