Eep!

[rivka]

I had no idea they publicized it.

I made overheads today for my defense. I had been planning to use Powerpoint, but John told me that (a) my presentation can only be fifteen minutes long at a maximum, and (b) he does not approve of students trying to be "flashy" with AV materials at their dissertation defenses. So I have a nice series of eight transparencies, very much all about substance over style.

I'm starting to get nervous.

I was thinking today... for years, my dissertation was my private bete noire, my solitary battle. I was ashamed of my lack of progress, so I resisted talking about it to anyone. It was very lonely. But in the last six weeks or so, as I've been pushing towards the finish line, more and more I've started to think of my dissertation as a rite of passage. I'm very conscious of my friends who have gone before me. When people say, "oh yeah, I felt like that too, just before the end," it's come to mean more to me than just sympathy - it reminds me that I'm traveling a path that generations of academics in all fields have traveled. There's something encouraging about it. I guess it's... context, for how hard all of this has been. I don't know. I've started and then deleted a bunch of attempts at explaining it here.

It's just... thanks, guys.

Comments

[rivka.livejournal.com]

The difference is largely a matter of audience, I bet. The only people expected to be at my defense are on my committee, so they will all have read my dissertation. At a public defense attended by the whole department, you have to present your work at length, because it's the only information much of the audience will get about your research.

In my department, even the full 15 minutes may not happen - we're told to expect to be interrupted with questions. My advisor told me that I shouldn't think that I can talk long enough to avoid the committee's questions. ;-)