Surreal Academia Moment
Today I was hanging around campus working on my readings for EASIA 598, the graduate course everyone in my department has to take. It's essentially an overview of the various disciplines within the field of East Asian Studies. Thus far we've done Orientalism, some works on the problems with Eurocentric studies in the Humanities, Asia's place in world global markets through time, and grant and journal opportunities in our respective fields. We're getting a little more specific now though, spending each week going into a specific discipline with one or two of the professors in our department. They're choosing the readings, including something of their own work.
My advisor is the professor for the course as a whole, and he's up first, so I started reading his book he assigned on warrior-monks of Japan. (Which is so freaking cool, oh my god.) As I sat there reading and making notes, I realized I could literally walk down to his office right then and ask him a question about a specific passage, or talk to him nonchalantly about his research, no big deal.
Dude, that is such an awesome feeling.
The reason I applied to this school in the first place is because of my advisor; I first read his work back in freshman or sophomore year, and used some of his work on my thesis. I was floored when I found out my EAST advisor at undergrad went to school with him (doukyuusei!), and really pushed for me to apply here. One of my friends from IUC is still jealous that I get to work with this guy since his work is so well known.
The funny thing is even though I totally have an academic crush on my advisor (all his research is amazing~), I'm not intimidated by him. And it is just too cool that I can just chat with him about anything.
Moral of the story, I love academia.
My advisor is the professor for the course as a whole, and he's up first, so I started reading his book he assigned on warrior-monks of Japan. (Which is so freaking cool, oh my god.) As I sat there reading and making notes, I realized I could literally walk down to his office right then and ask him a question about a specific passage, or talk to him nonchalantly about his research, no big deal.
Dude, that is such an awesome feeling.
The reason I applied to this school in the first place is because of my advisor; I first read his work back in freshman or sophomore year, and used some of his work on my thesis. I was floored when I found out my EAST advisor at undergrad went to school with him (doukyuusei!), and really pushed for me to apply here. One of my friends from IUC is still jealous that I get to work with this guy since his work is so well known.
The funny thing is even though I totally have an academic crush on my advisor (all his research is amazing~), I'm not intimidated by him. And it is just too cool that I can just chat with him about anything.
Moral of the story, I love academia.