PhD opportunites at SOAS

Apologies for the ragged formatting of this – it’s just a post to display the information that I don’t have space to tweet.

SOAS have a growing interest in SL linguistics – apparently.

– post –

The Department of Linguistics at SOAS is pleased to announce the availability of several (partial or full) scholarships for students wishing to undertake PhD research.

Reinforcements… and an interesting challenge

With Christmas intervening – and then a frantic new year of catching up, I’m only just getting to the point now where I can come back to the blog.

And I do so with news… I have reinforcements In the last week, the long awaited replacement Client Support Officer has started at work. The hope is that… in time… he will learn to do everything that I’ve been doing, and effectively replace me – freeing me up to do other (and more interesting) things.

His arrival has, however, brought an interesting challenge to light – which is the amount of time and effort that it takes to effectively train and mentor someone.

This is a challenge that I suffered from… from the other end – as a PhD student.

Whoops… and I’m back

Dear all,

One good thing about only posting sporadically to this blog is that, when I disappear for a few days, no-one worries.

The last few days of absence were, unfortunately, a  bit more serious than me just being busy.

I fell off my bike on the 28th November into the path of a Ford Focus, which then drove over me.

Somewhat miraculously – having spent a few harrowing moments staring at the underside of the engine… and then a few uncomfortable days getting the use of my ribs back, less than a couple of weeks later, I’m back at work…

Thanks to all who have expressed good wishes.

I’ve had a good think about priorities in the time off, and while nothing has changed particularly, I’m even more determined to make sure that I don’t simply drift – ticking off years of time without actually getting back to the heart of what I want to do.

My friend Austin Kocher recently wondered… “Is there anything more exciting than learning something new?”

I don’t think there is… unless, perhaps when that learning then takes you to passing on that knowledge to others and seeing them also learn it, engage with it, and then take ownership of it, and start to move it in new directions.

Research, writing, dissemination, collaboration, exploration, discovery.

Love it

 

 

AAG 2012 session details and content

The AAG 2012 schedule has been released, and the information on each of the Deaf Geographies sessions is available at the following URLS.

Monday 27th February.

12.40 – 2.20: Deaf Geographies I – Foundations for Deaf Geographies

2.40 -4.20: Deaf Geographies II – Analyzing Deaf Geographies

4.40 – 6.20: Deaf Geographies III -The Future of Deaf Geographies

If last year is anything to go by, the wealth of information and research will be amazing, and I’ll be so excited by the end I’ll barely be able to sleep.

I’m presenting in the first session, so lots of time to kick back afterwards, relax and listen.

I *am* going to New York

Amazing what securing a tiny bit of funding does in leveraging more. Maybe it’s about the credibility that it lends to your project.

Having secured the conference fees from the AAG, I’ve now been told that work are going to contribute something to get me to New York. This is wonderful news, particularly since part of the ‘new vision’ that I described yesterday requires me to develop a way to hold in (tension is the wrong word, it suggests that there is a tension… maybe balance would be a better one) balance the two roles that I currently play within the University (IT services and Academic) and, if possible, work them together.

Unless the university adopts a revolutionary new approach to many things (I can’t, for example, be a member of academic staff and support staff – different pay grades and structures and different rules on what each can do apply), one of the only ways to constructively bridge the two areas is to present ideas that do just that, at fora like the AAG.

Last night, upon hearing the news that I’d got partial funding, and some more on the way *fingers crossed*, I got the go ahead from home to attend – no small grace when it involves leaving Jo at home with a (will be then 23 month old) toddler for a week on her own.

Big Apple – here I come

 

The Clandestine University

A recent article by Thomas Doherty in the Timer Higher Education, suggests that within increasingly polished ‘Official Universities’, Clandestine scholarship is becoming the only way to carry out real research and teaching.

Doherty argues that with :

“Transparency playing as a poor substitute for truth; and raw Information supplanting the curiosity-driven demands for critical knowledge that are the primary concern of a serious university, there exist at least two universities within each institution: an “Official” one and a “Clandestine” one.” (text slightly adapted)

He goes on to detail all the things that the Clandestine university does but cannot admit to. Things which are fundamental to keeping the heart of knowledge-generation beating, but which don’t officially exist.

I might be going to the AAG after all

Following on from the previous post – which was put up rather too long ago – I decided that the only way to get to the AAG was to go aggressive on the ‘travel fund’ angle.

There were two options:

Long live the status quo

About a week ago, I reluctantly had to tell the organisers of the sessions on Deaf Geographies at the AAG 2012 that I wouldn’t be able to attend. The cost of the conference (£200) plus the flights (£400 + tax) plus accommodation (++?) means that, although it’s a subject that I’m passionate about, I just couldn’t justify the expense.

Then I heard that it might be possible to sign up and then ‘find that I couldn’t go any more’ and send in my submission on film… so I signed up.

I’ve just heard that the AAG don’t allow pre-recorded presentations, and that there is no way to webcast into the proceedings.

So, having paid my sign-up, I now have to work out whether to lose some of that, and revert to the original plan, or whether to try and get there anyway.

‘Disabled’ or ‘with disabilities’

I recently overheard someone saying that it’s no longer ‘correct’ to talk about ‘Disabled people’. Apparently, the UN and other international organizations use ”people with disabilities” instead.

It makes me think that we’ve slipped back to the 1960s again.

Where are the V-lists?

I’ve been following several debates on a list for Deaf academics recently – I’m kind of privileged to even be able to follow it, given that I’m not deaf. It’s predominantly a list with academics in the US, UK, Australia etc… there are very few from non-English writing countries and all discussions are held in written English.

So, a recently mail caught my eye asking why it was that there was no method for posting in sign language – either ASL, BSL or any other.

The idea that this is even a sensible suggestion is one that should make the hearing world sit up and take notice. The idea that a group of internationally dispersed academics could conduct academic discussions in a number of different sign languages and all make sense of each other is something that the hearing world should marvel at. Sign languages, however you theorise them, as long as they are natural languages and not some form of signed spoken system like SSE or Cued Speech, are able to flow towards each other in the iconic which still carrying nuanced meaning in a way that spoken languages (with their so-easily-broken point and click sound=meaning reference system) could never do.

But there’s another thought that makes the question pertinent – which is where are the V-lists?

We now have the web tech to create v-lists… so why aren’t we doing it? You wouldn’t want to carry the video in the mail, it would be too big, but you could simply refer people back to a URL on a site like YouTube?

But lists are easy, you just click ‘reply’ and have done with it.

Perhaps Twitter is the answer as you can record the video direct from within the tweet on something like Tweetdeck

What would it take to set up a ‘list’ that worked with video?