For our final week of discussion, in the Conclusion, the authors reflect on their own collaboration in writing the book, which they describe as putting Slow principles into practice, as well as the various merits of "thinking together." Fundamentally, inspired discussion and supportive collaboration builds and is built on trust.
Since the co-authors had known each other for a long time, "we were more patient with each other and more compassionate when life events or work pressure intervened in a deadline. Recognizing that the understanding and care that we extended to each other brought out the best in us has made us more compassionate towards our students" (88). They sandwich in that sentence the idea that this support, rather than some kind of organizational cure-all or fire-rimmed deadlines, brings out the best in themselves and each other. (Something in me instinctively bristles at this, as if "the best in us" is made by more exacting standards rather than loving support -- and I'm not sure I like what I'm discovering about myself.)
This is the conclusion, after all, and so there's only time for one more definitional clarification: "Slow philosophy overall should not be interpreted, Petrini reminds us, as "the contrast . . . between slowness and speed -- slow versus fast -- but rather between attention and distraction; slowness, in fact, is not so much a question of duration as of an ability to distinguish and evaluate, with the propensity to cultivate pleasure, knowledge, and quality" . . . Slow professors act with purpose, cultivating emotional and intellectual resilience to the effects of the corporatization of higher education" (89-90).
So in the face of the fast currents coming at him or her, the Slow Professor aims to not get caught up in it and instead think deeply and purposefully.
This is our last week and so is a great time for summing up. What have you gotten out of this reading and discussion? Can you imagine going about your professorial life differently -- with a more conscious consideration of Slow principles? How can you make time for timeless time? What ideas do you have for teaching more Slow-ly? How can a consideration of Slow principles help to nurture your research and scholarship? How can you engage in building the kind of trust in your department or academic circle that will nurture your intellect and emotions? How can you work to champion work-life balance for you and your colleagues?
6 comments:
I really liked that definitional quotation: "the contrast...between attention and distraction; slowness, in fact, is not so much a question of duration as of an ability to distinguish and evaluate, with the propensity to cultivate pleasure, knowledge, and quality... Slow professors act with purpose, cultivating emotional and intellectual resilience to the effects of the corporatization of higher education" (89-90).
I want to be resilient - who doesn't? - but not because I've got a rubberized outer coating which bounces everything off, because I don't actually care, because I seal off and protect the tender, passionate, kind, questioning, self-challenging parts of myself, which is what many business-oriented self-help articles seem to suggest. Resilience isn't the same thing as strong self-belief, which in the academy feeds into the competitive, each-for-themselves ethos the corporatizing powers seem to want to cultivate in their faculty. Divide and conquer! This manifesto is clearly for collectivism. A resilience founded in acting with purpose, being able to reflect, distinguish and evaluate, is one I heartily desire. A call to cultivate the garden of ideas along with my students, my colleagues, and the absent Great Host of minds who join in through the written word, to fill my garden with unusual varieties rather than focusing on a small number of fast-growing marketable commercial cultivars is overdue, and this book seems to at least offer a taste of what that might look like.
What have I gotten from it? Starting points rather than handy tips, which is a little frustrating! However, the realisation that there are a lot of other individuals feeling like me is powerful, and an encouragement to keep speaking up for the things that matter to me, to continue to resist. And that TLQ group and my real life writing group are more than just a small tool to help me with my own disorganisation, they're actually part of a resistence and a reimagining of how the academy might work. Small things, but they matter more than might seem. So keeping them going is a higher priority!
Can you imagine going about your professorial life differently -- with a more conscious consideration of Slow principles? I like the idea of that, but don't know exactly how. I need to go read it again and think about things some more...
How can you make time for timeless time? Rolls eyes. This still feels like one of those deliberately paradoxical Buddist thingies whose name I can't remember, "what is the sound of one hand clapping?" and all that. But I know how I can make more room for writing, and in that space, sometimes, I'll hit flow, meet my muse, whatever one wants to call that drawn out moment of engagement which I think is one of the things the authors mean by "timeless time" - keep making room for writing time, keep expanding my toolkit, use freewriting, read Peter Elbow and Ursula le Guin and other writers who make me want to practice my craft, do NaNoWriMo...
What ideas do you have for teaching more Slow-ly? For next year? Continue to use all the little things, the starters and finishers, holding the attitude that when I shut the classroom door I shut it on the whole world and am 100% there with the group and the days' ideas for the class' duration. I will be doing some quite overt work to help students acculturate to higher education in one module, so thinking about how to convey to students the ideas of knowledge for its own sake, balance in all things, quality of time/activity mattering more than quantity, pacing, self-care etc. will be to the fore more than usual - so I guess this sort of helped with preparing for teaching, as well as preparing for the year generally!
How can a consideration of Slow principles help to nurture your research and scholarship? This one's hard.
How can you engage in building the kind of trust in your department or academic circle that will nurture your intellect and emotions? Writing group and TLQ. Paying attention. Remembering we're all human. Providing the occasional cake to share.
I feel like there's room for several weeks of discussion of HOW these things could be achieved - maybe something TLQ could use next semester?
I like JaneB's idea of discussing the "hows" in TLQ this next semester. There are lots of fits and starts with the book, but it has got me thinking, and I have found the TLQ group has good hints on approaching this life.
I agree that the feeling of not being alone is powerful. I don't teach at the moment, so I can't quite envision how to bring slowness into the classroom, but I have several ideas of bringing those principles to my approach to research.
In no way can I improve on JaneB's suggestions about building trust, although my trust resides outside my department, and nearly outside my college entirely. How to do that in my department escapes me, sadly.
I love the idea of carrying the conversation forward by discussing the "hows" in TLQ this next semester. I really want/need to figure out how to implement this in my life. Just being on campus today I'm exhausted but jumpy. I need to meditate actually.
I feel pretty alone in my department. I have one faculty friend and ally, but just because of things that are going on at the moment our relationship is changing. I have this sense that I want to hold onto this traditional idea of a university as place of deep thinking and reflection, a very minority view at my institution. So the idea of figuring this out with you all in TLQ is awesome.
It's funny but to me it's much easier to figure out how to bring Slow into teaching than to research. I have no idea how I'm going to transition to timeless time at work. The very place makes me want to move and get going right now. I felt it.
I have to go and meditate that away now, if I can. So glad you've found this useful!
I can relate to your being jumpy, EE. I am bombarded by people and tasks the minute I walk in the door--in the winter, I seldom get my coat off before some crisis hits my cubicle.
I work in a very corporate-minded college, and I feel very alone as well. While I get along with my colleagues, I am a very odd duck, due to my humanities background, and exacerbated by being a "failed professor" (their nomenclature, not mine). It doesn't help that my dean describes my research as "that weird medieval stuff."
TLQ is therefore a very important group for me.
I agree about the challenge of applying Slow to research. I'm up for tenure (again--new institution) in a year, and I feel so much pressure to crank things along. Of course, the rate of journal-review imposes a different, and far more maddening, kind of Slow on one's work...but then the only remedy is to send out more stuff, more quickly. I'm struggling right now with the feeling that I'm pushing my book through too quickly. This feeling might be in accurate--I've been thinking about these ideas for years--but it's there, and unfortunately the solution is not to slow way down on it. If my two current R&Rs get rejected, I'd better have a second book in the pipeline.
Thanks for hosting this, EE! Reading the book was a good experience, if not totally life-changing. It would actually be interesting to revisit the chapters during the semester, when everything feels less manageable, and see whether they resonate differently.
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