As a part of the ‘Why do a PhD?’ series of blogs posts, I thought I’d contribute my own thoughts on the decision to do a doctorate. I must say that I have struggled with this post, because—like most people—I have had a mixed experience with the doctorate. Doctorates are hard, Read more
It’s almost a year since my last post for FiSch, on writing my acknowledgements to my recently completed thesis. Since then I’ve defended and finalised it: anyone who cares to can now download 100,000 words on ‘Anchoritic Prayer in Time‘! Since this is a pandemic year, of course, some things are still Read more
A few months ago I passed a milestone in my own post-PhD academic life, by starting a full-time academic contract. For several years I’d been juggling two part-time contracts at neighbouring universities, adding up to roughly full-time hours and with a higher than usual concentration of teaching, so in terms Read more
Finishing a doctorate is glorious and wonderfully freeing (see previous post). But it’s amazing how quickly reality sets in after a brief moment of victory. One set of goals is replaced by another and the challenge of navigating along the unmarked, foggy road of a DPhil is followed by the Read more
This year my autumn term has been a bit different from those of the last six years. At the end of September my postdoc grant ran out, and we moved to Durham, where my husband has started his training to become a vicar and I became a part-time visiting fellow Read more
A couple of months ago, fellow FiScher Alicia Smith wrote a fascinating blog post on the relationship of her PhD studies with her faith. I’d like here to attempt something similar in relation to my own field. This post is going to ask more questions than it answers, for space reasons, but Read more
A large percentage of PhD students don’t follow a career in academia … will it all turn out to have been a waste of time? This is something of a ‘farewell’ post from me, as I’m stepping down from the Faith-in-Scholarship blogging team, in order to concentrate on my studies, Read more
“A scientist is a person who knows more and more about less and less,” goes the saying [1], “until he knows everything about nothing.” There were times during my PhD studies when I took heart from the first part of that quip, and times when the second half seemed all too Read more