#karen kelsky

[aliteraryprincess]

Celebratory Book Haul!

Since my dissertation prospectus is finished and turned in, I treated myself to $50 worth of books. Husband isn't happy with me. But I am!😆

Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis

Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher

The Horse and His Boy by C. S. Lewis

The Night Dance by Suzanne Weyn

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis

The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison

The Silver Chair by C. S. Lewis

The Professor Is In by Karen Kelsky

The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis

[luxe-pauvre]

MAY 2024

Read:

I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream: The Terror of Tamagotchi

How to set yourself free with ritual

We are all caught in a pessimism trap but there is a way out

Her body is a problem

The Everything Virus

How to Future

Libraries, A Love Story

The Anxiety of Difficulty

Thinking Like a Scientist Will Make You Happier

Why Won’t Academia Let Go of ‘Publish or Perish’?

On the moral responsibility to be an informed citizen

Don’t be stoic: Roman Stoicism’s origins show its perniciousness

How Do We Get People Who Believe in Pseudoscience to Trust Science?

The Professor Is In by Karen Kelsky

Watched:

Priscilla and the Plight of Women(’s Biopics)*

The Double-Edge of Beauty Explored Through Malèna

The Beautiful Illusion of Cozy Games

Challengers

Belfast

Wicked Little Letters

Eileen

Poor Things

Listened To:

Good Luck, Babe! by Chappell Roan

Challengers (Original Score)**

Challengers [MIXED]

Went To:

Swan Lake @ the Royal Opera House

[drdemonprince]

Hi! I love your writing and your thoughts on things. I desperately want to go back to grad school, but don't know where to begin. I'm autistic and disabled, and undergrad was already really hard for me. I want to be a professor (ideally of literature with a focus in mythology/folklore and sociology). I don't know how to go about getting help even with the application process. I don't know how I'd financially survive getting through a master's or PhD. Do you have any advice for autistic people to get through grad school?

My advice would definitely be to not do it. Especially for something like literature or the humanities in general. Graduate school is highly abusive toward neurodivergent people and exploitative of workers across the board, and the long-term employment prospects are horrible and only getting worse statistically with every single year and with every additional PhD that is minted -- and it's particularly absurdly dire for people in the humanities. I would never under any circumstances recommend it to anyone.

I would recommend reading the blog (and book) The Professor Is In by Karen Kelsky.

[scientificphilosopher]

I tell my students, if you have a question you’re nervous about asking, you should ask it, since there’s a chance your fellow students have that same question, and you will be a hero to them if you have the guts to ask it. That doesn’t apply to all questions, of course, and at the graduate level or for faculty, people’s experiences and research interests prompt less common questions. But at any level there may be some reticence about asking questions, and there are better and worse ways to do it.

In a recent column at The Chronicle of Higher Education, Karen Kelsky of The Professor Is In acknowledges that what you ask and how you ask it can make an impression, for better or worse, on your professors and colleagues, and offers a typology of questions and tips on how to ask.

She recommends writing your question down. I think this is excellent advice. Even better would be to phrase the question in the actual words you plan to use and memorize it, saying it silently to yourself. You will then be more confident when you ask it.

If you can’t memorize your own question, there is a good chance it is poorly formed or too long for others to easily follow. If you are objecting that memorizing your question is impossible, since you need to preface it with a long explanation of something you or someone else said at some other time, or because you first need to engage in a lengthy argument to convince the speaker to take seriously some ideas that seem irrelevant to the paper, then you should either save your question for when no one else has a question to ask, or just discuss it after the talk (perhaps by email). In my experience, people underestimate by about half how long it has taken them to ask their question. In a context in which others have questions, this lack of self-awareness is very annoying. If you fail to take steps to make sure your question is clear and concise, you are being rude to others who have questions for the speaker.

Kelsky gives some advice for settings in which some assertiveness is needed:

I… learned that I could not wait for a pause in the conversation, because such pauses rarely occur among academics. So I learned that I had to really insert myself with a loud and assertive (but still collegial) tone, no matter how awkward that felt… I observed the gendered norm that women tend to raise their hands and wait to be called on, while men tend to just shout out questions or comments. Eventually I learned that if I didn’t want to be continually ignored or talked over, I had to stop waiting around with hand meekly raised, and just start talking. If that feels uncomfortable to you, master such conversational gambits as, “Oh, and expanding from what David just said …,” or “Right! I had that thought as well, but also would argue that …,” or “That is such a terrific point. The way I saw that manifesting is ….” Go ahead and practice such interjections with friends or in front of a mirror, or in a role-play exercise, or in low-stakes environments like your own classroom. The idea is to have them down for the higher-stakes context of a departmental seminar.

You can read the rest of her advice here.

The locus classicus on asking questions at academic talks is this post at PrawfsBlawg. Read it.

Sometimes reticence is not the problem. Sure, usually, you can have a follow-up question, but don’t jump into the conversation without first taking a moment to see who else wants to participate—especially among those who haven’t yet asked a question or don’t typically participate as much. I have found that actually sitting on my hands helps as a reminder to stop asking further questions.

Relatedly, for guest talks, I think it is usually a bad practice to ask or allow the speakers to field their own questions. You need a moderator who can tell an audience member to get to the point, or to stop interrupting, or that no, they cannot have another follow-up, and it is not kind to give that job to your guest.

[post-academic]

Every year in the United States, universities produce more and more Ph.D. graduates in an ever-shrinking academic job market. Many are saddled with hundreds of thousands in debt and left to teach part time at such low rates that many qualify for food stamps. Why does this happen and why do bright students continue to fall for it? Dr. Karen Kelsky, renowned academic expert and owner of The Professor Is In, answers these questions in this engaging and enlightening talk.

[bbtwords]

So write.... Not like a girl. Not like a boy. Write like a motherfucker.

Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar Cheryl Strayed Quoted in Conclusion: Declaring Independence, The Professor Is In by Karen Kelsky

[hawtchocolate]

I’ve been reading this cool book, The Professor Is In by Dr. Karen Kelsky, about understanding the faculty job search process in academia. She’s a little more focused on humanities than life science, but covers both fairly well, and I took away a few really good tips from her!

[cancerbiophd]

“the professor is in: the essential guide to turning your phd into a job” by karen kelsky is a really great resource for both prospective and current phd students in every field (humanities, social sciences, and STEM). it’s probably the most thorough advice book for phd students i’ve encountered and covers everything from choosing the best thesis advisor to grant writing tips to how to apply for post-docs and interview tips and much more. as the title suggests, it does lean more towards those wishing to stay in academia to become assistant professors and such, but there are still good tidbits for those going into non-academia careers (and the advice given for grad school in general is applicable to everyone). 

i highly recommend checking it out, no matter where you are in your grad school career! even as a seasoned grad student about to graduate i still found a lot of helpful tips in there (as you can tell by my stickies). 

[mediaeval-muse]

Reads of 2020: The Good, the Bad, and the Meh

Reflecting on what I read this year, and I thought I’d share my thoughts with you. I noticed that I read a lot of bad or middling books in 2020, and I didn’t read as much as I usually do (I’m guessing it’s because I finished my PhD, moved to a new state, and had a lot of mental health struggles). So, in no particular order, here’s a recap of what I managed to accomplish:

The Good: Books I Loved

Fiction

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

The Empire of Gold by S. A. Chakraborty

A Choir of Lies by Alexandra Rowland

The Countess Conspiracy by Courtney Milan

After the Wedding by Courtney Milan

The Masqueraders by Georgette Heyer

Unveiled by Courtney Milan

The Governess Affair by Courtney Milan

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Spin the Dawn by Elizabeth Lim

Poetry

The Unstill Ones by Miller Oberman

Non-Fiction

Hope in the Dark by Rebecca Solnit

Humankind by Rutger Bregman

Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber

The Unidentified by Colin Dickey

Rebel Angels: Sovereignty and Space in Anglo-Saxon England by Jill Fitzgerald

The Professor is In by Karen Kelsky

Utopia for Realists by Rutger Bregman

Borrowed Objects and the Art of Poetry by Denis Ferhatovic

God: A Human History by Reza Aslan

The Meh: Books I Enjoyed, but Am Not Raving About

Fiction

Ring Shout by P. Djèlí Clark

Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson

A Touch of Stone and Snow by Milla Vane

Lacrimore by SJ Costello

Mirage by Somaiya Daud

Fortune Favors the Wicked by Theresa Romain

Butterfly Swords by Jeannie Lin

Domu: A Child’s Dream by Katsuhiro Otomo

The Sea by Villadsen Rikke

Echo North by Joanna Ruth Meyer

Once Upon a Marquess by Courtney Milan

Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

The Bourbon Thief by Tiffany Reisz

The Watchmaker of Filigree Street by Natasha Pulley

Unclaimed by Courtney Milan

Talk Sweetly to Me by Courtney Milan

The Heiress Effect by Courtney Milan

The Red Tent by Anita Diamant

The Monster of Elendhaven by Jennifer Giesbrecht

Non-Fiction

The Fall of the Faculty by Benjamin Ginsberg

Know My Name by Chanel Miller

Cranioklepty by Colin Dickey

The Bad: Books that Let Me Down

Fiction

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

Bride by Mistake by Anne Gracie

Not Quite a Husband by Sherry Thomas

Paladin’s Grace by T. Kingfisher

Unravel the Dusk by Elizabeth Lim

In Search of Scandal by Susanne Lord

The Raven’s Tale by Cat Winters

Wicked Intentions by Elizabeth Hoyt

A Dangerous Invitation by Erica Monroe

Prosper’s Demon by KJ Parker

Death in an Ivory Tower by Maria Hudgins

Gawain by Gwen Rowley

Non-Fiction

So What are You Going to Do With That? by Susan Casalla

[aliteraryprincess]

November Wrap Up

Where exactly did November go? At least this one is posted in a timely manner...

Books Read: 8

I had a much better reading month than October, thank goodness. My favorite of the month was The Professor Is In, though Deathless is a close second. The worst of the month was "Brother Jacob." And for some reason I subjected myself to rereading Midnight Sun and dealing with Edward's angsty narration again. I don't know why I did that, but it held up at 3 stars. Books marked with ® are rereads.

The Professor Is In: The Essential Guide to Turning Your Ph.D. Into a Job by Karen Kelsky - 5 stars

Wolfsong by T. J. Klune - 3 stars

Lovely Bad Things by Trisha Wolfe - 4 stars

"Brother Jacob" by George Eliot - 2 stars

Deathless by Catherynne M. Valente - 5 stars

The Plot by Jean Hanff Korelitz - 4 stars

The Equivocal Virtue: Mrs. Oliphant and the Victorian Literary Market Place by Vineta and Robert A. Colby - 2 stars

Midnight Sun by Stephenie Meyer - 3 stars ®

On Tumblr:

Have some lists and cute animal photos. That's all I've got for you. And I guess the incredibly late October wrap up. 🤷‍♀️

October 2023 Wrap Up

Cat Photography: Sleepy ❤️

Dog Photography: Willow

Nonfiction aliteraryprincess Has Read - Updated 2023

aliteraryprincess' Nonfiction Shelf

Books aliteraryprincess Has Read by the Same Author - Updated 2023

On YouTube:

There's not as much here as usual. I just was not in the mood to film whenever I did have a free moment. I usually opted to nap instead. Maybe it's the seasonal depression setting in.

The End of the Year Book Tag 2023

Victober Wrap Up

September to November Book Haul

Currently Reading 11/17/23

The George Eliot Project: Brother Jacob

What I Read for My PhD in English Literature: Comics and Graphic Narrative

[eloneblog]

Clear template on how to approach grant writing by Karen Kelsky.

[drdemonprince]

Hi!

I’m autistic and currently recovering from a depressive episode/burnout. Last year I started research for my thesis, got lost in the sauce and completely overworked myself (I was in the lab 4 days/week + research + analysis of my data + volunteering + a long distance relationship). Now I want to make changes in my life to better accommodate myself so I’m not as overwhelmed and stressed out all the time. I want to get to a place where I can work on my research sustainably, but I don’t even know where to start. I read both of your books and they were already helpful in making me reframe a lot of things in my life, could you point me to any other resources regarding this?

(also I’m not from the US, so maybe something that isn’t specific to the US)

Thank you so much for your work and I hope your top surgery scars are healing well!

Since you're an academic, the blog & book the Professor is In by Karen Kelsky! Work Won't Love You Back by Sarah Jaffe is also very good but more general.

[greenpeugeot]

Books 1, 2, and 3 of 2017

Strangers in their Own Land, by Arlie Russell Hochschild. Today Will be Different, by Maria Semple. The Professor is In, by Karen Kelsky.

These are the first 3 books I read in 2017. The Kelsky book I read with some current PhD students from the program I graduated from -- it's mostly about finding academic work, which I didn't do, but it was nice to read with hindsight. Kelsky offers really great advice for what to do as PhD student, starting in year one, to set yourself up for tenure track work, but I'm not sure I would have been able to hear or absorb that advice at the start of grad school. She's smart and matter-of-fact and this is good anthropology of academia.

Today Will be Different is nowhere near as good as Where'd you go, Bernadette was. It's pretty unmemorable a couple months later.

Strangers in Their Own Land is by far the best of this batch -- sort of a follow-up read to Hillbilly Elegy in the strain of understanding poor rural America. Hochschild is an outsider, not a memoirist, and her scholarship has been concerned with feeling and empathy for a long time. Here, she seeks to understand why people in rural Louisiana feel an affinity for republicanism and Trumpism, even though they are the worst hit by environmental degradation. The answer is religion, a feeling of suffering as its own kind of marker of virtue, and the metaphor Hoschild puts forward of (white) people "waiting in line" for the American Dream and feeling like they've been cut in front of by women and people of color who they see as gaining more rights and prominence. I'm not sure this book was successful, in that I as a reader don't feel like I have any more understanding of how and why these folks think what they do. The researcher position Hoschild takes makes it impossible for her to argue back; she just has to absorb and report what people tell her.

[classroomsofshame]

SLAC in the Midwest

I once taught at a SLAC in the Midwest as an adjunct. The English comp classroom I was in was only accessible by walking through the gym across the basketball court; you interrupted games and during class you heard “pound pound thud clang pound.” The locker rooms were next door, so the room smelled rancid – hot, sweaty, foul. I asked for a room change, and the only available one was a chem lab in a posh new science building. Smelled great, but big black lab desks weren’t ideal for group discussion. That was my first stint there and I actually had an office with a window. I came back for more.

The second stint my office was literally just the *end of a hallway* in the building I taught where there were some available chairs. When my students wanted to meet they had to email me to set up an appointment to meet me “at the blue chairs.”

For more info on this Tumblr contact Karen Kelsky at gettenure@gmail.com (http://www.theprofessorisin.com)

[bbtwords]

I was indeed angry back then. Because back then, I was living entirely according to the principle of external validation. I was in thrall to the academic cult, which dictates that you have value only if others in authority have validated your work. Your comprehensive exams, your dissertation, your articles, your grant proposals, your book, your job search, your tenure case: All succeed or fail based on the judgment and approval of people above you. The properly socialized academic makes that validation the core of her identity. No wonder the young of the profession are so servile. Dependency on external validation is the enemy of contentment and joy. My process of becoming post-academic has been 100 percent a process of finding my own inner source of validation. My work is valuable because I say it is. This was a brutally hard stance to achieve.

Conclusion: Declaring Independence The Professor Is In Karen Kelsky

[2plan22]

RT @ProfessorIsIn: From our cousins in medicine. 😡 https://t.co/PuCW35swLX 2PLAN22 http://twitter.com/2PLAN22/status/1364028398612455425

From our cousins in medicine. 😡https://t.co/PuCW35swLX

— Dr. Karen Kelsky (@ProfessorIsIn) February 23, 2021