Wednesday, August 29, 2012

So... wanna try this writing thing again?

One thing I learned by running a writing group?

Thing one: If you were to look at my CV, you would notice that I have a ton of conference papers, but very few published articles.  Conclusion: I am spending too much time writing conference papers, and not doing anything with them.

Thing two: I have to file for promotion in a year.

Thing three: I need accountability.  But I have time to either run a writing group, or to write, but not both.

So here's the deal:
1. I've dug out my copy of "Writing your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks," and I'm going to follow it here, every Friday, starting a week from tomorrow. Gonna stick to the book like glue.

2. If you want to do the same thing on Fridays (either here or elsewhere), you're welcome to do it. I'm not going to be leading discussions or responding to every check-in or tracking and posting everyone's progress, because that's what made it hard for me to keep up with both the group and my own writing.  But if you just want a bit of structure and accountability, Stop by again this Friday, when I lay out the week 1 project, and next Friday, when I check in and lay out week 2, etc.

Just an idea.

UPDATE: Dame Eleanor is a saint, and she is running a group over at her place.  So let's meet over there instead of here, yes?

11 comments:

Dame Eleanor Hull said...

Come over to my place! I'm running a writing group this fall, and I'd be more than happy to have you join!

Ramblings of a PhD Student said...

I love this!! How do I join?!

Notorious Ph.D. said...

Ramblings, it looks like you go to Dame Eleanor's!

http://dameeleanorhull.wordpress.com/2012/08/17/announcing-the-sept-dec-2012-writing-group

Historiann said...

You HAVE TO apply for promotion? WTF??? I've heard about this at UC Davis, but I haven't heard of it anywhere else. It sure seems like they'd prefer that we write a ton of crappy articles rather than write books.

My uni was going in the lots-of-crappy-articles direction a few administrators back, but then of course those administrators moved along. And then the new administrators decided that our peer unis are Kaplan and Phoenix. From the frying pan into the fire!

Notorious Ph.D. said...

"Have to" is a bit of a misnomer. It's more "everybody here does it on the clock." I don't have to. But it's against the culture of the place. I have actually considered waiting a year or so. But since promotions are the only way to get raises around here...

Contingent Cassandra said...

I'm glad I'm not the only one with a conference presentation/article imbalance on my c.v. Nobody thought to tell me in grad school that this is considered a bad thing (because of course we were all headed to R1 jobs where there was plenty of time for writing and research), and I spent about a decade thinking that presenting at conferences at least showed that I was staying in touch with my research despite a heavy teaching load. Thank goodness for academic blogs, where people are a bit more blunt about such things.

I'm now trying to cut back on the conference presentations in favor of (very slow) progress on articles and eventually a book (and I'll see you over at DEH's place; I need to get an intro. up there).

Linda said...

So want to try this writing thing again. This has also been my topic for my essay look here. The best part of this website is it has unlimited pages. Thank you for sharing this post with us.

Linda said...

I have searched a lot of website http://www.referencegenerator.net/best-reference-generator-mla-only-for-you/ but could not find any best post about this writing thing again. Can you tell me where I can get best and quality stuff?

Linda said...

Wohoho. This post really awesome and nice to read this with my mates at http://www.rewordinggenerator.org/ sometime before. Thanks for sharing this amazing thing man.

Nawazo said...

I have addiction to drive my car with the self driving for the better trust I have only on myself with the great of advertising. From my house the distance was far and all the drives by me for www.originalitycheck.net I had done after the night to the mid time.

Bano said...

By the Logitech company these are G25 model racing wheels along with the pedals we can connect with the gaming device. We can control the gaming races better with wheels then for the http://www.similaritychecker.com/document-similarity-checker/ we have to some same technique to apply for the controlling decreasing marks.