My Life as a Grad Student

Oh, the end is so close I can almost taste it.  I imagine myself in my graduation gown, the same one that I wore for my under-grad ceremony and that Heidi posed in for pix. I imagine standing in line with my pals to have the cowl placed over my head (my hair looks amazing in my imagination).  And I imagine what it will be like come the end of May when I, for the first time, will not be already thinking about classes beginning in August.

There are never enough photos of

Clark on any woman's blog

My time as a grad student at Sac State is winding down. I'm right now going through the hell that is exams.  For readers unfamiliar with this particular form of torture, here's the run-down.  First, you have to decide just what the hell you actually want to focus on--what time period, place, movement, category of analysis, whatever.  For me, after having test-driven several different points of historical focus, from an early love of California history to a mild flirtation with Medieval Europe, it wasn't until last spring that I realized there is an entire field of study devoted to how people remember the Civil War.  As a lover of Gone with the Wind since junior high school, I was delighted to find that scholars actually look at things like why that book (among lots of other things) was so popular, what story it told, how it fits in the Civil War narrative, etc. 

Area of focus determined?  Check!

Then you have to find advisors, one for a major field and one for a minor field, who are willing to work with you on preparing and conducting your exams.  At CSUS, that's not as easy as you'd think.  While there are amazing professors who conduct classes on American history, it seems that there are only a handful of tenured or tenure-track professors who are actually Americanists.  And even these are somewhat locked into specific areas of focus, like history of American women, African-American history, or economic history.  But a pal recommended one Dr. Burke (not the same Dr. Burke who Christina Yang left at the alter), whose broad interest was American cultural history, including the nineteenth century.  So I approached her and, to my great delight, she was willing to work with me on a major field of study that included the Civil War, the memory of the Civil War, and Reconstruction and the long Civil Rights Movement.  Dr. Burke assigned 24 hefty books and a long journal article, and set me about my business.

I so want a locket like this!

Then there was the issue of the minor field advisor.  Enter Dr. Castenada.  This fine educator was my professor in my graduate-level research and writing class, better known as History 209.  Under his watchful eye, I completed my research paper entitled "Perpetuating the Myth: The Lost Cause in the Films of the 1930s."  I approached him in conjunction with a classmate, Logan, also taking his exams this semester.  Together, we all came up with a minor field of study and....voila!  Andrew Jackson versus the Second Bank of the United States.  For those of you who know me, you won't be surrised that I jumped at the chance to learn more about my beloved Old Hickory.  Dr. Castenada then assigned a bundle of books on the subject, and off I went.

Exam advisors acquired?  Check!

Jon Stewart can show you how Civil War

Memory is still contested

Then the hard part.  All that reading!!  Book upon book upon book--almost all of which I have enjoyed. But getting through the reading, and understanding and remembering the materials I've read, is nothing but up-hill sledding (sounds like how my Nana got to school on those wintery mornings in Oshkosh).  But I've made it through the majority of the books, and I have learned so much.  From the giant works by James McPherson, Eric Foner, and Walter Johnson, to my favorites by David W. Blight, Stephanie McCurry, Drew Gilpin-Faust, and Nina Silber, I've been given wonderful insights into the past.  I have learned the different ways in which these scholars look at events and people, how they interpret everything from single events to huge movements.  Most of all, this has solidified for me my love of Civil War memory as a field of study.  Even now, 150 years after the events of 1861-1865, Americans still struggle with their memories of that period, how things were, how they turned out, why it all happened in the first place. Hell, if you don't believe me, check out these two episodes of the Daily Show to see the divergent viewpoints of Americans on the Civil War.

http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/fr7m1i/denunciation-proclamation - When disputing the idea that slavery was withering on the vine and would have died of natural causes: "The South was so committed to slavery that Abraham Lincoln didn't die of natural causes."

http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/abrzf9/exclusive---the-weakest-lincoln - The Weakest Lincoln game show, hysterically funny and including historian Eric Foner on its panel of judges.

Yes, when I'm not watching clips from my pal Phoebe's favorite television show, I am actually doing my reading.

Get the reading done?  In progress!

Soon, it will be time to demonstrate for my advisors just how much of these 35 books I've been able to take in.  I'll be expected to understand and explain the historical theories at work as well as the actual historic events, places, and people.  I'll have to give opinion based on what I've read and to write knowledgeably on the wide range of works that encompass my exams reading lists.  I'll be set before a computer on April 25, and I'll spend an entire day (with an hour for Diet Pepsi consumption at lunch) writing four essays, two on my major field and two on my minor.  Then will come a harrowing wait to see if I am invited back for an oral interview, at which point my instructors will again see just how well I've digested the material they've given me and if I'm ready to be awarded that Master of Arts degree.

Nervousness about the whole thing?  Oh, definitely in progress!