I suppose this is a continuation of yesterday's post about focus. Frequently I say that one of the joys of working at a non-research one school is range. I can teach a range of classes (comp! creative writing! an honors course in working-class studies! an upper-level writing course for education majors!), engage a range of subjects and conversations in my scholarlship (though they all seem to return to issues of class), and this variety keeps things interesting. I never feel tied down or as if I'm lost in the world of hyper-specialization.
And yet the choices can overwhelm. Should I devote energies to developing this sequence of courses? Focus on the first-year classes and how we might enhance them? Do more with the honors college? Do more with the campus's civic engagement initiatives? Continue focusing on this line of inquiry and maybe conceive of it as a book project? Keep doing "mini-studies" that turn into articles followed by sharp movement to the next topic? Decisions.
Usually I think of these Big Questions when particularly long and varied lists of tasks sit on my desk. This morning I spent a good amount of time writing and worked on both the 4Cs paper for the panel I'm on and the mini-paper for the Cs working-class special interest group meeting. The latter is finished. The former is getting there. Feeling productive (yeaa) but also a bit haried by these big picture concerns (boo).
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