Recently, a contributor to the Daily Kos noted that Noam Chomsky, the “legendary linguist/philosopher,” analyzed the zombie apocalypse for a group of students in a Skype session. What students? What kind of class? Where? (There’s no mention of these salient facts). A student asked Chomsky about the current preoccupation with zombies and the apocalypse in […]
On Chomsky and Zombies Read More
My most recent piece, The Hard Business of Letting Go, is more emotional than my other pieces. I dwell on what it is like to realize that a dream is dead. What happens when you are forced to let go and move on? How do you feel when you confront that hard truth? What if you no
This post originally appeared at Chronicle Vitae on December 11th. When I decided to take a year away from academia, one of my goals was to avoid the job market. For six years, fall was a time of anticipation and dread as I waited to see what jobs would be available. How many jobs this
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In May, I quit my job and moved to Florida. Both decisions might seem big (they were), but they were remarkably easy. My lecturer gig paid little, the teaching load was heavy, and my department was dysfunctional. Leaving behind students, friends, and colleagues was hard. Watching my daughter mourn the loss of her friends was
This post is inspired by Rebecca Schuman’s post from a couple days ago. Go read it now. Also, check out the #NotARealAcademic on Twitter to see what other folks are saying. A few years ago, I was at a graduate conference presenting on a panel on post-graduate life. I was the “part-time” panelist, the one
Not a “real” academic Read More
http://youtu.be/k1bxlDAjGCo I promise a more substantial post later when I am ready. (Cryptic is sort of fun, though.) Suffice to say, I moved on from the University of Tennessee, and I am enjoying the alternating sunshine and rain of Florida with my partner, the big girl, the old dog, the young dog, and the mean