rheya19

Thank you, sacklunch! I appreciate your generosity. I have pmed you.

Hello! I just finished my third year in my PhD program in early Christian history at UIowa, and I'm preparing for exams in the fall. I am looking for other people to compare reading lists with. My focus is more of the 2nd-4th centuries, bleeding into Late Antiquity but still more interested in pre-Constantine history. Most of my cohort does Late Antiquity, and the general early Christian history reading list that I inherited from them has more Late Antiquity titles than I think I need. My advisor (who is the only one in the department who focuses on early Christian history) is on sabbatical right now and with the quarantine going on too, he is basically MIA. Sigh. He's given me leave to adjust the list as I want to, but I don't really know what is vital to include in early Xty or what is extraneous in Late Antiquity. I also feel like the list has too much Gnosticism, but again I'm not sure. Maybe that's the norm these days. My reading iist (in progress) is on Google Docs, and I am happy to share it: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1I67MFqOIxzXs-8hFOSeIVk2xGMMjQmtjoCPWq-sCLBA/edit?usp=sharing The first list is the one I'm looking for input on. The other two I have more of a handle on. Does anyone in ancient Christianity or ancient Mediterranean religions have a reading list they would be willing to share? Thank you! Stay safe!

It took me forEVER to write a complete draft of my major seminar paper this semester. I have three others, but those only need to be 12-15 pages and aren't super related to my research interests. But this draft ended up being 26 pages and is the kind of work I want to publish someday. And it's DONE! It took me weeks, but it's DONE! I'm so happy! Next week my colleagues will workshop it with me and help me fix it up real pretty like, and then the semester will be done!

It's possible that the people who were drawn to this panel were people who were in the process of dealing with the kinds of issues the other panelists were talking about still struggling with. As a person who deals with mental health issues too, I feel like our society sends us messages that those who seem positive and optimistic have "successfully" dealt with their problems, which always feels like a moral judgment to me. The audience might have been low-key intimidated by someone who (In their minds) has "pulled themselves up by their boot straps" while they're still struggling to cope. I'm not saying that you in any way projected any of that. I just think that those of us with mental illness are made to feel like we're doing something wrong if we take too long to "succeed" in coping (as if coping is a finite process. LMFAO) I'm just conjecturing based on my own years of self-judgment, so take my ideas with a grain of salt. I'm sure you did a great job, and you don't know that you didn't impact people in the audience who didn't say anything. Keep reaching out.

man crush

Oops! I forgot a couple of things in my precis template. Let me try that again: Publication info Purpose Argument Sub arguments Key words (with definitions in your own words) Sources Methods/Strategies Contributions/Evaluation Quotes

flag pole

My husband is completing his PhD in clinical psychology this spring, and he's been in the reserves for about 8-9 years. It's really hard. I'm not going to lie to you. He started in the National Guard, but the one-weekends-a-month just killed him. You're not always going to be able to spend a full three day weekend away from class work every month--especially between midterms and finals. That being said, his faculty were incredibly understanding and accommodating, but he ultimately transferred to the Air Force Reserve where (as a chaplain) he gives 21 days a year, which he works with his CO to fit into his schedule (usually 5 days around winter break and the rest in the summer.) I hope that helps! Let me know if you have any other questions I might be able to answer. I can even pass them along to my husband.

code red

One of my professors gave me an awesome little precis template to fill out for each title I do for exams. It consists of: Title, author, publishing info: Topic: Main argument: Subarguments: - - - Sources and methodologies: Contributions: 2-3 quotes: She encouraged us to try to keep the precis to just one page (Word document) or two max if the work is particularly long or complex. You can keep them all in a file and print them out to play with (review, group together in different ways, think through) to help you prepare to discuss them in the broad survey--ish kind of way you will need to on your exams. I hope this helps!!

I'll be done with my courses after this semester and can then just focus on studying for my exams and my own research.

Top hat

First I would research your school's policies on bringing on a second advisor to your dissertation and make sure you're very clear on what the procedure is for doing so. There has to be some policy on the books somewhere. If there is someone in the department that you trust (like a professor or advanced graduate student), talk to them privately and see what they think, if they have any suggestions for getting the help you need. Then set up an appointment to talk to your department chair or department's director of graduate studies and politely suggest that your current advisor is very busy and you need a little bit more help, and wouldn't it be moist convenient for everyone to bring on a second advisor. Use what you've learned about the school's policy to show (again, politely) that your suggestion is totally ok and easy to do. If no one will help you, then you might need to go over the department's head--to the graduate school admissions or graduate union if you have one, and find out what your next options are. When you signed that contract as a graduate student, your school had to grant that it would provide you with any reasonable resource you need to complete your program, and that includes first and foremost an advisor who advises you. In the mess that is departmental politics, it's easy to lose sight of the fact that they are obligated to help you in addition to you being obligated to them, but that's what the contract is for. Good luck!

Are there other ways you could find beauty on your campus? Is there a performing arts center where you could go see live theater or concerts? Are there art displays or venues around that have live music? Maybe you could even try to make some of your own beauty by auditing a visual arts course; I myself am a historian auditing a course in ancient to Medieval calligraphy this semester, and it's a no pressure creative time for me. Good luck! Keep us posted!

Hello! I'm in my second year of my PhD program (religious studies) and have an MA as well. A couple of weeks ago I got an official diagnosis for ADHD. So I'm here to seek out other grad students with ADHD or other challenges and start a thread comparing strategies that help us handle the workload, organize our time, get through readings, write, finish what we start, start what we need to finish, etc. etc. I've realized that I get very overwhelmed by large amounts of information, so I have to take certain preventative measures to not get overstimulated. So when I have a lot of reading to do in one book, I might cover the opposite page of what I'm reading and track the lines that I'm reading with a note card. In general I also do the 25 minute read/5 minute rest thing. I take more notes than I used to and stop after each chapter to sum it up in a few bullet points. I also use a meditation timer on my phone to play a little chime every 1-2 minutes in case my mind starts straying. I've taken great pains to organize my planner and keep a "dump list" to write down the odds and ends I think of when I'm in class so I can jot it down and return to listening. I've gotten really anal about my keeping my planner just-so, but it does give me a sense of structure and direction. What I still need to do is work on a plan for writing my seminar papers. I have FOUR this semester. >_< So I'm meeting with my professors whose writing is clear and organized to see if they can give me any advice. So far I have a general outline structure to follow (Intro, Warrant/Relevance, Opposition, Evidence and Rebuttal/Qualifier, Conclusion). I'm hoping by making tight outlines, I can manage writing more easily. Boo. I'm scared to have to write all these papers. I'm also working with my advisor to create more structure around my comps reading, like weekly deadlines, prioritizing readings, and more frequent check-ins. What are you all doing? At least hanging in there?