Comments

  1. shelly

    The last day of class? Related to the dis? I’m obtuse.

    But I’d love to have a pair of those iron-clad boob protectors.

    Reply

  2. mike (author)

    The diss. And I’m thinking of wearing that iron-clad protection to the defense. With, you know, the wig.

    On July 7 at 2:30 in the afternoon.

    So I’m already thinking about inspirational music. Songs I might put on that morning. The Clash, “Death or Glory.” Rihanna, “Pon de Replay.” Gogol Bordello, “Underdog World Strike.” Drivin N Cryin, “Fly Me Courageous.” Joan Jett and the Runaways, “Cherry Bomb.” Ram Jam, “Black Betty.” Patti Smith’s venomous take on “My Generation.” Survivor, “Eye of the Tiger.” PJ Harvey, “Dress.” Bad Brains, “I Against I.” Sheryl Crow, “Steve McQueen.” Rammstein, “Feuer Frei.”

    But beyond all that, nothing quite does it for me like hearing Bernstein’s take on Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” played loud enough to rattle the windows and shake the floor.

    Suggestions?

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  3. shelly

    Got it. 7/7, 2:30, I’ll be thinking of you and wishing you luck.

    Man, I’m thinking the other direction entirely. Maybe it’s because my floors shake too often without my wanting it to happen, but when I’m readying myself for anything, I’m into the mellow. I’m usually so wound up that I have to key down.

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  5. Amanda

    Wig or no wig, I’m sure you’ll knock ‘em dead. Just remember to visualize them all in their underwear if you get nervous.

    (Oh, wait. That never worked for me. Never mind…)

    Best of luck!

    Reply

  6. aerobil

    Oh. My. God. I love the comic book. I want one! I want one! And you know that big green hand coming out from the bottom right belongs to your diss. director. ha!

    Knock ‘em dead.

    Reply

  7. Clancy

    “Fly Me Courageous” is a GREAT choice. I would also recommend “Roxie” from the Chicago soundtrack. Sing along with these parts:

    The name on everybody’s lips Is gonna be Roxie The lady raking in the chips Is gonna be Roxie

    I’m gonna be a celebrity That means Somebody everyone knows They(‘re) gonna recognize my eyes My hair my teeth my boobs my nose

    [. . .]

    Mmmm, I’m a star! And the audience loves me! And I love them And they love me for loving them And I love them for loving me And we love each other And that’s because none of us Got enough love in our childhoods And that’s showbiz Kid

    Reply

  8. mike (author)

    Ha! Love it. Check out this snip from Chapter 3:

    Bourdieu’s approach to class demonstrates that among individuals, similar cultural practices take on differing cultural values depending upon who performs them and the performers’ relationship to economy. Consider the composition of New York City audiences who might pay roughly equivalent prices for tickets at the same-day Times Square TKTS booth for two different performances: the Broadway “Chicago” revival at the Ambassador Theatre on West 49th and the off-off-Broadway performance (though only a few blocks away) of Vaclav Havel and Samuel Beckett’s “By and for Havel.” One understands that these audiences will comprise differently diverse modes of dress, go to differently diverse arrays of restaurants before and after the shows, and even have radically different sorts of comments about the shows they saw. The “Chicago” audience may be more likely to note with delight the choreography of Roxie and Billy’s ventriloquist act in “We Both Reached for the Gun,” and the “By and for Havel” audience more likely, perhaps, to comment on the sublime inscrutability Beckett’s sole explicitly political work inspires in the performances of the actors. Even these seemingly inconsequential differences, however, point towards a question regarding classed practices about whether a night at the theatre constitutes “an occasion for conspicuous spending” (Bourdieu 270) and the experience of a pleasant spectacle, or an opportunity to intellectually experience the cultural juxtaposition of the uncomfortable works of a Nobel laureate author and a Nobel-nominated political dissident. Furthermore, one should also consider that those differently diverse audiences share (as is likely obvious) individual members, who are differently classed in different environments and in their relationships to others in those environments.

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  11. Francois Lachance

    Have fun. If the thesis defence is like that at some other insitutions, it’s like a conversation between you, the writer, researcher, theorist, and other writer-researchers-scholars. And as conversations go, their questions are likely to be leading. Oh yeah, a defender at a defense sometimes judiciously declines to be baited. Graceful concession is also part of the conversation. But institutional mores vary. Your most difficult question: how is a thesis defense an act of investment as well as pure expenditure? by whom? when? I suspect your committee is looking forward to the enjoyable moment. Dr. Mike. Sounds nice, eh?!!

    Reply

  12. Clancy

    Also, I like that: The Defender. I believe I’ll feel more like the defendant at mine. :-(

    Reply

  13. Dennis G. Jerz

    Mike, as I see it, the goal of what I shall for a lack of better terminology call the dissertation attack committee is to see how far they can push you until you crack.

    Their motives are not sadistic or cruel. They know that they will be able to come up with a question that will stump you. You know that they will be able to come up with a question that will stump you. Assume that moment will come; and if it does, react with grace.

    For my dissertation (which was about 20th C drama), my stumper was a question about 19thC poetry. I couldn’t comment with any particularity on Blanche DuBois’s reference to Edgar Allen Poe in A Streetcar Named Desire, even though I had quoted her Poe line and I had made a relatively big deal out of how her literary knowledge contrasts with Stanley’s network of male friends.

    I said something like, “I could take a stab at that if you want me to, but I’d feel more comfortable looking it up.”

    At that, the committee members sat back, smiling, and clicked their pens shut; I knew that they were finished.

    Of course I was nervous as I waited in the hall outside, but I knew my adviser wouldn’t have let me schedule the defense if he wasn’t confident, and I figured that a dissertation defense is like the Kobayashi Maru of Star Trek – a scenario that masquerades as a puzzle to be solved, but that’s really a test of how you handle a no-win scenario.

    Reply

  14. mike (author)

    I had a really good meeting with my outside reader today and we went over the highly specific economic analyses (she’s a political economist/economic geographer) in my Chapters 3 and 4; the way I framed it to her, I was asking her to help me make sure I’m not making any fundamental errors in those analyses. These were chapters that have already been through multiple revisions to the point of satisfying my advisor, and it was a really productive meeting, with a couple “Aha!” moments for me, the big one being that while composition as a discipline has historically favored class analysis as a way of subtly addressing economic concerns without taking responsibility for explicitly addressing them; the mode of critique in which my outside reader works deploys class analyses as a point from which to more completely figure the workings of economic concerns. Based on our conversation, I think she’ll likely call me on my claims about Henry Giroux, but I think my critique of his work as it’s played out in composition is on fairly solid ground. In any case: Dennis, it sounds like you’re making the same point about judiciously declining to be baited that Francois makes.

    As far as my committee goes, I think my advisor will likely push me the hardest, but that the most flummoxing questions will come from my other departmental reader. If past experience is any indication. :-)

    Reply

  17. bradley

    I think that’s really Clancy, not you Mike. I just don’t see you as blonde as all that. Gives a whole new read to Culture Cat, don’t you think? Best of luck, though it’s long past time for luck! Knock ‘em dead instead!

    Reply

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