'Research' Category
Science and Literature
In his article May 11 article for the Boston Globe titled Measure for Measure, Johnathan Gottschall writes:
We literary scholars have mostly failed to generate surer and firmer knowledge about the things we study. While most other fields gradually accumulate new and durable understanding about the world, the great minds of literary studies have, over the […]Language habits
Scientific American interviews Alice Gaby, a linguist working at UC Berkeley (and a University of Melbourne alumna), about her research on how language affects our perception of the world. She explains, however, that language isn’t some sort of “straitjacket” that limits us to thinking in only one way, but rather a “habit” of mind that […]
It’s official
I’m enrolled in the PhD program. Till 2012. And I’m being paid to do it, which is utterly cool.
There were delays, of course - it’s taken almost a month and a half to process everything. You’d think, with an unconditional offer and two full scholarships, there’d be no reason for any holdups, wouldn’t you? I […]“Morality”
I’ve heard the terms ‘moral’ and ‘morality’ thrown around often and what irks me is that it is assumed that these must flow from some kind of religious foundation. So it was heartening to read Steven Pinker’s article The Moral Instinct in the New York Times yesterday. It’s a fairly long article and just about […]
Levitation
The Telegraph recently carried a story about levitation and how it could be used to help nanotechnologists keep ”tiny objects from sticking to each other.” It can do this by reversing the Casimir force, which causes things to be drawn together in the first place. In theory, this could be used to levitate whole humans and, more […]
I’m DONE!
I handed in my thesis a few minutes ago and I want to collapse. Or sleep. Sleep would be good too. Instead of being all elated and relieved, I’m feeling quite bereft. I want it back. I want to do it over. Not because what I handed in, despite its pretentious title, is bad, but because […]
Bye, bye, unconscious
Lo! ‘Tis done! My last assignment has been handed in and I am free to dip my aching fingertips in some warm, salty water. Seriously, they’re getting all funny looking from all the typing I’ve been doing. Or maybe I’m just getting old. Which I am, really. Next week, in fact, I’ll be a whole […]
Connecting
The Australian Association for Literary Translation had its second public lecture at Monash University’s Caulfield Campus yesterday. It’s just as well I checked the newsletter one last time before leaving or I would have ended up in Clayton which is a good deal farther away. I’m glad I got to the right place and in time […]
One down…
I handed in my final assignment for my research course yesterday. Yes, it’s silly to have to write a research proposal for a thesis that’s due in a few weeks, but that should actually make it easier to write. I took it as a good sign that I got it done without bursting into tears […]
Good and Bad
1. I must be doing something right if the references in the books I’m wading through are suddenly to books I’ve already read.
2. Why are journals so hard to locate?