I have two students who are both citing works by historian Lacey Baldwin Smith. There is some confusion as to whether Lacey Baldwin Smith is a man or a woman.

tags: his295

Did you know that after Nelson was killed at the Battle of Trafalgar, they packed him into a cask of brandy, along with some camphor and myrrh (I think) and shipped him home?

This strikes me as peculiar, but I can't put my finger on why. He wouldn't be the first person to be pickled and shipped, and I can certainly see the authorities wanting him back -- but there's something weird and interesting about this.

I have a student who is working on the death of Nelson, and I want this question (why did they do this with his body?) to be the core of the paper, but I'm not going to tell the kid what to write. So, we'll see how this develops.

(But really? A hogshead of brandy? Which makes me wonder: how did they fold him up? Fetal position? I suppose it depended on the relative sizes of Nelson and the barrel.)

tags: his295

I have spent much of the afternoon reading research proposals for my two senior seminars. Most of them were actual research proposals. One was a single sentence. That one will get spit back with instructions to re-do for half credit. (I think this is quite generous.)

And I know where I will be next year. Here, but with a lighter teaching load, and money for research. I don't mind this so much, even though it's not tenure track, because this is a decent job. Also, if one looks at it in a certain light, it's actually a fairly brilliant job. Aside from the fact of its being a job, with things like health insurance and a retirement plan, it is one of those jobs where you get to do whatever you want when you want to do it, provided that you show up in certain places (i.e. classrooms) at appointed hours, appropriately prepared. And I can spend my weekends re-reading Douglas Adams novels. As someone pointed out to me recently, I am living la vie boheme, but with a 403(b). Or 403(a). I'm fairly sure I have both, but I can never recall offhand which is which. But the point stands, regardless.

Also, I have actually worn out a copy of Rhys Isaac's The Transformation of Virginia. I'd had it for a few years, used it last semester for teaching, and again this semester, and this week the binding cracked. I wonder, if I write a letter to the Omohundro Institute and/or the University of North Carolina Press, will they give me a new copy? (I suspect not. But one wonders why books can't be under warranty. And they owe me. I could have ordered a free desk copy of this one both last semester and this, and I didn't. Possibly I should have.)

tags: his295, that noble dream

Still in painful suspense. Nothing. I am afraid of my email, because email is how rejections come. On the bright side, one search at a good university that isn't doing AHA interviews requested my book mss, published articles, syllabi, and everything related to teaching that I could come up with on short notice. This is encouraging, at the very least.

I finished up the footnotes for my draft article that I want to send out by the end of the month. I am 500 words short of the upper word limit, which is good. And I realized on the way home that if I rearrange one particular sentence I can avoid attempting to cite everything of interest that has been written on seventeenth-century Virginia in the last 30 years. (It is amazing how much difference phrasing makes.)

I was looking for secondary material today on a particular person, an obnoxious 17th-century Virginian, and the first thing that came up on EBSCO (America History and Life) was an article I myself had written. It is a measure of my stress level that I did not even smile at this.

tags: his200, that noble dream

I have heard back from one of seven, and I am turned down. Sadness. However, six more. I have a nasty foreboding that I will not get a job this year, but forebodings are simply that: bad feelings. They have no power to influence the universe and they do not tell me anything but what I already know, which is that I feel like crap about not getting that particular job. (This is what I like about not believing in the supernatural. It's a relief not being responsible for ideas that remain confined to the inside of my head. Also not being at the mercy of other people's, either.)

And besides, the chair of that search committee had a Dr. Fell sort of moment, I think. There was something about that man's moustache that I disliked.

In other news. I have one student who wants me to write her a letter of recommendation for a summer program aimed at undergraduates who wish to pursue a PhD in American history. I have agreed to do it, but I have misgivings. This student has a real love for the subject - she told me with real excitement at one point last semester how she was taking a class about ancient Greece, and how just plain cool it was. We had several additional conversations about history, graduate study, etc. However, her work for my class was not outstanding. Mostly I think it was that she was taking too many classes (she explained this to me at one point when I sent her an email about attendance/participation) which left her stretched fairly thin. As a result, she was absent more than she should have been, and her participation was not top notch. In addition, her writing is not strong. This is partly a style issue -- distractingly colloquial, lapses in usage -- and partly an analytical issue. On the one hand, I think a program like that she's applying to might help her with this. And, she would find out earlier rather than later whether she's suited for graduate study. On the other, I don't like writing recommendations where I have to explain points like what I just said here, which won't work in the recommendee's favor. But I promised, and I will do it.

Two additional enrollees for my work and servitude seminar. I am going to have to send out another "guess what, there's reading!" email on Sunday.

And Squirrel Man is poised to return. He not only wants to pick up his paper from last term, but he wants to drop by and chat at some point. Here I should say, this young person has some peculiar and in some cases objectively wrong ideas, but he's not dumb. The Great Squirrel Racefail aside, he did some good work for my course.

tags: students

I hate the waiting. Hate, hate the waiting. Catholic Institution #1 said they would get back to me, one way or another, by the end of this week. Which means tomorrow. Catholic Institution #2 did not specify. Neither did the others. Gah, I hate this. I want to hide under my desk and not come out, except that last time I took a really good look down there, I found a potato chip that was not mine.

We will save the space under the desk for a more serious emergency, I think.

History 200 went reasonably well today. The students all looked so young! And there were sixteen of them, which is one more than I expected. I allowed the cap to be raised on this course in the fall, to admit one extra person, and apparently this has carried over. Anyhow, the room was full.

Death Seminar also went well. There were two kids who were interested in the history of medicine, one in medieval history, and a few miscellaneous. We had a good discussion, I think. Next week is a chunk of Philip Aries and some Mort d'Arthur, which will be a little tougher than our readings today, Ziegler on the Black Death, and a bit of Boccaccio. (I suspect I have spelled "mort" wrong, but am too tired to check. French can go eat itself).

tags: teaching, that noble dream

One of the great ironies of my chosen field is that free books are easier to come by the further along you are in your career and the more money you have to buy them. Among the other items in my mailbox today was a complimentary copy of the Norton critical edition of Thomas Jefferson's writings. Not bad, for completely unexpected, no?

I have vowed to myself that I will finish my current article by Friday and get it out there and to the journal by Monday. This can be done. It's only a matter of adding a few notes, and re-writing a few sentences. The article is based on a conference paper I gave this fall, and because it started as a conference paper, the language is more colloquial than I would like -- suited for oral presentation, but not for print.

Also on Friday. Phone interview with a midwestern university. A friend of a colleague of mine told me a great story about a campus interview at this place sometime in the 1980s. Basically, he was kept awake the entire night before his job talk by the university bowling team rehearsing for regionals. (It seems to be a peculiarity of the student union building of this university that there are residence areas right above the bowling alley. And also that they have a bowling alley, but never mind.)

Classes begin on Thursday. I have History 200 in the morning and Death Seminar in the afternoon. Work Seminar is not until Monday.

tags: that noble dream

There was an Omohundro Institute reception at the AHA last night. On a boat, with an open bar. I didn't go, because at the time I thought I had not been invited, even though two friends of mine tried to convince me that I could easily crash. Probably they were right. (It turns out I had been invited -- the Institute sent a paper invitation and it got to my dept. mailbox after I left for winter break. I didn't make the connection between the "you got this random thing by postal mail from Omohundro" email from a friend of mine back home and my non-reception of an invitation to the shindig until it was too late. Chalk it up to AHA-related brain damage. Ah, well.) Anyhow, the arguments offered to me in favor of the early American boat party were

1) WATERBORNE NETWORKING OPPORTUNITY!

and

2) Don't you want to see Laurel Thatcher Ulrich drunk?

To which I suppose the most obvious answers are:

1) I hate networking.

and

2) No.

But regardless of the networking that may or may not be underway or the tipsiness of Harvard's great early American historian, I think it is a good thing in the world that there was, last night, at a well-defined position along the San Diego waterfront, an EARLY AMERICAN HISTORY PARTY BOAT.

Seriously. There should be more early american history party boats. Or even history party boats in general.

tags: that noble dream

I have been at the AHA since Thursday. Thousands of historians, all tagged with name badges. This year, nametags came on blue lanyards, so we could hang them from our necks rather than pinning them to our lapels.

And the mood is good. I had six interviews, one for a postdoc and five for tenure track jobs. (I still have one additional phone interview, scheduled for this Friday). And there were no disasters. I am unreasonably pleased about there not being any disasters. Low standards, etc.

The postdoc was with a big early-American history and culture institute -- I was surprised to get an interview, and beforehand I told myself that this was such a longshot that there was no need to stress. And I think it went well. I have no great expectations, but I have the satisfaction of a job reasonably well done.

I think I failed to impress the committee for a university in the mountain west. I had not thought of looking up what the main manuscript collections in the west were (other than the Huntington Library in California) and so I was unable to give a good answer when they asked me about said manuscript collections.

Two large Catholic universities, at one of which I was asked how I would support the university's mission -- to which I had what I think was a cogent, truthful and reasonable answer -- both of which were hard to read. I have hopes, but I am jittery. These are both very desirable jobs.

And one university quite close to where I am now, the interview for which I thought went really well. I got a "wow" after I talked about how I would teach early American history. (A GOOD "wow", I might add. Not a puzzled, what-the-fuck sort of "wow.") I want this one, I really do.

Well, I want all of them.

Anyhow.

Tired now. The gift shop here at the hotel sells alcohol, so I am now off to finish the beer I just bought.

****

Addendum, post Previous University reception (many schools have receptions at the AHA at which one can meet up with grad school colleagues, current faculty, etc.). With free food and booze, I should add. The following was written after two glasses of wine.

First of all, my grad school colleagues are nice people. I knew this, but it was reinforced to me over the past two hours. Simon, you are a good friend, and deserve a job. Kaja, you are very, very smart and I want to talk to you more. Sara, I miss you, and wish you had come - we are overdue for a good long talk. Jason, Twitty, Maya, Erica, Rupa, et al. -- you are a good bunch. Go Previous University 02 cohort!

(It is a peculiarity of graduate school that one bonds by entering year rather than graduating class, since people tend to go through the first years of coursework together but finish dissertations at different times. So, the people I know best entered grad school with me, in the 02-03 academic year, or the following year, 03-04.)

Also, we are all a lot older than we were in the fall of 02. Many of us are married. Some of us have children. Pretty much all of us have Ph.Ds. Most of us have smile lines, and here and there one spots a gray hair.

At this point, one would expect me to say that I am surprised that I am already thirty. I'm not, though. It seems like a long time since I was 22. Other people from college that I've talked to always seem to marvel at how fast the time has gone. I don't think it has been so fast -- I was doing A LOT between twenty-two and thirty. I started and finished grad school. I went to Europe for six months. I fell in love. I discovered opera. I read Foucault, and Proust, and George Eliot. I taught Shakespeare to undergraduates. I learned to speak Italian, and read French. I became a rather good lecturer. Basically, I became an adult in a way that I was not at 22.

Finally, the AHA is in San Diego this year. This means that I am currently in San Diego. It is warm. I went swimming, in the pool, outdoors, yesterday. There are palm trees. The air is balmy and soft. The air by the pool smells like the sea, which is not far away.

It's a good thing to be a historian.

tags: that noble dream

I did all my grades this afternoon. I finished grading papers and exams, made three little spreadsheets, and submitted the results to the registrar's office. I am quite glad to be done with this.

The exam I made up for the English Atlantic World was the first exam I'd ever come up with entirely on my own. I had submitted questions for exams as a TA, but I was never in charge of the whole thing, and when I was teaching composition there were no exams.

I was concerned it would be too hard, or that somehow I wouldn't have pitched it right, but I think it worked. Four of them finished before time, the rest just about at time, and only one failed to finish, but this was because he'd thought he had three hours and the exam was actually only two.

So, just for kicks, here is the exam. The answer to the bonus question is "beaver tail."

( Atlantic World Exam )

I was disappointed -- no one did the question about cannibals.

tags: teaching

"Overall, it is hard to argue that empire was perceived parsimoniously."

Yes, it is pretty hard to argue that.

tags: students

Apparently, by 1688 England was "well on its way to be coming an empirical giant."

tags: students

From a paper I graded this afternoon:

"General Chase, having just been emasculated, yelled to his men to 'Ride down the women!'"

tags: students

It is just past 7:00am and I have a student taking an exam for my English Atlantic World course in the English department library upstairs. She is leaving for Cairo this morning, so wanted to take the exam early. Let me reiterate that 7:00am is indeed quite early. She forgot to bring either paper or blue books, so she is writing the exam on printer paper. I need to buy a package of notebook paper and just stash it in my office -- exams written on paper with lines are just easier all around.

I had fun making up the exam. My first, in fact.

I am too tired to grade right now (had to get up at 5:30 this morning to get here on time) so I may just fool around with my syllabi and try to stay awake for the next few hours.

tags: teaching

Which means five research papers per day. I can do this. And I am not even counting weekends, because I hate grading on weekends.

Also: must come up with exam for Wednesday. And get up at 5:30 in the goddamn morning because one student is taking it early, at 7:00. I am going to take the rest of that day, off, I think. Specifically, I think I will crawl home after the main exam ends at 11:00, eat, fall asleep for about three hours, and then spend the rest of the day reading something edifying.

The interview count is now at five. Four tenure track jobs and one postdoc, but it's a NICE postdoc. I am going to prepare like a madwoman for these. (That is, I am going to prepare very intensely and thoroughly, but not by setting things on fire and leaping off buildings or anything like that.) Although, as a friend of mine reminded me (as I have reminded him in the past) that these things, in some sense, are utter crapshoots. And yet, we will all be members of search committees some day, and we will believe that we are making rational decisions based on real information. So, who knows.

tags: that noble dream

I finished grading all the English Atlantic World essays this afternoon. There were some where I think the student was for all intents and purposes asleep while writing -- one in particular became less and less coherent as it went on. However, due to some interesting bits at the beginning, it merited a B.

I am still reading about bodysnatching, but I will have to switch gears and work on my other syllabi -- I do have two other courses to teach in the spring. One, the methods course, I've taught before, but I want to make some changes. The other, the course on work and servitude, continues to frustrate me. Partly, I don't know as much about Latin America as I would like, but partly, it's a conceptual thing. I'm having trouble figuring out how to structure it, which is a sign that I have yet to figure out what this course is really about.

Possibly a bath is in order. At the very least, I am taking home with me a documentary history of slavery in Brazil. It is one of those books that is so thick that it's hard to get it to stay open. I am going to CREASE this thing tonight.

Also, I spent part of the morning in the university's medical library. They have a nice historical collections room up on the third floor -- wood floors, pretty rug, cushy chairs, and four walls of rare books about medical history. I xeroxed some pages out of The Life of Sir Astley Cooper, written by his nephew, which has a long section on resurrection men and dissection. Possibly I need to read up more on the history of medicine, just for 1) fun and 2) so I can hang out in this reading room.

tags: teaching

I have been reading the "Life of Sir Astley Cooper," which is an account of an early 19th century surgeon who was among those who dealt with the so-called resurrection men in order to procure bodies for dissection.

I was just paging through the table of contents. Among the individuals mentioned are a duo of medical professionals, Dr. Ash and Mr. Shrapnell.

Also, did you know that there are Library of Congress subject headings for both "cadavers" and "body snatching"? I learned this this afternoon.

tags: that noble dream

John Snart, Thesaurus of Horror: The Charnel House Explored, Being an historical and philanthropical inquisition made for the quondam-blood of its inhabitants, by a contemplative descent into the untimely grave shewing, by a number of awful facts that have transpired as well as from philosophical inquiry, the re-animating power of fresh earth in cases of syncope, &c. and the extreme criminality of hasty funerals ... (London, 1817)

Yes, his name is Snart. I really, really want this not to be a typo in WorldCat

tags: that noble dream

I have just given three of them, all for different reasons. The paper with great analysis but a slightly murky thesis; the one with a great thesis that isn't quite realized in the analysis; the one that that was all around better than merely adequate (merely adequate is a B- to a B) but still wasn't outstanding.

Avalanche of work this week. A press that shall remain nameless wants to see my book manuscript, which I sent today, which means that I need to get working on making it shorter (the editor wanted the mss as is, but we agreed that shorter, at this stage, would be a good thing nevertheless). It has not gotten to the peer-review stage yet -- that is next. This is less good news than an absence of bad news. But it still means a lot of work.

And then there is the AHA. Three interviews at this point (plus a phone one later in January) which means that I have several syllabi to fool around with and send to various places beforehand. And I have to figure out what I am going to say to the search committee at one very Catholic university, the director of which has told me that I am going to be asked whether I am Catholic and how I can contribute to the university's mission. I am not Catholic, and there are some bits of Catholicism that I am definitely NOT on board with (existence of deities, their position on birth control, covering up abuse of children, etc.), but we can probably find common ground on things like the pursuit of knowledge being a good thing and social justice for the poor. I hope so, anyway. And they sent me a packet of stuff to look over in advance, relating to said Catholic mission and a few other things, which I realize just now that I left on the table in the faculty lounge. Need to go and get that.

Also, grading of Atlantic World essays, preparation of syllabi for next semester (almost done!) and I was working, as far as I can remember, on an article. Or two. Must check.

tags: that noble dream

Reading twelve papers on The Tempest or Oroonoko. Some very good. Some completely baffling. No one has gotten the two texts mixed up, though.

At some point, I need to start writing exam questions for next week. Also, one of my students has gotten permission from the dean to take her exam two hours early, so that she can catch a flight to Cairo. This is a 9am exam, which means she will be taking it at 7am. I really, really hope that someone ELSE will be proctoring this thing, because I really don't want to get up at 5:30 to supervise a one-person exam.

More fun with syllabi today. I have been trying to find an English-language primary source account of the burning of Michael Servetus in Geneva -- no luck. There must be one out there. I have many accounts of Catholics burning Protestants, but I need a few of Protestants burning people, just to be fair. Also, Servetus was an interesting guy. He managed to get condemned for heresy by both the Genevans AND the Pope. Fun!

tags: teaching