not an academic.
It would be so much easier.
No more worrying about what to do on Strike Day, no more terrible RAE in the middle of the night panics and last minute changes to your esteem indicators (don't ask)
just doing what I like doing best which is:
Taking Photographs (like Dr Joolz)
Writing in notebooks
Being an ethnographer
Meeting people in odd places
Travelling
Writing muddly stuff which might or might not be interesting
Thinking
Being nomadic
Buying stuff (Whoops that is not art that is called earning money and spending it)
Anyway, this is partly brought on by this book which is my favourite book and cheered me up on the way back from Sheffield to London.
off to write fieldnotes...
7 comments:
It is crap having a job.
But possibly crapper not having one.
It is only when I got to the buying stuff point it dawned on me I had better stay in present job.
Is hopeless.
Hi being an academic is not whatit used to be, I reckon . What with the ethical review forms and the workload initiatives and keeping your CV up for the RAE, well who has time to write or meet with the colleagues who are supposed to be part of your working life ? Once in a blue moon that's all and then you come back to so many emails it makes your blood curdle or boil.
Even if people are in the department at the same time as you, they rush past one another mumbling stuff about marking or deadlines, or having a meeting with Wilf. I am posting this from Quito. I want to be someone else in this order ( this is not a list but a set of bullet points!)
- an ethnographer with a travel grant
- a worker for Unesco(there are so many children who need help here)
- a student again
- a postmistress
Or something where you get out and meet people without having to write a paper to justify your existence.
Oh Kate- surely there must be something else we all can do-
I am currently pretending to be an ethnographer searching for a paddle-in the museum of ethnography in Quito - no luck yet.
I actually would make a terrific waitress.
In THOSE shoes?
My more considered response. Poor you Kate. You came all the way up to Sheffield and felt totally abandoned and wet and fed up.
You are in the right job and we all have those crap times when we feel that almost anything will be better.
But. It is great that you have some nice projects and it is great that you can combine them with shopping.
You do really well living the nomadic life and staying in good spirits nearly all the time. I think it must be hard balancing all the bits of your life.
Cheer up as you are a great writer and researcher and teacher.
GOSH that was such a nice thing to say Dr Joolz.
Worth going to Sheffield just to hear.
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