(no subject)
So by the way, I live. There hasn't been much of excitement going on here - things are generally enjoyable but not dramatic. I've eaten a number of delicious baguettes, and lately, some pastries, and I have some hand-washing to do if I want clean socks tomorrow, and I've been going to the library and reading a lot, and the Canucks are 1-1-1 in their first three games this season, and I skyped with the house of Maybe and the denizens of the house of Maybe who were in Quebec over the Thanksgiving weekend last weekend, and I don't know, not dramatic, just me trying to motivate myself to be productive.
The one thing that might qualify as new and exciting is that I finally made it to the archives today and secured permission to work with the original documents I need (and that aren't available to the public), although my general state of "meh" over my research means that's not quite as exciting as it should have been. All these French historian- and archivist-types (or well, two for two so far) being very nice and helpful but at the same time all "make sure you don't duplicate something that's already been done! There's been a lot of work done on this! You'll have to find your approach!" are a little... excitement-draining. And it is a little depressing to feel like I'm back at square one with my research, even though that probably isn't really the case. As I'm sure I've said already, I'm trying to be patient and have faith that I'll figure something out to write a dissertation about, but that's fighting it out with feeling like there's really nothing new to say about charters or the eleventh century, or at least, about Brittany in the eleventh century using charters. Having no idea where I'm going with my research isn't helping me feel confident dealing with French historians either. I think I'm coming off as totally clueless, which, hello side heaping side of impostor syndrome along with my usual social-anxiety issues.
Anyway, that's pretty much what I've been up to this week - generally pleasant life in France with core of excitement missing. In the next few days I have to spend some serious time crunching data for my Haskins paper. That, at least, is moderately exciting, now that I'm sure that the master's thesis I thought might be what I'm hoping to say, isn't. I've read it to verify. I'm not sure this paper something I'm going to be able to expand beyond my planned article project (into say, a dissertation), but hopefully I can at least get a good conference paper out of it. Speaking of which, HASKINS NIGHTMARES. I'd finished writing my paper with lots of time to spare, only to discover the morning of that it was actually total crap. It was DEEPLY UNPLEASANT, as I've just remembered.
The one thing that might qualify as new and exciting is that I finally made it to the archives today and secured permission to work with the original documents I need (and that aren't available to the public), although my general state of "meh" over my research means that's not quite as exciting as it should have been. All these French historian- and archivist-types (or well, two for two so far) being very nice and helpful but at the same time all "make sure you don't duplicate something that's already been done! There's been a lot of work done on this! You'll have to find your approach!" are a little... excitement-draining. And it is a little depressing to feel like I'm back at square one with my research, even though that probably isn't really the case. As I'm sure I've said already, I'm trying to be patient and have faith that I'll figure something out to write a dissertation about, but that's fighting it out with feeling like there's really nothing new to say about charters or the eleventh century, or at least, about Brittany in the eleventh century using charters. Having no idea where I'm going with my research isn't helping me feel confident dealing with French historians either. I think I'm coming off as totally clueless, which, hello side heaping side of impostor syndrome along with my usual social-anxiety issues.
Anyway, that's pretty much what I've been up to this week - generally pleasant life in France with core of excitement missing. In the next few days I have to spend some serious time crunching data for my Haskins paper. That, at least, is moderately exciting, now that I'm sure that the master's thesis I thought might be what I'm hoping to say, isn't. I've read it to verify. I'm not sure this paper something I'm going to be able to expand beyond my planned article project (into say, a dissertation), but hopefully I can at least get a good conference paper out of it. Speaking of which, HASKINS NIGHTMARES. I'd finished writing my paper with lots of time to spare, only to discover the morning of that it was actually total crap. It was DEEPLY UNPLEASANT, as I've just remembered.