Lit Reviews

I've been reading non-stop for about three weeks now...on a paper I've already submitted drafts of twice. Before grad school, I thought paper writing a pretty linear process. You have an idea, you read about it, you write the paper and turn it in. Of course I knew writing involved revisions, but I guess I had no clue what revising actually entailed. I've now realized that even after drafting a paper, there's still more thinking to be done. Not only thinking, but rethinking. Part of my rethinking this paper entailed the realization that I'd neglected an entire portion of the literature about punishment in the U.S. Not only that, but in the course of searching for this new literature, I found a bunch of stuff related to my old ideas about public opinion on mandatory sentencing. Unfortunately when I read that, I realized I couldn't frame my paper in the same way I had been thinking about because the literature actually did mention what I said it did not.

On the bright side, I've actually enjoyed this process of discovery. I'm reading what I want. I don't want to continue on with this exact topic after this paper, but I've become more of an expert on the subject of punishment and mandatory sentencing. Even though all the ingredients for a brilliant paper still wait to be mixed in just the right proportions, I feel like I'm on the cusp of an idea that will send me flying into the rewrite without looking back.

Today's Grad Gravy: Enjoy the process of discovery we call paper writing.

A New Quarter

Today begins a new quarter. Already I have high hopes for what I will accomplish. I wonder if I can finish my qualifying paper, write a quant methods paper, and finalize my oral exam lists in ten weeks. I guess I could stretch that to eleven if you count finals week. Sounds like a lot, but I'll try. It's funny how I start off with faith that I can do all these papers and projects in the span of a couple months, but then come June I'll be saying to myself, "What the heck was I thinking? I can't do all that in one quarter." For now, I'll stick with the positive attitude and hopefully that will pull me through. If nothing else, I'll work as hard as I can (with the obligatory fun thrown in) that way if I don't get everything done, I'll at least know I put all I could into it.

Today's Grad Gravy: It's not about meeting every goal every time, it's about knowing you did as much as you could to get there.

Today's Procrastination

Check out PostSecret. It's like a sociologists dream. People send in anonymous postcards with secrets they've never before revealed. Some make me want to cry, others just make me laugh.

When law and society collide

The sociology of law fascinates me. Today I got a chance to see it in action. Check out this post on the NY Times. The comments following the article reveal how people really think about the power of law, what it means to be a criminal, and how we think about punishment.

Sociologist on the Colbert Report

I had an interesting conversation over dinner the other night with a fellow sociologist about this clip of Sudhir Venkatesh's appearance on the Colbert Report.

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Venkatesh describes himself as a "rogue" sociologist because he tried to go into the ghetto and survey people about what it's like to be black and poor, but they wouldn't answer his questions (go figure), so he decided to live with them for 6 years and find out for himself what they thought and how they lived. My friend says that he gives people the wrong idea about sociological work. I agree. He mentions the questions he asked in the survey and it's quite possibly the worst survey I've ever encountered. I'm a fan of ethnography, so I'm glad that he abandoned the quanty stuff for fieldwork, but how is that "rogue"?

Watch the clip, see for yourself, and let me know what you think. By the way, Venkatesh is coming to our sociology department in April.

Winning the Lottery

No, I didn't hit the jackpot. I'm not quitting grad school to go travel the world until the end of my days. But, I had a thought this morning that I had to share. I've spent the last two days thoroughly immersed in paper revisions. This doesn't mean that I've actually been writing anything. Monday, I holed up in the library to read everything I could find on why the American legal system looks the way it does. Yesterday, I sat at my table reading yet more articles on American exceptionalism in penal policy (we incarcerate more people than any other nation, we have longer prison sentences, and mandatory minimums). I read and thought until I figured there was nothing left in that brain of mine. Then, magically, at about 6:00, the light bulb burst forth its illumination and I drafted a paragraph that made complete sense to me. That's right, two solid days of work for ONE paragraph (this is me yesterday at about 6:18pm).

Today I come to the computer completely motivated. I love ending on such a good finding/writing session yesterday because it makes me want to return. But why didn’t I see that flash of inspiration before? Did I really need to spend two solid days reading and thinking about it to come to such a simple conclusion? Then, I stop and tell myself that yes, all that reading and thinking was worth it. It’s those journeys through academic work that lead us through to the other side. Without that, I probably wouldn’t have ended up where I did.

And now we've made it to the lottery: My mind is a giant lottery ball machine. I dumped all the balls in and let them jump around. Then, when they were good and jumbled, the “right” one popped through the chute. Without them all in there in the first place, I couldn't have ended up with the one that'd make me millions (if only, right?)

Today's Grad Gravy: Dump all that information into your brain and enjoy the results.

Fewer paper woes today

Lest you all think I've drowned in negative feedback, I figured I'd give you an update on the critiques I received on the paper. As predicted, I did feel better about it yesterday, though I still disagreed on some points. I went back through the comments and tried to sort out the useful from not so useful (although I did spend way too much time dealing with one comment that I realized in the end wasn't crucial). Along the way, I noticed more positive feedback than I'd originally seen (funny how that works). So, I was prepared for today when I met with my committee member and we talked things out. I came away with a fair amount of work to do, but also a better understanding of where he's coming from. I do think that revising my paper in the ways he suggests will be helpful, but it will also be a lot of work. But hey, that's what we're here for right?