Writing and Presenting your Thesis or Dissertation by S. Joseph Levine

This guide for creating my Ph.D. dissertation is affirming what I'm learning in my scholarly writing class: You should think broadly about what your dissertation might be and not dismiss initial ideas, write down ideas that come to you so you don't lose them later, form a supportive committee, and most importantly, create strategies to get the paper written.

I'll be halfway through my Ph.D. studies at the end of this semester (imagine that!), so the dissertation is becoming to begin to feel like a real possibility to me now. After a couple years of comtemplation, I think I have a clear goal for my dissertation, and even good ideas as to who I want on my committee. One thing that does concern me is that two of the professors I want on my committee don't seem to get along, and the last thing I'll need when I'm trying to defend this is to have to deal with people who don't like each other. So I might have to decide for one against the other, which is really sad, because both could help shape my writing in such interesting ways.

I'm also already doing what the article suggested: doing a small preliminary research study on my topic, which is through the expository writing class I'm teaching this spring at USF. Because I'm considering how creative writing and composition can work together in the classroom, I figure this class is a great opportunity to test that theory. I don't always feel like I know what I'm doing, as sometimes I teach the class through instinct rather than firm pedagogical study, but so far I feel that it's going well. I plan on doing an independent study in this topic over the summer, which could further shape how I conduct the class in the future.

The Connectors ... who secretly run the world by Jeff Howe

This article from Wired explains how connections are made in business, and again emphasizes that who you know can often determine your success rather than what you know (unsettling for an academic). However, this has been true for me twice in the past three days, so I have to agree.

The first time it benefitted me. I was trying to publish a short story, and heard from a poet friend who had recently been published in a literary journal. The journal editor liked my friend a lot and even interviewed him. Well, I dropped his name when I sent in a work of my own for consideration, and voila! the work was accepted for publication. (However, I still don't think it would have been published if it were awful, so I feel you still need a bit of talent and education in order to be published.)

The second time I benefitted a friend, or at least tried to. I teach at Eckerd, and have an acquiantance at USF who'd also like to teach on the campus. I've seen her teach and like her style very much -- enough to give her contact information on who might be interesting in letting her teach on campus as an adjuct, getting her foot in the door. I even told her she could use me as a reference (which, according to this article, is a second-level mode of introduction). I did stop at sending an introductory e-mail to the people who hire teachers there with my friend cc'ed, which is the third level of introduction; I had considered this, but decided it would be too pushy.

So, yes, who you know definitely has an affect on your level of success, although you have to be in a position to achieve that success once you use contacts. I wouldn't have recommended my friend to teach if I hadn't seen her in the classroom before; my writing wouldn't have been accepted if it had been awful.