Kathleen Fitzpatrick // @[email protected]
Note: Thanks so much for having me, etc.
- Work with your advisor and committee to develop and revise your proposal
- Get committee approval to go forward
- Read, read, read
- Write!
- Defend!
- Done
Note: This is what the comps process looks like in theory; in reality, it's a good bit more complex
- A hurdle you need to get past
- A key transition from coursework to independent research
- A moment to synthesize, reflect, and look forward
- A demonstration that you're ready to make a contribution to the field
- A start on your dissertation research
Note: Comps feel like a hurdle, and its true that they are something you need to get past
- but they mark perhaps the most important transition in your graduate career: out of coursework and into your own independent research project
- and so they ask you to gather together what you've learned from your work thus far and to put it into practice in laying out the work you hope to take on
- which is to say that they are not intended to be a massive final exam -- it's not a matter of demonstrating that you've been paying attention and that you've read everything (or not just that, in any case)
- rather, it's a matter of demonstrating that you've done your homework and are now ready to make an original contribution to the literature in the field
- and, done right, the comps can give you an enormous jump on the research toward your dissertation
Note: this is a moment to stretch beyond the received wisdom about the texts you're reading and to think instead about the meaningful connections across texts that will help you surface the ideas you intend to work on in your dissertation
- it's also a time to think toward that project and what tools you're going to need to accomplish it
- all of which is to say that while your committee members will undoubtedly have things they think you need to have on your lists, and issues they want you to be sure to take up, this is the moment when you should start filtering that advice through your own lenses
- which is not me telling you to ignore your advisors' advice! but rather to talk with them about what you're thinking and see how that conversation might help shape the directions you take
- Put together the start of a list of books and some early thoughts on your focus
- Talk with your advisor and get some input
- Read around in what's on your list and mine for related texts
- Revise your list and your early draft proposal
- Talk with your advisor again, as well as your committee members
- Ponder their input and revise
- Read around some more
- Rinse, repeat
Note: this is why the process is in fact super nonlinear
- it seems as though the process would be linear: put together list of books, read books on list, write essays
- in fact it's more recursive: put together list of books, read some, talk to people, write some, add more to list, read more, write more, add more, etc
- which is to say that (1) you're going to start the reading and writing even while you're still putting the list together, but (b) you might need to think about the reading in waves, getting a basic familiarity with texts early on and then diving deeper into them once the lists are approved
Note: and finally: the comps are the moment when you start getting pulled out of the more collective model that operates during coursework, in which you're at least seeing the same people relatively frequently, into the far more isolated model of focus on solo projects
- it can be super lonely, so find ways to work together, to maintain contact with your colleagues
- share drafts and trade off commenting on them
- talk about process and exchange preparation ideas
- set up meal trains for one another during exam week No doubt you and your colleagues will have other, even better ideas for how to make the best of this process.
Kathleen Fitzpatrick // @[email protected]
Note: Many thanks.