the problem with the undergrad

channeling the undergrad, it seems, is a double-edged sword. on the one hand it meant that i turned in my chapter on friday, on the other, that the second half was pretty horrible. hastily written, too breezy, not exacting, too rambling (i.e. in no way resembling something i would call "good" or "smart" or "compelling"). the real problem is that i fall in love with my archival findings and tend to fall into show and tell.when i dropped it off, my advisor asked me "will there be an argument here or will i have have to go hunting for one?" fair enough. i have a long history of not making arguments (and yet i'm so argumentative in the rest of life. right j?), but i actually think there are several arguments in this chapter, though many may well been hidden behind my shameless encomium to anna ticknor.

the real problem is that now i'm at a weird crossroads with the academic job market starting up in a couple months. do i switch over and start writing cover letters and teaching statements or stick with the dissertation and try to bang out my Jane Addams chapter in six weeks? I'm also coming up against the fact that though trained as an antebellum lit. person, i'm essentially essentially writing a dissertation on progressiv era female educators, making that chapter on walt whitman seem increasingly out of place. also making the need for another major lit. figure more pressing. and yet i ask, why can't i just keep writing the cultural history (or as some would say, the now defunct, totally unacceptable, apolitical-old-school-american-studies junk)? it just feels very weird to be writing so out of the period that i thought i would be focused on. this also makes it feel daunting to write my dissertation descriptions for the job stuff. the project no longer resembles the prospectus and yet it doesn't really resemble anything yet.

but on a much more positive note, while i have spent much of the last six years believing, really believing, that i'd never finish, i can now say to myself -- and to you my faithful readers -- that i will finish my dissertation. hell, i think i might just be close to halfway there.