Where (and How) The Work Gets Done
September 21, 2009
When I teach, one of the things I try to instill in my students is an ability to reflect critically on their own processes—how they write, how they read, how they think, how they learn. I try to learn about and think through my own processes, too. Turning an eye (or both) back onto the self is never wasted effort.
I spent some time over the past week trying to photograph the places where I work—and to photograph them in such a way that the resulting images reflected the kind of work I do there, or the energy I feel. This was a far more difficult process for me than photography usually is. I felt like I was trying too hard, that my color sense was off, that the shots I took weren’t doing what I usually want my photos to do—namely, reflect how I, personally, see the world around me. That in and of itself was an interesting experience. I don’t regret the time spent in this exercise at all—my dissertation prospectus is still under review, I had to go out and do something to stave off the fear of stalling out—but I find it worrisome that actively trying to capture a very particular set of sensory experiences fell flat in the face of my own internal hype. (Perhaps my high expectations were to blame.)
That said. This is how I work:
When I work at Macaulay, one of the things I most appreciate is the view. It’s not just the matters of interest, like the lines forming outside the ABC studios across the street. The combination of structures outside (ironwork, trees, differing facades) and the details inside is quietly stimulating. When I need to work on a solitary project, I end up in one of the red Eames-style chairs near the windows. I don’t write by hand here—it’s all Macbook stuff. But there’s something very chill about working on a blog from my lap, not a desk.
While I definitely rely upon the quiet productivity I find near the window, when I work at the tables across the room it’s all about community. This is where I go to brainstorm with the other central ITFs, to write out my ITF to-do lists and goals, to consult with students who have come by with questions. The tables give you an even better view of what’s going on at ABC (always a point of interest among those of us working in the reading room), but they’re also set up in a communal fashion. Even if we’re not actively collaborating while working there, I like the sense that everyone at work at the table is engaged in a project which will further support our collective enterprise. There’s also room to spread out, which is probably why I like it as much as I do for organizational stuff.
Working at home feels both comforting and challenging to me at the present time. On the one hand, I’ve got Fay, my trusty assistant, always ready to hang out on the back 0f the couch, sit on a pile of student papers, or headbutt my Macbook. Fay pretty much disapproves of everything. I find her ornery qualities endearing.
On the other hand, I can get distracted. Even having thrown out the TV and cancelled the Facebook account, I find myself most susceptible to comic books or Hulu or the real estate section of the Times. So what I’ve had to do of late is designate certain areas of my apartment for certain tasks. When I sit on my living room couch, I’m often planning next week’s lessons for my composition students. I write out my goals for the upcoming week, revisit the reading I’ve assigned and jot down discussion questions, and plan writing exercises from the couch. I have two pedagogical goals for this semester that have shaped my practice of late. One is to be as free of technological intervention as I want to be. I feel more connected to my teaching practice if I write out my lesson plans by hand. I can actually “draft” them this way, edit and rewrite sections as I play out the upcoming class session in my head. I’m obviously not averse to using technology in the classroom. But I do think I am a better teacher if I sit down and engage with the material without the automatic use of a computer screen.
The other thing I’ve been working on with this particular teaching experience is getting as close to a handout-free classroom as possible. I used to be the Queen of Handouts. When I taught research writing at York, I had so many that I’d send off my photoduplication for any given week with a request that each one be printed on a different color, so that I could refer to “the pink one” or “the green one” over the course of the class. But this semester, with the exception of the syllabus, I’ve not yet handed out anything. Asking my students to write down assignments and activities seems a quiet way to encourage them to take responsibility for their education, and it means that I don’t break my back dragging stacks of paper to the classroom.
I engage with my students over e-mail, correct papers using MS Word’s reviewing toolbar, and will definitely throw all of the class information up on BlackBoard as soon as they process my !@#@ payroll paperwork and add me to the school’s IT system. I’m even planning to use my Flip camera to do some video work with these students later on in the term. But I want the bulk of my classroom teaching experience to be relatively low-tech.
Not so my own scholarship, really. I used to write out a lot of my thinking by hand. As I’ve gotten deeper into my doctoral education my wrist strength has gone out the window, so now the bulk of my stuff is typed directly into my computer. I pace around my entire apartment when I’m thinking aloud, but when it comes time to organize or revise my writing, I work in my dining alcove. (It’s the only space in the whole apartment with that paneling. I’d like to paint it someday, if I can get landlord approval, but for now I’m enjoying the contrast with my otherwise cream and brown walls.) It’s a small space, very compact, looking out onto the rest of the apartment. As such it feels secure. 
As I head into my dissertation, I’ve begun to realize that “safe spaces”—nooks and crannies and little corners—are an essential physical component of my drafting process. I ramble and roam all over my apartment, or indeed the city, when I’m thinking. Long walks, lifting free weights, talking aloud to imaginary respondents in my kitchen (don’t laugh!)—that’s how I get the ideas circulating in my brain. But setting those ideas down? That needs to happen in as contained an environment as possible.
When I reorganized my apartment this summer, I created a tiny nook in my bedroom. The ottoman which matched my armchair was too bulky for the living room, so I placed it in here with a couple of pillows. I imagined it would be a reading spot, a place to curl up with a book. It’s really become the place in my life to write. I draft here. I can place my back up against the cool wall. I can’t be seen from outside the room. My Macbook plugs in nearby; I can have the radio going if I want. It’s a tiny little sanctuary of a place. You can’t see it in the photo, but there’s a photograph I took of Cimetière Notre-Dame-des-Neiges hung above the seat.
The last location I get work done is, obviously, at the grad school. As you walk down the hallway to the English Program, the artwork interpellates you—something I’ve always found to be way too apropos. When I work in my program’s lounge, I’m often doing busy work or technical work: e-mail, bibliographies, database research, conference abstracts. I’m writing this in my program lounge, actually—and the folks around me are either hard at work or very chatty. There isn’t a happy medium to be found in this space.
In contrast, the back end of the lounge is a quiet place—perhaps the perfect place to edit stuff by hand. Normally, I outline by hand, then I draft on computer—and I also do a quick edit via computer, too, reading through and editing my sentences for clarity, or restructuring the paragraphs I think need refinement. It’s only then that I think I have a full draft. But when I’ve completed what I consider to be a complete draft of something, I like to do a run-through or two on a paper copy before editing or redrafting on my Macbook. I print them out and bring those things here, usually as early in the morning as I can manage it. The walls are lined with the most recent dissertations produced in the program. I’ve gotten to the point where this isn’t terrifying as much as it is inspiring. (Let’s hope that feeling lasts.)
The very last location I want to highlight in this lengthy process description is where I grade. Grading is one of those things that everyone loves to hate. For myself, I don’t expend a lot of energy talking about how awful it is. It’s got to get done, and it’s important for students to get a thorough response to their work. If I’m grading the essays of my composition students, I do it in my program’s lounge, with my headphones on. This allows me to get through them quickly, using Microsoft Word, but it also allows for easy printing when I’m done. But sometimes I have to grade papers from Barnard (and that will be 50, 60, 70 or more in one go, all 5-8 pages apiece) or handwritten materials from my composition students. I take those to the Graduate Center library’s dissertation reading room. A double-height interior room with no windows where computers are verboten, it’s the quietest place to study in the building, and the beauty of the room helps me soldier on through my responses to student writing.
That’s where and how I get my work done. I suppose this was pretty boring for anyone other than myself, but I think that the places in which we work and think and live our lives are just as important as the working, the thinking, or the living. Space shapes consciousness, shapes self. (One of the reasons I love long train rides through the American West—and try to take one every spring—is because I feel at home with myself when I get back.)
Entry Filed under: Dissertation,Macaulay,Pedagogy. Posted in Dissertation ,Macaulay ,Pedagogy .
