ABD STORIES
Meet three of our ABD students, Sharon Johnson (left), Ayana Harris (right), and Michelle Clonch (below)
Ayana shares...
What's life like after coursework in the "all but dissertation" phase?
Life is as busy as ever since I worked throughout the time I took classes and haven’t really had a “rest” period. Supposedly, I have all this free time, but I am always trying to balance family, personal, and professional commitments along with the “research.” I have had time and freedom to delve more deeply into my interests, but I still have to earn a living—that much hasn’t changed. I have also made time to apply for research grants and conferences. As a result, I have been accepted to present papers at two different conferences in late 2009 while making significant contacts that I am sure will contribute to the dissertation and beyond.
Tell us about your dissertation project.
I will be doing a critical depth psychological analysis of award-winning speculative fiction writer Octavia E. Butler’s life and work, pulling out themes and creating a framework for working with groups and individuals that are navigating transition, change, and trauma. This will likely involve analyzing lived experience, some autoethnographic and performance oriented research methods. I am much more interested in the quarter-life aged adults or young adults than exclusively on early childhood or the traditional Jungian focus on middle age. My working definition for critical depth psychology is informed by liberation psychology, performance studies, critical studies, and postcolonial studies. This means that I have to take a multi/interdisciplinary approach to my dissertation.
How did you come to be interested in the topic?
I really feel like the dissertation is just one piece in the course of my life’s work. Since I was an adolescent, I have been interested in people’s lived experiences, their engagement with culture, and the stories that come from the margins. Now, as an educator I am constantly working with adolescents and teens in various states of transition. As an undergraduate, I had a fantastic experience as a young actor that combined working with classical texts, archetypes, and the play as an imaginal world at least as culturally and personally relevant as the “real” world. Later, I did a graduate fellowship at the California State Capitol and realized that it isn’t enough to legislate change that can only be incremental, but that it is necessary to shape change in other critical ways. Activism along with civic engagement, narrative embodiment (through character work), and cultural mythology all came into play at various key stages in my own development. Lastly, I started Pacifica at age 27 and found the emphasis on mid-life to be lopsided and somewhere along the way, I started reading speculative fiction. Since then, I haven’t been able to get enough because it brings together all of my interests and more.
How is the depth psychology coursework informing your research and writing?
The coursework at Pacifica supplemented the embodied performance education I had already received and taught me some of the theoretical underpinnings of the practical work of soul-making. It was a very different way of learning in a different cohort style than the ensemble work I am used to. I really learned how a psychological and depth psychological lens could help to filter the subtext and through lines of my work. In some ways the coursework floats back to me (and sinks in) as I encounter more information for the actual dissertation. It is important to note that I went through ALL of my coursework including the entire Dissertation Development series without knowing how all of the various interests and pieces would go together. It wasn’t until after I got back into life without classes that things seemed to gel more for me. I must have needed to marinate/ruminate/cultivate/gestate it a little longer than the program is designed!
ABD = All But Dissertation
That betwixt and between place where a student
transitions into a scholar
Sharon shares...
What's life like after coursework in the "all but dissertation" phase?
I like the autonomy. I've always been a pretty disciplined writer/student and it's an added plus to feel that I "carry" my whole Pacifica experience with me in the ABD phase. I love the work.
Tell us about your dissertation project.
My dissertation is an in-depth examination of the friendship and collaboration between two Harlem Renaissance writers. I use a phenomenoogical hermeneutic method through the lens of Jungian psychology. Phenom herm has been a great method to use because I feel like I'm really open to exploring and understanding the two writers and their lived experience in ways existing scholarship hasn't addressed. My dissertation also includes an original screenplay based on my research and interpretation re: their relationship, which goes to many phenomenlogists', psychologists', and other writers' theories that art can reveal and communicate aspects of human experience more effectively than history or scholarly treatment alone.
How did you come to be interested in the topic?
I became interested in my topic in 2004 (before I came to Pacifica) while researching and writing two magazine feature stories on one of the writers. I felt that the story of the two writers would make a great film, but that there was a master narrative about their relationship that was incomplete and required more research to uncover the full dynamic. That initial interest and desire resurrected and "tapped me on the shoulder" in 2007 as we began exploring our possible dissertation topics.
How is the depth psychology coursework informing your research and writing?
I've been alert to and aware of synchronicities during my research and writing, in ways I probably would not have been without "carrying" my coursework and classroom experiences with me throughout the process. This "notitia" has helped me to stay rooted in my intention to write a dissertation that will expand and broaden scholarship on my topic; it has kept me refreshed and energized to look into all the possibilities in my research and writing.
Michelle Clonch (left) and her dissertation advisor, Jennifer Selig
Michelle shares...
What's life like after coursework in the "all but dissertation" phase?
Busy! After 3 years of full-time coursework and part-time work, I needed to return to full-time work and “part-time” coursework. Life seems to have filled in all the time that I was able to carve out before for school and studying. However, after a year of adjustment and transition, I am feeling ready to get deeply reconnected with my work. As strange as it may sound, I genuinely miss delving into the topic and related areas. After all, the reason I chose Pacifica is because I felt that I would be sincerely supported and encouraged by the faculty, staff, and my fellow students. This was absolutely true and, in the ABD phase, I have continued feeling supported and connected with my greatest allies and advocates in the Pacifica family.
Tell us about your dissertation project.
At this initial stage, my project proposes to address an overlooked area in the psychological studies of peace: the archetypal, symbolic, and mythological realms of peace and how these very ideas can often be exported by politically dominant cultures through visual globalization. With a critical participatory hermeneutics approach, the research will aim to understand what conscious or unconscious material an individual or community may or may not project upon peace symbols; to critically investigate the emergence, fortitude, and atrophy of peace symbols; and to see how visual globalization may or may not foster these dynamics. The lenses of mythology, archetypes, visual culture, political narratives, and critical theory will guide the cultural-historical research as it aspires to deeply appreciate how peace symbols labor for the benefit of liberation causes and how some symbols lose fortitude and become discarded in the cultural economy.
How did you come to be interested in the topic?
About 7 years ago I began working with my mentor, Dr. Kathryn Norsworthy, in South and Southeast Asia around peacework and social justice issues. In our travels, I noticed how often people use peace symbols to convey certain messages to the media or to signify their particular politically-invested positions. I started wondering what peace meant as I witnessed people in different places and different groups around the world devoting their lives to peace-work. Everyone had a different perspective on what peace meant based upon his or her “cause.” It quickly became apparent that the more I wanted to understand how peace symbols were used to do work within liberation causes, the more the topic unfolded with its different textures, materials, and complicated ideologies. Deeply learning about and seeing-into peace ignited a passion for me and led directly to the dissertation topic.
How is the depth psychology coursework informing your research and writing?
One of the greatest gifts I received from the depth psychology coursework is the understanding that I do not need to assert myself as an omniscient expert in my chosen field; I can actually learn more from the “seeker” position--a position of interest and curiosity. If I bind myself to an expert position, there will be nothing left for me to learn. But if I engage the research and writing with fresh beginner’s eyes, I will have much more to learn. Entering the research and writing stage with eyes that are ready and willing to seek out and negotiate the nebulous gray areas allows me to consider more possibilities and openings for original, creative, and contributing ideas to the ongoing field of peace scholarship.
TIP: Quite early in the program and whenever possible, I began to slant my final papers towards this topic. So, by the time I got to the ABD phase, I had a good 15 or so papers with faculty feedback exploring peace from all the different, wide, and broad angles our programs embraces! The written feedback been advantageous in my life away from Pacifica (on the east coast) and I highly recommend doing this!
