Teaching Myself Zotero

When we discussed formatting / info gathering software such as EndNote and Zotero in the group, several people said they thought using one of these programs would have been helpful...but now that they're knee-deep in their dissertations, it's too late.

I dabbled in RefWorks years ago for a project, but after hearing Aya singing the praises of Zotero, I thought I'd give it a try.

I'm still in the buying-and-hoarding-and-sorting books phase of my dissertation, and already I'm starting to forget which copies of what I've bought online. I decided that I could start learning Zotero by creating a list of books that I've purchased for the dissertation.

I began by going to the Zotero website and downloading the newest version. It requires Firefox 3.0, which I have. I also watched the very helpful demos on the website.

Right off the bat, I couldn't get it to work. I couldn't see the "Zotero" logo at the bottom of the screen, the key point for accessing the thing. So I searched on the very helpful forums on the Zotero site, and sure enough, within a few minutes, found the solution to my problem (for me, it was simply going up to the "View" bar and selection "Status bar.")

Once I figured that out, I began going to amazon.com and the Honnold library site to find the books on my shelf. It's so easy to use Zotero for this - you find the book you have, then click on a little blue book icon next to the web address in the browser. And Sha-zam! It's sent to your Zotero folder.

I made a couple of mistakes where I uploaded the right book but the wrong edition. It was easy to fix. I also uploaded a few dissertations on my topic that I've printed out (and gloriously 3-hole-punched one night).

So far, so good. I also began adding notes on each of the books describing the covers of the actual books. Because so many of my books have the author's name as the title, it's helpful for me to remember, ah yes, this is the one with the peacock on the cover, this is the one that's orange, etc. I'm very visual.

It's too soon yet for me to know how well I like Zotero or how easy it is to use, but based on the helpful forums and my initial forays tonight, it looks promising.

Parodies of Job Letters

Welcome to 2009! This is the year you're going to write your dissertation!

I've just come back from MLA (the Modern Language Association's annual conference and job smackdown) in San Francisco. While I was there, I noticed several job postings that somehow didn't look quite right...and upon closer inspection, I realized they were marvelous parodies by www.mlade.org.

For a little sampling:

"Unfortunately, my dissertation chair has decided that her perverse amusement is more important than my professional advancement. I agree that it is, mind you, but I would still prefer to have defended this semester."

- Anita Gedaclu

Even if you're not in English, Languages, Literature, or Cultural Studies (the target audience for these letters), you can still get a kick out of how these letters poke fun at academia, boiler plate cover letters, the desperation of job seekers, and the overall stress of writing a dissertation and looking for jobs.

"I feel confident that I could offer classes at the lover-division, upper-division, and graduate level in Homoerotic 19th-Century U.S. Critical Writing, The Fireside Poets, and transatlantic hemispheric New Jersey Literature. Techncially, I do not feel confident about anything, but I'm told that is a standard phrasing."

-Anita Gedaclu

There's this applicant to Riverdale University, who mentions writing his dissertation under the influence of Juan Valdez and Captain Morgan:

Click on image to enlarge

There are letters from Riverdale University, the Yemen Institute of Polytechnicality, and the State University of New York, Yonkers. Go to www.mlade.org to see all 5 letters. Enjoy!

To Do: Write This Post

(if you have an odd fascination with reading other people's lists of chores, just click the images above to enlarge)

In a recent meeting, we discussed the power of the To-Do List. Properly done, a To-Do list can be a really satisfying experience.

Make To-Do lists of tasks you know you can/will accomplish, along with the things you don't want to forget. Mix in the household tasks and everyday business of life tasks with dissertating tasks.

I make To-Do lists on junk mail, random pieces of paper, and my datebook. Several people in the group make lists out of the basic green calendar pages that we hand out as part of the Dissertation Workshop.

The calendars don't look like much. But surprisingly, they can be useful tools if you write down goals you want to accomplish that week (especially easy / simple goals you know you can reach).

One member of the group mentioned that when the green calendars were handed out, she was nonplussed. "I initially thought, 'I coulda made a fucking calendar!' But I ended up using it. This allows me to relax. It says 'rest and decorate the house' this week, and I did it."

Weirdly enough, meticulously writing down the goals you want to accomplish, what you "can" and "can't" do for any given day or week, can feel great. And crossing off the items on the list can feel "almost as good as a professional massage."

We all have our methods of organization...according to Bennett, his method used to involve random milk cartons all over his house and car (he's since upgraded to 3 ring binders).

Paula uses RefWorks in the place of 3x5 cards. Lynda swears by color coding of highlighting.

Everyone finds their own kind of organization scheme during the process of dissertating.

What's yours?

Is that a jump drive, or are you just happy to see me?

"You know that black cloud that hangs over Charlie Brown's head? I've felt that way for the past three years."

- On the strain of the quals and the diss


Coming on the heels of Lynda's post about having to evacuate due to the recent fires, the group talked about methods of saving your work on the dissertation.

The group discussed the importance of backing up everything you write in case of computer crashes, fires, alien attacks, etc. Lynda carries her dissertation on a jump drive in her purse.

In addition to the security of knowing that you have everything backed up, there's an odd comfort of carrying a bit of your dissertation with you, wherever you go. (although this might also become a memento mori??)