Anything But Dissertation?

Enough time has elapsed since I've talked about my dissertation that some of you have probably begun to wonder . . . has she quit? or is she stuck in the quicksand that threatens every doctoral student who is "ABD"? 

ABD technically indicates that a student has completed "All But Dissertation." Perhaps "Anything But Dissertation" is more accurate for most of us. It's a strange season in academic life that requires a tremendous amount of self-motivation. Many enter it . . . and far fewer emerge with a degree in hand. It's so easy to let all sorts of other things crowd out productivity in research and writing (um, like this blog post, which is interrupting dissertation work. sigh.).

I've done all sorts of things since moving to Oregon that might be interpreted as an avoidance strategy. I bought a grain mill, studied and experimented with breads and grains, started making my own yogurt and chicken broth, and signed up for a class at the local community college entitled "Backyard Chickens" (really!). I've planted trees and painted trim, hemmed curtains and played with my children. We've camped and hiked and driven to the beach. None of these activities appear on the list of what one must do if one is to succeed in academia. But academics are real people, too (at least some of us try to be!). This has been an important season of slowing down, settling into our new home, and developing healthier eating habits.

Meanwhile, I have continued to work on my dissertation. It started off slowly over the summer, but since the kids started school this fall I've been carefully reading a 300-page German monograph on my topic, diagramming a dozen chapters of Exodus in Hebrew, and reading up on cognitive metaphor theory. I sit at my desk (or at Multnomah's library) working at least 6 hours every day. Since you can't see me sitting here, I thought I'd reassure you ... I haven't quit. It's just a long process. And I trust the end product will be worth the wait (and all the hard work).

Tomorrow I'm heading to San Diego to reconnect with colleagues and meet with my advisers. As usual, the annual conferences of the Evangelical Theological Society, the Institute of Biblical Research, and the Society of Biblical Literature are being held back-to-back in the same city. Thousands of professors and students of the Bible from across the country and around the world meet under one roof every November to reconnect and learn from each other. Academically speaking, these conferences are always the highlight of my year. This conference will be especially significant since I have been working remotely. My days will be packed with one-on-one meetings, attending sessions, networking, and browsing book tables. When I arrive home next week my brain will be so full it hurts. It happens every year. But I can't think of a better way to invigorate my research and writing than to spend 6 days with a community devoted to the study and teaching of God's Word.

When the shelves of my fridge are filled with leftover turkey and stuffing, you'll find me back at my desk cranking away on the biggest project I've ever attempted. With God's help, one day those three letters - ABD - will become PhD.

free language resources for spanish, german, french, and aramaic

I've recently been introduced to several free resources for those attempting to learn Aramaic, German, or French (among other languages). For your convenience, I've added links for the Aramaic websites on my Academic Resources page on the right-hand side of the screen.

I studied both French and German for reading several years ago in order to be able to read academic books and essays related to biblical studies. However, since then I've been consistently embarrassed that I can neither speak nor understand either language when it is spoken, because I never learned to pronounce them. I've been tempted to spend big bucks to get Rosetta Stone language-learning software to teach me pronunciation and improve my fluency. But I'm so glad I didn't. This week our family discovered Duolingo, a FREE online language-learning program that may even be more effective than Rosetta Stone (with NO ads!). Duolingo offers practice in reading, listening, speaking (if you have a microphone) and translating to and from your target language. It tracks your progress and offers incentives to keep you learning. In just 3 days my ability to hear, speak, translate, and spell in German has improved significantly!

In case you're not yet convinced, here's another testimonial: Our daughter, Eliana, went through all 5 years of Rosetta Stone Spanish and still felt like she didn't "get" it. After a week of Duolingo Spanish, she's finally understanding how the language works and speaking to me in Spanish. Try it yourself and see!

how to eat an elephant

divide and conquer . . . one bite at a time

(Confession time) I'm hyperventilating in my study carrel, looking at all that must be done this summer to stay on track in my doctoral program. You may not be a doctoral student, but I wager you have too much to do and not enough time, just like me. And if not, you  might be glad just to know that I get stressed, too. A dear friend just sent me this note:

I hate to say it, but I'm glad to hear you struggle with getting stressed too :) You usually seem so calm to me and like things are very under control. So it's good to know you are normal :) But I hope you can relax and know that everything will get done somehow, and know the Lord is sovereign over everything, including your time! I am trying to learn this myself.

A great reminder. If God called me here (and he did!), then he will see me through.

I've spent the whole morning taking stock of what I need to do, prioritizing, counting days, and dividing it all out. Winging it is not going to work very well. I need to know exactly what I must do today so that I can fit it all in. Knowing what I have to do will also (theoretically) keep me from being stressed about how much more there is to do. Better to let tomorrow worry about itself.

What, you ask, could be so daunting?

• learning to read French (and read 80 pages of French articles for my dissertation)
• reading 240 pages in German (for my dissertation)
• reading 2755 pages (for a fall seminar and from the comprehensive reading list)
• skimming 24 other books from the comprehensive reading list
• researching and writing one full chapter of my dissertation and part of another (about 60 pages total)
• taking a 3-week class at Notre Dame (I don't have a syllabus yet, so I don't know how much more work that will add)
• reading through the entire Bible, finding relevant texts for my dissertation

Too much for one summer? I'm inclined to agree with you, but all I can do is try.

So, for the month of May I will attempt to . . .

• write the partial chapter of my dissertation (10 pages)
• do 2 lessons a day from my French book
• read 33 pages a day from my current Comps book
• read 15 chapters a day from the Bible
• translate 3 pages a day of German
• skim 6 books
• and do as much reading as possible for Notre Dame (when I find out what it is)

That almost sounds relaxing.

After all, no one could eat an elephant in one sitting. But if it's cut into chunks and eaten one bite at a time, it might even be nourishing!

May you have a nourishing summer. Don't try to do it all at once. It'll kill you! (It almost did me.)

divide and conquer . . . one bite at a time

Oh . . . and if anyone wants to join me on the Bible read-through this summer, click here for the checklist I'm using to pace myself. Let me know if you're on board!

onward and upward!

The German exam is happily behind me.  It was not nearly as painful as it could have been.  I won't find out until next week how I scored. 

Meanwhile, Multnomah University, my alma mater, has just published my story on their blog.  You can read it here.  I was honored to be asked to write for their "Alumni Connection," and I hope that our journey will encourage many other alumni to step out in faith in response to God's call.  God is full of surprises, and He loves to do the impossible!

trial by fire

I'll be officially welcomed to the Wheaton community tomorrow morning at 9:00 ... by a Theological German exam.  After that we'll be oriented to the library.  Granted, knowing German is a prerequisite for enrollment.  Still, I can't help feeling that it's an intimidating way to say, "Welcome to Wheaton!"

If you think of it, prayers are appreciated!  I've been spending about 3 hours a day on this language with its convoluted sentences often 5 lines long. It's coming along, but there's no way to tell for sure how I'll do until tomorrow.  Last year, 3 of the 4 brilliant new recruits failed it.  There is at least some comfort in that: if I fail I'll be in good company!

hitting the books

From the comfort of my new study carrel in Wheaton's library, I'm diving back into German studies.  Why German, you ask?  In order to interact with the greater scholarly community, I have to be able to read works written in other languages.  For biblical studies, the traditional required languages are German and French.  Spanish is increasingly a language of publication, too.  German scholars have been hard at work studying the Bible for centuries, publishing commentaries and articles, and shaping the way biblical scholarship is done.  No dissertation in this field would be complete without a survey of what the Germans have said on the subject.  German is *not* an easy language, and I'm told even native speakers have trouble locating the main subject and verb of their enormously long sentences!  I'm a language junkie, though, so even German can be fun for me.  I've studied enough different languages to know that they all start out impossible, but with perseverance they all make sense after a while.  Let's hope it will be true for me this time around!

Here are a few nuggets from April Wilson's German Quickly: A Grammar for Reading German:

Anfang is kein Meisterstück. (A beginning is no masterpiece.)
Geduld is der Seele ein Schild. (Patience is a shield for the soul.)
Arbeit überwindet alle Schwierigkeiten. (Work overcomes all difficulties.)

In other words, it is ok not to be an expert at this point.  We all have to start somewhere.  As much as I'd like to be fluent, there is no shortcut to learning a language.  So patience and hard work are the only ways to proceed.  To learn German I need to make a million mistakes, so I'd better keep plugging away!

retrospect and prospect

All five of us are finding ourselves pulled in two directions these days.

There is life to be lived in Charlotte.  The girls have another week of school left, and they are in the throes of field days and field trips and tests and parties, not to mention the urgency of playing with friends they will soon leave behind.  Danny has a full-time job to do; financial transactions do not stand still just because he has other things on his mind.  Our house was for sale by owner, and the buyer also came with no realtor, so he is busy getting things in order for closing next week.  For me there is laundry, cleaning, packing, and a garage sale. There are meals to make, homework to manage, and grading to wrap up for the spring semester.  Preschool is over, so Easton and I have many important tasks to do together, like engineering bridges, working on his baseball swing, and learning to jump in the swimming pool.  We're doing our dead-level best to finish well here, to grieve, and to say goodbye.

But our life in Wheaton has already begun.  Eliana is busy designing her new attic bedroom to look like a jungle.  I'm nearly drowning in medical forms for me and the kids.  Schools in Illinois require medical, dental, and vision forms signed and dated by the appropriate professionals.  There are school enrollment forms, a lease to sign on the house we're renting, moving arrangments to make, and travel plans to work out.  I have a good deal of studying to do over the summer so that I'm ready to pass my German exam, ready to present a paper at ETS, and ready for classes this fall.  My first meeting with Dr. Block is scheduled for the day we arrive.  Despite the urgency of other tasks, I feel a sense of compulsion to do random, non-urgent things now, like shop for winter clothes while they are on sale and figure out a fall schedule that will allow both of us to work full-time with only 5 hrs/week of preschool for Easton. 

Honestly, I don't feel like I'm handling it all that well.  I've gone from 2-5 hrs/day of quiet, reflective study time to almost none, now that preschool is over.  The goodbyes are starting to close in on me, feeling much like the 98-degree heat and choking humidity outside.  It's obvious that God has opened this door, and we want nothing more than to walk through it, but it's exhausting nonetheless.  I'm running on fumes and putting out fires and longing for a few precious hours to sit and reflect and sort it all out.

The kids are handling it like champions. 
Easton is full of stories these days:  "When I was a little boy, I got bit by a bug." 
Me: "Really?  What kind of bug?"
Easton: "A red bug."
Me: "How big was he?"
Easton (reaching way up high): "He was this big!"
Me: "Oh, wow! That's a big bug!  Where did he bite you?" 
Easton: "On my hand, right here." 
Me: "And where were you when the big red bug bit you?" 
Easton: "At the beach!"
Me: "Really?  I didn't see a big red bug at the beach." 
Easton: "But I did!"
And he's planning ahead, too.  "When I get big and become a grown up, I'm not gonna suck my fumb anymore!"  In anticipation of his 3rd birthday this month, we're talking a lot about big boy underwear and potty chairs, too.  He was utterly delighted to learn that we'll be staying at a hotel on our way to Wheaton, and that we'll be taking all of our clothes and toys and even toothbrushes along!  His favorite question this week is, "Can I bring this to the hotel, too, when we go to Wheaton?"

All of us made a "bridge" poster to help us think about what we're leaving behind in Charlotte (the teardrops on the left) and what we're looking forward to in Wheaton (the balloons on the right).  Emma's first teardrop said "moving to Wheaton."  She said she didn't want to go and leave her friends behind.  But moments later she drew a balloon that said "making new friends."  We know there are lots of special friends just waiting to be met!  Today, though, we are somewhere in the middle, feeling pulled in both directions and praying for strength to finish well.

do we live in a Christian nation?

On this most patriotic of holidays, it's worth asking the question, "What should the relationship between church and state look like?"  Consider this quote from German scholar, Theo Sorg,

"The New Testament knows nothing of a Christian state, but it knows of Christians who profess their Lord in public life and in their political responsibility, and who make every effort to realize symbolically something of his good rule.  It is not they themselves who create the coming reign of peace; God alone will bring it about.  But they have this goal before them and can therefore seek to bring about peace wherever and however that is possible, in every weakness and fallibility, but nevertheless with the breath of Christian patience."

From Theo Sorg, "Die Bibel zum Thema Frieden," Theologische Beitrage (1982): 264-265. Quoted by Helmut W. Ziefle in Modern Theological German: A Reader and Dictionary (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1997), 243.  My translation.

a nugget from nazi germany

Here's a nugget from the writings of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Christian who resisted the Nazis and was consequently imprisoned and executed in 1945, just prior to the end of the war. This is a man who knew the true meaning of life!  (He also knew how to write long sentences!)

"Everything that we with good reason await from God, that for which we are allowed to ask, is found in Jesus Christ. ... It is certain that we are permitted to always live in the nearness and amidst the presence of God and that this life is an entirely new life for us, that there is nothing impossible for us, because there is nothing impossible for God; that no earthly power can touch us without the will of God and that danger and need only drive us closer to God; it is certain that we must demand nothing and yet are permitted to ask for everything; it is certain that in sorrow our joy is hidden, and in death our life is hidden; it is certain that we are in a fellowship that sustains us in everything. ... Had Jesus not lived, then our life would be meaningless in spite of all the other people who we know, honor, and love."

From Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Widerstand und Ergebung (Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag Munchen, 1951), pp 196-197. Reprinted in Modern Theological German: A Reader and Dictionary, Ed. Helmut W. Ziefle (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1997). My translation.