Last month I had my final summer class session (I took a wonderful American Gothic course). I am officially halfway through my MA degree. 18 credits completed and a 4.0 maintained. When you consider that people on my tract tend to spend about 7 years of their life in grad school, 1 year seems like a drop in the bucket. Yet, while I am early in my journey, I feel that I learned a lot in this first year in graduate school:
I started graduate school thinking I knew everything. Now I don't know anything.
I have read a ton of new books, completed a lot of interesting research, and developed a broader vocabulary and understanding of the world. Clearly, I have grown intellectually and I am far smarter now than I was a year ago. Strangely enough, however, I don't feel smarter. I have acquired a greater amount of knowledge, yet I have far more uncertainties and questions. Graduate school has been a humbling experience because it has introduced me to writers and thinkers one hundred times greater than myself. My "intellectual universe" has become a whole lot bigger. With this humbling experience also comes excitement: I am nowhere near complete. There is so much more to learn, so many more questions to be asked, so much more room for growth.
There is a difference between male and female academics.
I should preface this by saying that I love the guys in my program. I think they're enthusiastic, funny, and incredibly smart. That being said, however, there are differences between my male and female grad school friends. The men can't necessarily help it--these differences are merely symptoms of much larger cultural problems that follow us even into the liberal Ivory Tower of Academia. Examples? Female students worry about babies and marriage. Men don't even mention them. I've heard the phrase "biological clock" quite a few times. Women in my program have considered postponing the thesis in light of wedding preparation and have expressed anxiety over what happens when they want to have children. Although not in a serious relationship, I am still constantly torn by family commitments and relationships (Am I being a good sister, daughter, granddaughter, niece, friend?). Meanwhile, men don't seem concerned. Men just do their work. Women feel guilty for their time being so divided. Although women are passionate about their research, they are less likely to argue and speak up in class. They are far less academically aggressive. I've even noticed that women in my class (myself included) are more likely to begin their comments with phrases such as, "I could be wrong..." or "This is just an idea...". Men are more precise and more committed to their opinions--even if they're far from amazing ones. Some of my professor-friends tell me that these are situations I will encounter through my entire career. They're frustrating, but I am glad I am facing them early on.
It's hard.
As an undergraduate, I may have romanticized the idea of graduate school. I'll admit it. Now, after a year, I feel like all I do is complain. I complain about it simply because it's hard. You postpone a decade of your life that could be in the workforce, you make little to no money, all so that you can earn a degree that may never even get you a job. You have an odd, inconsistent schedule and struggle to find the time to sleep. You have to read enormous--almost impossible--amounts of dense material. You're expected to produce quality, individual research. You're constantly under pressure not only to succeed, but to outshine everyone else; to say something new, different, and original; to present at conferences and get things published. You meet some awesome (and also some super egotistical) people, but you're also in a subculture that sometimes makes you feel alienated from your non-academic friends in your society still overwhelmed with anti-intellectualism. In the meantime, you have to juggle some kind of job so you can actually eat. Did I mention there's not much sleeping?
...And yet I love it.
During my undergraduate years, I had many professors tell me, "If you can see yourself doing something else, go do it." Many might perceive this as mean-hearted, but I realize now that they were only being truthful. A career in academia is a long, hard, unreliable road to travel. If there's something easier to do that you also find enjoyable, why wouldn't you do it? What I've learned from being in graduate school is that despite all of my frustrations, there's nothing else I could see myself doing at this point in time. If someone were to ask me, "What's your dream career?" I'd say that I am already pursuing it. I've considered other possibilities (food critic? animal shelter worker?), but when it comes down to it, this is all I truly want. Speaking purely of happiness and fulfillment, it is my only option. There may come a day when this will change, but for now I am where I need and want to be. Caring so much about what you are pursuing is both a liberating and wonderful thing, but also a scary thing. Most days, I find myself juggling immense gratefulness with utter paranoia. What I've discovered in the meantime is that all of these feelings are part of the very experience of a true intellectual journey: you think, you grapple with ideas, you expand, and you question. Somewhere in that messy cerebral venture you strangely find yourself living a more enriched life, both within and beyond the mind.
