Another job search season is upon us and, not yet knowing if our Department will be lucky enough to search for a new tenure track line (this year I submitted requests for two, in fact), I thought I’d offer a little unsolicited advice to people on the job market (and simultaneously solicit anyone else with […]
continue readingHow to Make More from More? the Large Conference Loner Challenge
“Less is better” is a dictum that doesn’t just haunt Matt Sheedy. I feel as though that spectral proverb from J.Z. Smith may apply as much to conferences as the classroom. The phrase resonates with my cultural heritage, too. There’s a cookbook title, famous among certain generations of Mennonites, that encapsulates the bent of that culture: “More-with-Less.” […]
continue readingOn the Problem With Reproducing Ourselves
It’s long past when faculty in doctoral degree-granting schools in our field need to start reconsidering what it is that we’re doing in graduate education. I’m hardly the first to say that, I know.
continue reading“What Do I Talk About At the Job Interview?”
I’ve written a number of blog posts over the years about the skills that students in the academic study of religion acquire. It’s worth thinking about because too many people seem focused only on the content of an undergrad degree, assuming that the thing that you study is the thing that you’ll do. It’s an […]
continue readingOne Week of Research in an Archive: A Journal
Professors around the department often talk about their “research.” But what exactly is that? It’s something to do with books and articles, right? In hopes of showing how some of us work–or at least how I work–below is a day by day running journal of a five day research trip I took to the Bancroft Library […]
continue readingAim High…?
I was at one of the field’s doctoral schools a while back, to give a talk, and heard from a couple sources — both grad students repeating what they’d been told as well as from a faculty member — that the primary purpose for students to be enrolled in graduate school (or perhaps at that […]
continue readingMaking Sense of a Sabbatical
In my Introduction to Religious Studies course, my students think a lot about “making the strange familiar and familiar strange.” With those lessons in mind, I thought I’d make a bit more familiar for students who won’t see me as much in the Spring a practice that happens within the academy—the sabbatical. After being awarded […]
continue readingOut of My Reach?
I assume you’ve seen the discussion over the past month of so around the CV of failures — a movement among some academics to publicize, and thereby make apparent to others, a list of their failures, so as to dispel the myth of merit, i.e., that success just naturally comes to those who already have […]
continue reading10 Things I Learned at the REL Film Studios
Russell McCutcheon wrote a post on this blog recently in which he talked about the history and development of our filmmaking ventures here at REL, and as a student worker heavily involved in producing the films, I felt the need to respond to his post. For about two years now I’ve been planning, directing, filming, and editing […]
continue readingWriting Well: An Incomplete Set of Guidelines
It’s that time of the semester: final essays. But before you mash the print button or send that paper to your professor, you should take a quick look at this writing advice from Prof. Matthew Bagger. Prof. Bagger gave these tips to his REL 360 course but they are helpful for any papers you may […]
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