I have mentioned this before, but I have to give a shout-out to my professor who assigned a review of scholarship. The idea is that before you set out to write a paper for a conference you should know what’s been done already. So you collect as much information on your intended subject as possible and see what’s been written. Doing this is a lot of work but it also helps answer some important questions, like if someone has already published the paper you were planning to write and, more importantly, finding what about the topic hasn’t been sufficiently covered.
In my case, I found out that lots of critical work exists on the early part of Louise Erdrich’s career but it really tapers off after 1994. So instead of focusing my paper on Tracks, a novel that has a billion articles written on it, I will shift my attention to her more recent work. That body of existent critical work actually helped me put my paper in context of the larger discussion about Erdrich’s work, and next week I need to present my paper topic to the class. The review of scholarship practically wrote my outline for me, and writing the paper summary was a snap. Once again, it’s this kind of project that makes grad school fun. Instead of feeling like you’re floundering trying to come to grips with massive theories, this review helped focus my attention to a specific issue that has yet to be sufficiently addressed. In short, this is not only what good academics do, but it also shows how they do it. Brilliant.
Also, a good friend of mine is doing her preliminary exams this weekend. Her rationale was entitled “Modern Fantastic Literatures (19th and 20th Centuries): Emphasis On Magical Realism,
Slipstream, Science Fiction, and Fantastic Poetry.” She’s got lots of literature in translation on her reading list, and the prelim committee members were very enthusiastic about her take on the topic. This is all good news for me, since I should be doing a very similar thing in about 18 months.
Current Mood: Things are Looking Good, Despite the Rain | 
Currently Listening To – Elliott Smith – “Either/Or”
2 Comments
That body of existent critical work actually helped me put my paper in context of the larger discussion about Erdrich’s work, and next week I need to present my paper topic to the class.
You know, in undergrad always thought of criticism as a way of proving my own argument right. It was a proving to the professor, “see I’m not crazy! This person agrees with me too!”
It was only in grad school that I learned to think of criticism as an “ongoing conversation” in which your own paper will be participating, so you have to include or mention what has come before in that conversation.
I think the best paper topics are the ones where a little bit has been written on the subject you want to write about like a paper or two, but not twenty or thirty papers. I also think it’s just as hard to write a paper when NOTHING has been written on the topic.
Yeah, as an undergrad I thought scholarship was basically making a point about what you read. I never really engaged the “So what?” part of the equation.
And I agree that it’s best if there are a few articles out there to work with. Our professor said no critical work has been done on David Treuer’s Translation of Dr. Apelles because it’s a difficult book that resists simple analysis and no one wants to go first! It’s funny how often we read criticism that tears apart earlier arguments without crediting them for getting the ball rolling.