So What

Another uneventful day. I have been waking up half an hour earlier each day, just because. I'm trying to keep track of all the things i need to get done, you know, those readings and papers. Sometimes I wonder if i have a life at all, i mean, I do nothing but study. I guess that makes me a good student. Talking about student, JJ took a couple of her books the other day and put underneath her arm, went to the door all dressed-up and said, "mommy, come on; i'm going to school!" needless to say, I was glad to hear it as my mom told me that i, too, dressed in my sister's school uniform when i was a toddler and that i would sometimes pretend that i was going to school; i even pretended to read their books from cover to cover. So that little J is a real joy to watch; she's following in mommy's footsteps nicely. I'm a very lucky mother.

I have been reading Dionne Brand and Austin Clarke for my summer "Black Canadian Literature" course. Now, i'm on to Brand's, Land to Light On...

JJ just came through the door; gotta go!

Derrida is not for Everyone

Okay. So i had to recover from the intellectual violence of my presence in last week's seminar in contemporary theory before i could write this blog. I have ten minutes to type this so bear with me...

Last Friday, we had a guest lecturer who specializes in Derrida and Deconstruction and he came to elucidate for us, the students, the principles of Derrida's theory. Now, i read all the criticisms / materials assigned for that week, and i even laughed out loud when i stumbled upon Derrida's keen sense of humour / irony (something i've never done / was ever able to do before in theory).

I went to the seminar hoping to laugh out loud even more, but, shame on me. I must add that Dr. X did a great job clarifying the relationship between the Platonic dialogues and Derrida's theory about writing / speech and he was even animated and very enthused about the topic. The problem was this: I knew absolutely nothing about Greek myth and, for the life of me, could not begin to wrap my brain around what he was saying. Then, came the numbing pain in the back of my head as my cerebral strings tried as hard as they could to process all the "foreign intelligence." By break-time, i was more than ready to leave but too embarrassed to move. Eventually, the seminar reconvened, but my brain didn't. All his questions went over my head and into the wall behind me as i nervously struggled to maintain my composure. Near the end, my brain finally exploded and gave way to a gush of chemical goo...

When i reached home, i was darn well near depression and had to pull out my undergrad transcript just to remind myself (however corny it may sound) that i am not stupid; that i am qualified to be there, in that seminar; after all, i said to myself, i graduated in the top 3% of the University; and that ought to mean something. It's the least i could do to prevent myself from slitting my wrist.

That's what happens in THEORY. Now, i need to deconstruct how i will survive the rest of the term...

Here's a Story

Everyday is a struggle against the odds: the odds of getting an MA in English. Sometimes i feel so fragmented, i'm amazed that i have been able to stay whole instead of being fed to the wind like debris caught in a storm.

Another Academic Muse

At what point in our lives do we stop blurring? When do we become crisp individuals? What must we do in order to end these fuzzy identities--to clarify just who it is we really are?
--Douglas Coupland, Girlfriend in a Coma

I happened upon this quote while reading Girlfriend in a Coma, a book filled with dark humour and an apocalyptic sensibility. I'm not too far in, but it had me thinking about that quote, especially how it relates to my personal experiences as a graduate student in English. I am realizing that the further up i go in the institution the more blurry i become, the more it doesn't really matter who i am. I become a slave to the system in such a way that i am producing essays, research papers, argumentative strategies for discussion but it provides no meaning for me, especially when i begin to survey my own subjectivity as a "crisp individual." I know that this sounds a lot like life in the big city, or even nihilistic, but i think that it is a bit more complex than that. I feel an incredible rush of excitement and satisfaction when i produce a paper and i am usually very happy with the returns, but for no apparent reason, at times i feel lost and confused. The truth is: I realize just how phony the whole system is and how complacent i am, moving to the same phony beat as everyone else. I guess that is what happens when you lose a sense of meaning and purpose in your work and your entire life becomes obfuscated by this burring: the inability to see who you really are.

I am writing a paper and i have reached the end; i am supposed to be happy at the finished product because it is coherent, the argument is solid and the structure is great. Instead, i start thinking about the next paper that i am to have done in a few weeks and i try to think about the "new" language i will need to successfully produce that argument. I have to create that new language while producing a sense in the reader that i have mastered the topic/language. But, really, getting an excellent mark has to do with how well i can argue that i am right; it does nothing, it changes nothing, it challenges nothing--at the end of the day, it goes into a drawer and takes its place with the pile of other papers i'd already written, and it stays there.

Higher learning institutions thrive on showing you how insignificant you are; how minuscule to your professors, your superiors who "know everything." They keep you in place by making you aware that you can't know everything, and if you're black like me, that you won't reach anywhere. It's survival of the fittest. The university is one of the most brutally racist, sexist, elitist, Eurocentric, xenophobic places on the earth. yet it praises itself on being the best door to a world of opportunities. In the end, it doesn't matter who you are and the University becomes a big business that owes you nothing...

I survey the drawer, then finally, i manage to get-up and open the door; i enter the parts of my house that aren't filled with phony people and phony principles. My daughter sees me and calls, "mommy, mommy!" She runs up to me, and as i take her into my arms, she starts to sing me a song; suddenly, i realize who i really am, and my world isn't so blurry anymore.

I have met some amazing professors, students and writers who are not in the least bit phony. And that is why i have survived, and still surviving, the traumatic alienating effect of higher learning.

All Work

Busy as a bee, these days. My life is crowded with work, work and more work. I'm up to my neck in readings and i have two presentations this week (one was yesterday so one more to go). I am not keeping up with my RA hours which means i will be playing catch up in December. Single people i know can't imagine what it must be like to run a family and do full-time study. They tell me there's light at the end of the tunnel. This is one long tunnel.

People/books to read in the near future

White Teeth (2000)-- Zadie Smith, black British writer
The Unbelonging (1985)-- Joan Riley, black British writer
Small Island (2004)-- Andrea Levy, black British writer
Wish I Was Here (2006)-- Jackie Kay, black Scottish writer

Thinking through Race

"Every writer should feel free to write about any and all subject matter as a part of their creative impulse."

This is the general energy prevailing in class after having read a novel written by a white Canadian male author about Native Canada, cleverly disguised in multiple voice narration.

Professor XY (white woman): "If everyone (Blacks, Natives, Indians-- minorities) write only about their own identities then it can lead to a ghettoization (emphasis mine) of the literature they produce."

Why do i find this problematic?

On a Separate Occasion

Same idea that everyone should teach everything and race shouldn't factor into who's teaching what. A black person should be able to teach a course in renaissance literature in the same way that a white person should be able to teach African literature without there being a race issue. That's fine, except:

Me (black woman): "You cannot look at a person and not see race."

Professor Q (white woman): "Yes, true, but the colour of a person tells you nothing about that person. I see black when i look at you but it doesn't tell me anything about you except that you are a minority; i am a minority, too, in Toronto (emphasis mine)."

Why do i find this problematic and ironic?

Expired "Free" Time

First day of classes and, to quote Ward, i'm already "swamped and struggling to breathe". I still need to get a routine going. The aches and pain that i feel while walking from one end of the campus to the other made me realize the kind of shape my body was in. After all, i stayed home all summer; the funny thing is, i thought chasing my daughter around, everyday, would be all the exercise i needed! Now, i guess the joke is on me. There is no way i can possibly fit gym into my schedule, at least not right now; maybe not ever! Who said motherhood, marriage and higher learning could work? Oh yea, oops, that would be me! Actually, it doesn't, i'm the one who makes it work. I can't take all the credit, but most of it :) Now, if i could only get my husband to believe that...

Anxiety, Plus

Oh my, i'm nervously excited about starting GS next week. I keep wondering if i will be able to handle it; you know, all that "serious" work. Truth is, i wondered the same thing when i started my undergrad, and here i am. I am very intellectually insecure but i'm the only one who knows that. I told one of my professors that i was shy to speak when she invited a guest lecturer (*embarrass*) and i believe she was surprised :); i don't know, i certainly become a different person when i write. I feel more free to be honest and could care less what other people think when i'm being ethically or morally open-minded. As soon as i begin to verbalize, i almost become too cautious.

What annoys me most is a seminar in which nobody talks and we all just show up because of the participation marks and could care less if the instructor speaks for the entire three hours. To sit and listen to an instructor for three hours is more excruciating than getting my wisdom tooth out; not because he/she isn't doing a great job, but my attention span is not that long. In my first and second undergrad years (which are the listening years) i would often dream and wake-up to reality many times over before the period would be up. It's amazing how, somewhere between dream and reality, i acquired knowledge.

I like when i can look forward to a seminar, and when it's over, wish the next one would be the following day. I'm weird like that :). I have to get over my shyness though. Sometimes i get so nervous before i speak that when i do begin, i am, literally, out of breath. And my contributions are often times productive, i would like to think. Oh well, we all have things we have to "get over". Now, if i could only get over my fear that the MA program will be unmanageable...