thinking is the new black

What doing a PhD feels like sometimes.

So I promised an update on the state of the per her der back in October, and so far I’ve managed to avoid following that up, because I HAVEN’T FINISHED.

I have been working on my PhD since April 05 and am grimly aware that I’m approaching the end of 2008 and I HAVEN’T FINISHED. 

Yes, despite having 3 months at the beginning of the year where I holed myself and renounced pretty much every other aspect of my life to write, I HAVEN’T FINISHED.

But why haven’t I finished? I’m really not sure, because I worked all day last Sunday whilst all around me were Christmas shopping, watching football, drinking beer and having fun. I worked until 21:50 last night whilst others watched crap on Living and ate chocolates. At this rate I should’ve finished by now surely?

This is the point where if I were in a film of my life (staring Scarlet Johansson as me) there would be a big focus pull. Spooky voice-over would rasp accusingly  ”where has your life gone?”, as something truly tragic composed specially by Morricone sets the scene, the heroine is finally caught out  by the truth; that she sat around all day, eating chocolate, playing with kittens, reading Vogue and attending light lunches.

But hang on…

A really depressing fact, which I came across today is that 3/4 of PhD students in the UK take 7 years to complete. Man oh man. I started the PhD in April 05, so I’ve been at it a total of 3.5 years and during that time I changed my status from FT to PT. When you’re registered as PT you only received half the supervision hours and are only expected to work about 16 hr p/w on the thesis. So, a year consisting of 2 PT semesters only counts as 0.5 when the trajectory is calculated. Following that logic, if the PhD took me another year I’d still meet the national average, and I could actually take another 2 years to complete it. God forbid.

Mulling all this over, I started to think quite seriously though what have I been doing? So I had an audit of sorts. In 3.5 years of doing a Phd (nearly 4 years in terms of my life, time and commitment)  I’ve presented at 4 conferences (one international)  & attended another international symposium. I went to Cuba, Morroco, Thailand and Vietnam, Spain and Italy. I’ve ended a long-term relationship, started a new one, and moved house. I’ve written 2 papers and had one published, taught for 5 semesters, held a FT position as an analyst for 3 months, followed by another period as an analyst later in the year for 5 months, and this semester I’ve begun supervising  undergraduate dissertations. And yes, I have not missed reading one monthly addition of Vogue. 

Phewee. I feel so much better for this little audit; I’m now able to say I haven’t finished in lower case. So joy to the world, and peace on earth.

I think it is quite common to worry about the big bad deadline, and especially given that people are constantly asking me when I’m going to finish. It’s very hard to impress on people who are not doing a PhD- quite what it is that one does, when doing one, and all the to-ing and fro-ing with supervisors reading drafts, redrafting, progress reviews, transfer vivas, selecting externals.

But I’m rather cheered that I’ve discovered some fantastic PhD blogs recently. It provides a great deal of comfort to know that there are other people out there experiencing similar things. 

Dramatic events in the thinking is the new black house hold this week, when my personal computer began to sound as if it were being powered by a russian hamster on a tread wheel. Unfortunately it was the hard drive in my 3 year old mac mini that gave up the ghost.

Apparently living in and powering my mac-mini

Frankly at the time, an utter horrendo disaster. Although I regularly back work up, and managed  to salavge all my thesis and teaching work, I still lost some of my itunes and photo data. It’s a painfull lesson to learn as I’ve spent several hours already this week, loading CDs into itunes and rummaging around for old software disks and memory cards. But thanks to some help from my friends I now have a suped up 160GB, and modded mac-mini as good as a brand new one. And I have discovered a great Mac Mini civilization camped out there on the t’interweb of streams.

Even more nail biting perhaps was the return of my TV husband Jack Bauer, in a one off special 24 Redemption. Damn It! This has certainly wet my appetite for Day 7 which is on in January. I’m now beside myself with excitement.

I always base the upgrade of my mobile phone on what ever Jack is using, so the writers strike in the US has meant a delay and me being stuck with a rather rubbish motorola razor for some time and looking like a right old laggard. Jack I am waiting for you.

sorry Bruce Parry - there can be only one. xx

I went to the 1st of the evening media seminars at Brighton University yesterday to hear Dr Kate O’Riordan from Sussex give her paper “The Genome incorporated: Constructing Biodigital Identity’” which

“examines the intersection of genome sequencing and digital media practices through a discussion of interactivity, social networking and genome browsing which centres around the personal genome sequencing company23andMe “

In terms of social networking 23andMe has a community function whereby users compare their genome data with other people signed up for the service. As I commented last night I can really see this ending up as some sort of face-book style application  / public profile. 

What was especially interesting to me is that Google is one of the investors of 23andMe. 

As the article points out

the investment could be seen as Google’s first step towards indexing genetic information.

Food for Thought

If Google were able to combine the immense amounts of user data they collect right now with the health and medical data that could potentially be gathered from Google Health AND combine that with data potentially available to them through 23andMe, a person’s Google profile could be a dangerous thing. What if this hypothetical Google profile ever got into the hands of a health insurance provider? Could you be denied coverage based on a genetic predisposition to cancer? What if you also often search terms like “breathing problems” and “wheezing,” or you’ve emailed a cancer specialist to try and get an appointment?

I watched Question Time on the beeb last week after Obamas’ victory. It featured Brian Eno, for one, who is apparently a consultant to the Lib Dems. How about that? He is a  rather charming reactionary and good to see the Lib Dems appropriating a bit of cool. I’ve long thought that they’ve  catching up to do in the communication of democracy stakes. I know politics should be all about the policies, but in this day and age it has to also be about the brand. As well as be being on the money and having some sound political views, Eno mediates politics at the level of personal activism and social responsibility. Plus he allows the Lib Dems to draw on also sorts of connotations of hip and culture.

Anyway, as you can imagine the whole QT show was rather a viva Obama fest / “we are the world, we are the people”, including Bonnie Greer  who is normally very sensible telling everyone how she was in tears on victory night. Everyone wants to be Obamas’ friend, and every one wants to show  that their personal emotional reaction to the event is stronger than their neighbors, and some how more authentic. I mean don’t get me wrong I AM pleased ( though rather like Bonnie  I flipflopped from being a Hilary supporter to a Barack supporter).   2 events come to mind through all this.   One is the death of Princess Diana and the other, Tony Blairs’ victory in 1997. The whole emotional competitiveness is symptomatic of Western Society, particularly in the UK since the death of Diana. The notion of the media facilitation “our” ability to feel if you know what I mean. 1997 for me was one of the most important elections in the last 100 years, not least because it was the 1st one I was able to vote in. What I am reminded of more specifically is this discourse of optimism and hope obscuring actual policy.

I remember staying up all night watching the votes some in and seeing Neil Kinnock dancing awkwardly to D:ream. Remember this?

In 1997 I was an undergrad struggling to live independently of my family in East London during the eve of Cool Britannia. I was so hopeful and optimistic for the Labour party; all I’d ever known was Thatcher and that life as a young adult living on the bread line in the capital was quite hard. My pals and I got carried away with the election, because a change of government for us signified such giddy anticipation for the future. Alas, like so many others, I’m let down by what actually followed.

The language of new labour has been brilliantly analyzed by Norman Fairclough,  in his wonderful book New Language New Labour. But I thought it would be interesting to run a quick word cloud courtesy of wordle on Baracks’ victory speech.

Check out the focus on patriotism, words connoting change, inclusively and signifying society. The world awaits to see if this discourse will have any effect on social change. No pressure then..

Atlanta Highway by Choking Sun

In between juggling getting back into thesis mode, teaching, supervising undergrad dissertations and general research-arama, I’m slowly, slowly trying to spruce up thinking is the new black. Therefore I’ve been having a poke around the blogosphere over the last few days, and looking at blogs I like, such as The Sartorialist, Fresh Peel, this one about culture and brands, the brilliant brilliant stylebubble.

I came across a discussion about  an analogies for the web recently, which captured my imagination, and reminded me of an amusing conversation I had with a colleague, about the different words and phrases people use for the same technologies, and how these can shape our perception. The idea of streams makes me think of the Amazon and all its’ tributaries,  which in turn makes me think of  Bruce Parry.  * sigh & goes all girly* 

It is very interesting to me that we as humans require analogies and metaphors for communication and information revolutions.  It’s discourse init.

Some of these analogies for what is happening in the web and social media, make me feel slightly uncomfortable, and think about the notion of echo chambers. It’s about the suitability of a metaphor to an intended audience. I haven’t really had the time or inclination to develop this further at the moment. However there is a brilliant reference by Phil Agre on the internet and public discourse.

I found it on this site I really like,  the v useful resource from  Caslon Analytics group. 

Also it’s all referenced bootifuly using the Harvard System. Nicely.

Thinking about the internet has been bedevilled by a range of metaphors such as the ‘information superhighway’, ‘digital divide’ and ‘broadband gap’. This page considers conceptual challenges and particular memes. 

Thanks to Peter Kay, I, like hundreds of others have been guilty of using the t’interweb in professional situations -such is its’ acceptance into common parlance in the UK. I’m also a huge fan of The Internets, and the terribly retro sounding,  Information Superhighway. Of course, these all mean slightly different things, are historically specific and depend on who’s doing the talking.

I’m quite fond of the town square and placing web theory in context with Habermas, as you know. But the reason I still quite like Information Super Highway, is that it evokes the idea of networks: sometimes monolithic motorways with service station stop offs, or contrasting bendy country lanes, bridle paths and cycle lanes, sometimes gridlocked, but very often going nowhere, empty or abandoned. 

Marx is trendy, official.  I was thrilled to read in the “going up” bit of yesterdays Sunday Times Style supplement, along with Ruebens Apples ( a cross between pink lady and cox), recession shopping  All Saints home, and purple boots, sales of Karl Marx Das Kapital are soaring.

You heard it hear 1st many moons ago, but if Style says – it must be a la mode.

Moi and Karl

As the Wild Child Fatboy slim remix goes…”Default damager, power to the people“.

Oui mes readers jolie, it is I, & I am back with the ill behavior.  

Google analytics tells me, much to my surprise and delight, that people are ending up at this humble destination whilst searching using key words stress & PhD. Therefore I’m thoroughly obliged, nay, compelled to revive thinking is the new black and share the highs and the lows of my personal tale of research-arama, avec tous.

So much has passed since I last blogged way back in April:  I watched the new season of Lost no less, Hilary was defeated by Obama, people wore Gladiator shoes, Safari chic and the Global Traveler look, I moved in with Senor Marco,  we went to Italy & Ibiza for the Summer hols, the iPhone came down in price, & I returned to the commercial world of work for 5 months. And still IMHO no one has really found a use for Twitter. My, time has flown. 

 Why no words on here from me for so long? By April I had been holed up for 4 months writing the thesis, and was more than ready to get ba wit it mandemz the legendary content and media team at iCrossing UK. But alas alack, after bashing 65000 words out of the 80000 word count of the PhD between Jan-April 08, frankly I have not felt like writing  even a shopping list until now. In addition, I was busy working on some research and analysis projects over the summer for a TV client, a major FMCG and finally a pharma client, on behalf of iCrossing, so social media kept me from social media.

It has been a very tough decision indeed to leave the team, but I’ve decided to return to academia and teach this semester in order to allow me time to submit the thesis, prepare for the viva, maybe even write a paper and go to some conferences. (More of this in coming weeks…) Teaching starts next week and I’m really looking forward to supervising some undergrad dissertations this year, and teaching “Innovation, Culture and Technology”. Although I’m already missing the A-team in content and media in the Brighton office and their clever clever ways I’m also really happy to be able to pursue my own agenda.

So yes folks, I am a university lecturer and PT freelance researcher, or as I prefer to say at diner parties when asked what it is that I do?   I’m  presently a symbolic analyst thank you very much for asking.  A term which comes from economist Robert Reich, in Reich R, B. (1991) The Work of Nations. Simon & Schuster.

 “all the problem solving, problem identifying, and strategic brokering activities […] they do not enter world commerce as standardized things. Traded instead are the manipulations of symbols -data, words, oral and visual representations. (Reich 1991 p177).

Although it’s some 17 years old, I’m still very taken with this book and I’ve employed Reichs’ work in my own a fair bit, and especially in a paper I wrote for the BSA conference in 2006. I’ve also used his theories in my thesis, so expect more of him too. Anyhow, I’m one now, a symbolic analyst that is, when I’m not busy being either a research student, social anthropologist slash social scientist slash communication theorist, slash fashionista revolutionista slash retired at 33. Hmmm. So little time so much to do.

A full update on the state of the PhD and A/W fashions with be with you imminently.

Following yesterday’s cat theme – I discovered today that Miu Miu is her mother’s daughter. I’m so proud! I doubt there are many people who can claim their pet has read Das Kapital.

It all began very early this morning when I was looking for something else entirely on Adfreak and came across a blog post about cats getting a PR overhaul. It seems not everyone loves cats as much as me. Wierdos.

The US based website CatChannel.com are running a competition asking people to create a 7″ x 10″ ad that shows the world the value and importance of cats. As they say cats are terribley misunderstood. “Throughout history, cats have been the victims of superstition and misunderstanding – and even today, cats are in trouble: More than 70% of cats in animal shelters are euthanized (compared to a still-shocking 56% of dogs).”

Anyone who knows me knows I love cats. More than that, I worship my very own mini-panther, Miu Miu. Not in a sad, lonely, cat-spinster way, but in a cats are the thinking mans best friend way. I can say this confidently as a) I’m not a spinster. I have a v nice b.f. who I knew was a keeper when I met his mum, who has 4 cats of her own and who gave me a present to give to my cat & b) I’m not alone, because I shone a spot light on the t’interweb quickly to see just how big the cat loving community was, and there are flippin loads of us.

awww little Miu Miu, constant companion &
critic to my PhD.

Cat lovers share a very special unspoken bond and this fascinates the ethnographer in me and I think the online cat loving community and social networks such as Catster are simply ter-riff. I have kown of the existence of catster for some time, but only just found out about mycatspace. Thrills. I am very taken with the idea that people are blogging on behalf of their cats. Check out the homage to the late great Albert. I mean, seriously? SERIOUSLY!!???

one more piccie of iccle miu miu for good measure.

I’m not a linguist. Phew.

I had a minor set-to last week with the discourse analysis section of my consumer interviews, which has knock affects on the overall final structure of the thesis. Being so near the to the end, at the time this felt somewhat of a minor disaster, and sent my bonce in a right old spin.
There are many styles of discourse analysis, all slightly different in nature and therefore consequence and, some favoured more by certain disciplines than others. My research is what is known as “interdisciplinary” and I have been feeling a little tugg of love between humanities and social sciences lately, perhaps confounded by the fact that I have 2 supervisors who’s areas of experience and expertise have a humanities/soc-sci split. This has actually worked really well for me up until now, but last week during a meeting, it became apparent that there was an atmosphere of concern over the way I have analysed the interview data. Obviously it is good to know these things now before submission and viva, and that it what supervisors are for. However it is an unpleasant feeling when the output of nearly 3 years toil is called into question.

Two pieces of advice that I’ve constantly echoing in my head (which actually come from the Gaunlett article I mentioned in a previous post) are

Don’t let the PhD over run 3 years, get it finished.
Stop reading, start writing.

So consequently I’ve been all 6s & 7s this past week because, I ‘ve been in the library doing desk work on theories of my method and have lost writing time, because I am reading. However in the words of Tammy Wynette I am going stand by my method. A little known fact is that Tammy originally wrote her famous hit about the insecurities she had over an emerging field of data analysis she was developing. At the very last minute she changed the lyrics from method to man, to avoid alienating fans without a university education.

Back to me. I went away after meeting the supers, with a sense of impending doom that I was going to have to review all my data and produce a corpus and would bankcrupt myself doing the PhD forever. I spent a day looking through all these hideous methodology papers on sociolinguistics, speech act theory, and pragmatics looking for clues. There were tables and graphs and metrics and grids and diagrams and, and, YER- UCK! You have to understand that it you cut a slice off one of my limbs, that it would say “qualitative” in sugary pink writing like a piece of Brighton rock. I am qualitative in the way Cathy was Heathcliff. I loathe numbers. I can’t even remember my mums phone no, which she has had for 15 years. Then I came across some comforting words on Foucault from the lovely squishy cultural theorist par excellence, Stuart Hall, that made me feel all warm and fuzzy.

“The first point to note is the shift of attention in Foucault from language to discourse. He studied not language, but discourse as a system of representation”.

That’s what I’m talking about, discourse as a system of representation. Language and practice – language and practice. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Discourse is something we do. No piece of software, or visualising metrics, table thingie is ever going to provide insight into the ideological biases and power relations explicit in discursive formation as far as I’m concerned. What good would a graph do in offering perception of socio-cultural context? Numbers Pah! It’s back to my first love of social –semiotics for me. I’ll be applying Saussure & Barthes on the ones and twos. Words as signs; iconic, symbolic, indexical. It’s denotation and connotation all the way. Yes sireeeee.

In the interests of balanced debate, here is an article from my friend Shirl biggin up graphs. Shout out to the graph collective. RRrrrspect.