Well, that was a bit of a ‘down’ way to
leave this blog and there’s been quite a hiatus. I'm going to try to blame the
insanity of Xmas and hope that you don’t notice that I haven’t made an entry since
the 6th of November… It’s a new year, new leaf and all that guff.
I’ll try to be better.
So, to catch you up with the major events
since I last wrote:
My writing is improving. That’s not to say
that what I’m producing is necessarily better but just that it has gone from
excruciating to uncomfortable to bearable to enjoyable and finally has become
downright fun. And within that process, I think I’ve pretty much finished the
first drafts of one of the collections of stories. I started in a relative
comfort zone of my own cultural heritage, predominantly English, and their food
& immigration stories. Now I’m making a big jump in time & familiarity
to work on stories based on Somali food and experiences. So, it’s back to
reading and researching for me.
The AAWP (Australasian Association of
Writing Programs) annual conference held at Deakin’s Waterfront Campus in
November, 2012, was my first academic conference. I went as
a spectator only but was still incredibly anxious about it all. To my delight,
everyone was friendly and welcoming—there was less name-tag-checking of a
person’s status before striking up conversation than I expected. But there was
a fair amount of academic posturing & ‘theory dropping’. There were too
many interesting sessions to choose from but one of the best was one I went to
‘just because’. The others I tried to choose with my project in mind and I was
able to meet others writing, researching and teaching about food and culture.
My last piece of news is my most exciting
but I’m not sure that the excitement isn’t, in fact, at least 90% terror…
With the ever-ready encouragement and
support of Amazing Supervisor, I applied to present a paper at the Third International Food Studies Conference to be held at the University of Texas in
Austin and they have accepted my proposal! So, in October this year I’ll be off
to the Lone Star State to present my findings so far to my peers and betters.
If I bit my nails, I’d already have none left!
Maybe I should go & get Friday Night Lights on DVD... as research, of course.
Congrats on the acceptance to the conference! Sounds amazing!
ReplyDeleteMy only connection to Texas is through Friday Night Lights, and I think you should certainly watch it in preparation for your trip!
Ry and I will be in Atlanta (or at least I will be, he sometimes has to travel for work). We'll also have a baby for you to meet! We would love to see if you have time to stop in Atlanta, but not sure we will be able to get to Texas with the baby.