Here I am on another research jaunt. I got a grant to come here. But the fact of the matter is that I've already been here. Yes, in the academy you get grants to go to places you've already been. And it's turning out that I maybe didn't even need all that extra money—I thought I'd just scratched the surface of these collections, but I picked through five or so pretty effectively the last time I was here.
I can hear you saying: Well, good on you, CheeseQuest! Take that money and go spend it on the fair-trade yoga clothes on offer at every other store on Main Street here. And have a $4 cup of coffee (also fair trade) while you're at it. Put that grant on your CV and ride into the sunset.
Of course, it's not that easy. I have to give a brown-bag talk on Friday. At first I thought it was no big deal, since I've done enough in-class presentations in grad school. Then I heard it should be thirty minutes long. Did you hear that? Thirty minutes long. I have no idea what I'm going to say. "Thanks for the opportunity to come here. I love your library, especially how each table is equipped with outlets for laptops. It's pretty here. Your call slips are easy to fill out. You get me my boxes real fast-like. I wish I had gotten into your graduate school." That will take up one minute...and then what?
I know, a twenty-nine-minute funk breakdown!
2 comments:
Option #1: 29 minutes of mind altering funkadelic heaven.
Option #2: talk about the lesbo prison scandal you're reading about.
Option #3: distract the audience
with their own memories of being a Tom Boy.
Either way, remember to return to the Mother Ship, my fellow funkateer!
Dude! They wish they had gotten into your grad school.
You know what I might do is photocopy a few choice quotations from your sources that you really like, start the talk with a vague frame, explain what the sources are, then toss them the quotations and say you're working out what these sources mean, and facilitate discussion like you would in a class. I did that the other day for a "research talk." The undergrads in attendance weren't keen on it, but the faculty seemed to enjoy it. And they had some good ideas.
Post a Comment