Preparing for graduate school

[rufzilla]

As graduate school approaches and I sit at home like a bum (I have a semester gap between graduating and graduate school and barely work 10 hours/ week) I get increasingly nervous about being able to handle the coursework and classes. I have always been a good student -- went to class, took good, detailed notes, etc., but being away from academia for 9 months (including summer) is kind of starting to freak me out! I haven't picked up a book since I graduated, my longest paper written so far (since graduating) has been my SoP, and I just feel plain dumb.

So, I am wondering (and hoping too, honestly) if other entering grad students feel just as rusty as me? If you do, what are you doing so that the transition from "bumming it" to school will be easier? Are you doing anything academic-ish in the mean time?

I'm thinking of getting Rosetta Stone and learn some Latin and continue with my Japanese and (hopefully) catch up on some reading (Milton, Chaucer, Spencer) during my hiatus away from school.

What about you guys?

[Spritely]

Many of us--and probabaly many of your future classmates--have been out of school much longer than 9 months, so you'll be fine. I agree that reading and language study are good ways to spend the summer, although for those of us with a full time job through August, there is not as much time for such activities as one would hope. Also, plan for the move if there is one, or for other logistic/administrative things that need to be taken care of before school starts.

[teaganc]

Instead of reading random classics (although that's not a bad option, certainly), I would find out what classes you are taking next semester, ask for a syllabus/book list, and start reading those books. It will get you into the habit of reading critically/taking notes/whatever, and also allow you to start the semester already ahead.

[Jack Cade]

Read, write, think, do what you love about the game as much as you can, as freely as you can. But do make sure that you are getting better at it.

Because come August all of that will stop, except for the getting better. You'll get better, but in ever more specific, constricted, and ultimately directed ways.

Enjoy the next four months of complete freedom.

But don't not do the thing (I say fuck Webster, et al. I like double negatives, most everybody else has them), just do it on your terms while you can.

This is the last chance you get until you're a full prof or maybe until you're a DP.

To be clear though, I wouldn't trade being in the game for being out.

[AnxiousEnglish]

I took a year off. I know what you mean about the feeling slightly stupid now. Since I've been out of the academic environment for quite a while, I worry too that I'll be a little rusty when I get back. I've been working close to full-time, so I've been pretty busy with that. I also feel like I spent tons of time working on my applications. However, this year I committed to spend tons of time reading all those novels that were harder to read in my free time during undergrad. Since I'm an aspiring Victorianist, I've been reading lots of giant Victorian novels this year, as well as a few critical books. I think the habit of reading is important to keep up, even if you aren't necessarily writing papers about the books you read. Sometimes reading through a novel once helps you to be more detailed and attentive the second time through. I've also taken my undergrad thesis and made a pretty detailed outline of how I want to expand it and improve it. I'm also planning on reading a lot of theory this summer, just to refamiliarize myself with it and also to think of possible teaching angles. The other thing I want to do is look at various journals and see which ones I would like to be published in, so that when I write papers, I have an idea of direction. I sound really overachievey, but I guess all this time out of academia has allowed me to accomplish things I couldn't have done while still in school.

I'm not getting stressed about it, though. If I don't get everything done, I'm not going to worry about it. I know that time off will help me to be able to dive in when school starts. I'll have energy, I won't be burnt out anymore, and regardless of how much I have prepped in my time off, I know that I'll still have the research and writing experience to get started. And who said that we have to be experts the moment we arrive for orientation?

[JustAnotherModernGuy]

what are you doing so that the transition from "bumming it" to school will be easier? Are you doing anything academic-ish in the mean time?

If you have limited time and you're going to read one single book this summer, I have a suggestion to consider:

Semenza, Gregory Colon. Graduate Study for the Twenty-First Century: How to Build an Academic Career in the Humanities. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.

I stumbled across some people talking about this book here at grad cafe (in reference to getting published). I would like to echo their praise of this book. Reading chapters 1-5 will be a great way to get back to the "student mindset" (chpt 1 The Culture of a Graduate Program, chpt 2 The Structure of Your Graduate Career: An Ideal Plan, chpt 3 Organization and Time Management, chpt 4 The Graduate Seminar, chpt 5 The Seminar Paper). You'll learn a lot, get practical advice (task lists to accomplish) and even have a good laugh (how to quickly identify the 11 stereotypes of professors--and which ones you should avoid).

Rather than reading novels from your area (surely you will spend enough time doing this for the next couple of years) or guessing which literary theories your future advisor might want you to brush up on, I think this book would be a tremendous help for your return to academics.

This book has been a tremendous help to me; I hope it helps you too!

JAMG

[Minnesotan]

If you have limited time and you're going to read one single book this summer, I have a suggestion to consider:

Semenza, Gregory Colon. Graduate Study for the Twenty-First Century: How to Build an Academic Career in the Humanities. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.

That's a fabulous book that every person in the humanities should read.

I also think you should enjoy your free time. Take a road trip, head to the beach, go shopping -- whatever it is that you love doing. You're not going to get to do much of it while you're taking seminars and possibly teaching. Get in your leisure time now, and don't start overworking yourself before you even have anything to work on. You don't want to be burned out before you even get to grad school!

[Jack Cade]

That's a fabulous book that every person in the humanities should read.

Ditto, Semenza is a must read; although I would advise you to take him with slightly less salt then he and others have given his text. The picture has changed quite a bit in just the four years since this book came out--obviously it was written a year or two earlier. Also, his essentially meritocratic outlook obviously limits the book's validity. You could also start looking through the Chronicle of Higher Ed to kind of familiarize yourself with the world that you'll soon be landing in.

And if you know what you are interested in working on, make sure you've read as many of the important texts as you can.

For instance, early modern folks should read Greenblatt, everybody pretty much has to read Foucault (as in all of his major works)--although I hear tell that 17th cent folk don't, but I do not believe those rumors.

But I repeat my earlier advice, repeated by others, enjoy this last period of freedom as much as possible, it will end.

[Minnesotan]

everybody pretty much has to read Foucault (as in all of his major works)--although I hear tell that 17th cent folk don't, but I do not believe those rumors.

A fig for Foucault, says the RhetComp scholar!

Kenneth Burke is our Foucault, I guess.

[booksareneat]

The best grad school prep is to skim the list of critics who everyone refers to, but few people have really read that much of: Lacan, Bakhtin, Barthes, Foucault, etc... That way you can throw in great phrases like, "well, I don't think that he meant is in the Lacanian sense of the word." And then you can be prepared to roll your eyes when someone mentions Spivak.

"Spivak?" you say "she is sooooo 1997."

[engguy]

That way you can throw in great phrases like, "well, I don't think that he meant is in the Lacanian sense of the word." And then you can be prepared to roll your eyes when someone mentions Spivak.

And then you can look like a total idiot when someone who has read lacan asks you what the hell you mean.

Sorry, just wanted to finish that thought.

Anyway, all this is good advice, the only thing I would add is that you should try to be productive, but don't try to do too much. you will only get frustrated and never get to it all, and summers and breaks are really your only chance to relax and recharge a bit to avoid getting burned out. you'll be at this a long time, so that's essential. counting my masters time, this will be my fourth summer of grad school, and i've yet to really strike the right balance. i'm hoping to do some language study, but otherwise i'm not promising to read 20 books or write half my dissertation... i will relax and enjoy.

[rufzilla]

I agree that I won't study like a fiend (I am enjoying being a bum), but what would you guys recommend I read if I'm going to try and go into early modern lit? My school focused on more close reading than theory, so I know some of the authors I want to get familiar with (although suggestions would also be appreciated) but no theorists. Any suggestions on what theorists/ theories I should be brushing up on before I am overwhelmed by the smartiness of grad school?

[katanianQ]

If you have limited time and you're going to read one single book this summer, I have a suggestion to consider:

Semenza, Gregory Colon. Graduate Study for the Twenty-First Century: How to Build an Academic Career in the Humanities. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.

I stumbled across some people talking about this book here at grad cafe (in reference to getting published). I would like to echo their praise of this book. Reading chapters 1-5 will be a great way to get back to the "student mindset" (chpt 1 The Culture of a Graduate Program, chpt 2 The Structure of Your Graduate Career: An Ideal Plan, chpt 3 Organization and Time Management, chpt 4 The Graduate Seminar, chpt 5 The Seminar Paper). You'll learn a lot, get practical advice (task lists to accomplish) and even have a good laugh (how to quickly identify the 11 stereotypes of professors--and which ones you should avoid).

Rather than reading novels from your area (surely you will spend enough time doing this for the next couple of years) or guessing which literary theories your future advisor might want you to brush up on, I think this book would be a tremendous help for your return to academics.

This book has been a tremendous help to me; I hope it helps you too!

JAMG

I just finished this book and let me say, it scared the bejezuz out of me.

(robert browning would like to a get a word in-)

Here's the top-peak; the multitude below

Live, for they can, there:

This man decided not to Live but Know---

Bury this man there?

Here---here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds form,

Lightnings are loosened,

Stars come and go! Let joy break with the storm,

Peace let the dew send!

Lofty designs must close in like effects

Loftily lying,

Leave him---still loftier than the world suspects,

Living and dying.

A one way ticket to your very own Grammarian style funeral.

What do you all think about the work/life balance as Semenza (and many) describe? What are you preparing to give up as you begin your graduate studies?

[Minnesotan]

Lots of fresh-faced MA students think you have to give up your social life when heading to grad school. Resist that urge. When colleagues ask you out for a beer, say yes. In fact, when anyone at your school asks you to do something (legal), say yes. Yes is the best word you'll learn in grad school.

Work hard and play hard -- you'll keep from burning out, that way.

[jasper.milvain]

I agree with all the people suggesting nice breaks, with some independent reading.

The potential downside to reading ahead for your courses is that many seminars combine a certain topic with a certain methodology. If you read Middlemarch to get ahead and read it through your default lens of feminist criticism, you may have to read the damn thing all over again when it turns out that you're discussing it alongside Marxist, materialist, or new historicist criticism. I found that some of the courses I took during my MA totally transformed the way I read. I ended up re-reading assigned books that I thought I knew inside and out.

[teaganc]

The potential downside to reading ahead for your courses is that many seminars combine a certain topic with a certain methodology. If you read Middlemarch to get ahead and read it through your default lens of feminist criticism, you may have to read the damn thing all over again when it turns out that you're discussing it alongside Marxist, materialist, or new historicist criticism. I found that some of the courses I took during my MA totally transformed the way I read. I ended up re-reading assigned books that I thought I knew inside and out.

While this is potentially true, I've always found that the second (or even third) reading of a book is much more useful than the first. Now maybe you just want to get through your courses with the minimal amount of reading (and honestly, I'm not saying this is bad, as long as you succeed in the course and it's not in your area of concentration), in which case a second reading is just a waste of time.

[JKessler]

Everyone should read Kenneth Burke, regardless of field in lit, comp, or rhetoric. He is a genius mind and a great stylist.

[jasper.milvain]

While this is potentially true, I've always found that the second (or even third) reading of a book is much more useful than the first. Now maybe you just want to get through your courses with the minimal amount of reading (and honestly, I'm not saying this is bad, as long as you succeed in the course and it's not in your area of concentration), in which case a second reading is just a waste of time.

This is a fair point. I think that a lot of people go into early reading with the mindset that they're 'getting ahead', though, and just wanted to say that it's not the case. Reading course books early with the expectation of reading them again is dedicated and potentially useful. Reading course books early with the expectation that you won't need to re-read later on isn't smart, IMO.

[Yellow#5]

Does anyone really read a book once for class?

[jasper.milvain]

If it's for a class that's way outside of my research interests and it's a text I'm not presenting or writing on, absolutely.

[teaganc]

If it's for a class that's way outside of my research interests and it's a text I'm not presenting or writing on, absolutely.

This. I've also had professors who were seriously anti-theory, and taken courses on very non-canonical texts outside of my research interests. For both cases, if I'm not doing anything with the text other than a class discussion, I will never read it multiple times. It's just not necessary. In fact, for classes like this, I've read the books the summer before and not read them in class, and had no trouble with it. Even books that I am writing a paper on, I will often take notes during the first read and then go back and refer to passages that I noted, but not re-read the entire book again.

[Yellow#5]

In fact, for classes like this, I've read the books the summer before and not read them in class, and had no trouble with it. Even books that I am writing a paper on, I will often take notes during the first read and then go back and refer to passages that I noted, but not re-read the entire book again.

Oh, sure, that's what I mean. You re-read closely the passages you're interest in or are discussing because they touch on an area of interest for you.

That's why a first read in the summer IS a time saver, I'd argue. It allows you to do close reading on the part that "floats to the top" for you.

I have a class on 18th century novel, for instance. There is no way I'm going to leave all that reading until the fall.

[disjecta]

I'm concentrating on getting published this summer. Writing a book review and trying to get an article placed

[jasper.milvain]

Me too! My MA supervisor offered to help me see my graduating paper into print, so I'll be re-working it in light of the questions I got at my defense and seeing if anyone's interested.

[JustAnotherModernGuy]

KatanianQ--I think this fear is a good thing!

To echo Jack Cade's words, it is very important to note that Semenza's book is already a bit dated. In the last 4-5 years the job market has only worsened; to me, at least, this means his candid and practical information is even more important.

Semenza really makes a convincing argument that the only truly reliable key to successly landing a job in the academic world is long term planning and organization. This book was a big wakeup call to me