I am a shitty grad student.
It doesn't really make sense. I work about 60 hours a week between coursework and my teaching assistantship. Doesn't that sound like I work enough? The problem is, I fit that 60 hours between Sunday night and Thursday afternoon. Every single week since the semester started, I have managed to be lazy Thursday night, Friday, Saturday, and yes, most of Sunday. I decided that Thursday was my crash night....I fit so much stress into those four days of work that I practically collapse by the end of the week. And it takes two full days of football to recuperate.
So when I say I'm a shitty graduate student, what I really mean is that I should be working 80 hours a week. I should be working 100 hours a week. I shouldn't have to choose which book I'm not going to read this week or which two books I'm going to half ass. I should be reading outside my course load. I should be conducting research and writing papers for publication. I should be a graduate student.
The assistant professor who leads my Culture, Difference, and Inequality seminar left just one note on my previous week's response paper: "This is not graduate level work, and you can do better." I don't think she is correct on either count. I can do better, but not right now. It is graduate level work, but it's not doctoral work. Still, I don't think I've ever been told that my work isn't quality enough. My first reaction is to think I've peaked my intillectual capacity. My second, realistic, reaction is that I can't fake my way through school anymore. Every graduate student has a bit of impostor syndrome - a feeling that they don't deserve to be where they are, that everyone else knows more than you, is more driven than you. And I recognize that I'm not the worst graduate student, but I know what tactics have worked in the past to get me out of working hard. Up through my Master's program, I skimmed readings, I used my writing skills to bullshit through papers, and I gave people the impression that I knew more than I did. It was partially intentional and partial intentional negligence.
Unlike my last school, I'm surrounded by faculty and students who can hold me accountable. Not only do I feel like the graduate students here are stronger scholars, but many of them study my areas of interest. I can't just flaunt my niche to make myself seem brilliant; I have to back that shit up. I turned my Master's thesis in for review last week. I felt dread. I was embarrassed for my work to be evaluated by scholars in my area. It lacks cohesion. The conclusions are premature and with weak theoretical grounding. I've already learned about how I ought to have conducted the project. At last, I will be revealed as the fraud I have always been. They're all gonna laugh at me.
Maybe my teachers haven't cared enough to tell me that I could work harder. My average work has always been better than other students, so why would they bother to question? I might ask this professor who pointed out my uninspired work to be my advisor. I'll have someone to push me where I probably could go if I just gave the effort. Or maybe she'll just see me as a bum, as the impostor, and she'll have nothing to do with me.
Maybe the larger issue is that I'm already losing excitement. It's just a normal life again....one without the comforts of home. I don't know what the fuck I want to do, and the more I think about it, the more I know I could be happy with some less-than-ideal nine-to-five. I could stress less and pursue the other things I love.
I am a shitty grad student. I keep saying it over and over again. Maybe it's just because I am an unhappy human being.
But when am I not?
-Mike
3 comments:
Hey man. It turns out I am a shitty editor and a shitty singer and a shitty actor and a shitty writer.
I will call tomorrow hopefully. We'll talk.
We're all shitty grad students. It's just jumping through hoops long enough to prove we're good enough to get that Ph.D. Reading through your blogs make me extremely happy to be done with course work -- a little sad, but mostly happy. The thought of reaction papers makes me cringe. There's always more we SHOULD be doing in order to live up to this idea of what the perfect grad student is like. I'm beginning to think that this perfect student is a myth. There's no way that anyone can do all of the work that is expected of a graduate student and stay sane long enough to get a degree. I was complaining to Joanna that I felt like a bad graduate student, and she started talking about her graduate school experiences. Turns out she was also a shitty graduate student... so was Dwight... and Jim.... My guess is that only Tom was a "good" graduate student. And that's because he's the devil.
Hah...the idea of Tom being the only good graduate student definitely makes me feel better.
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