_Noise_Conspiracy.jpg "The (International) Noise Conspiracy - 002-09-17: 9:30 Club, Washington D.C., USA")
Career Aspiration #2
June 18th, 2007 at 19:22
If the Doctor Who thing doesn’t work out, I quite like the idea of having a career as an academic. I’m a big fan of learning, and I’m self important enough to look down my nose at the sort of plebs who don’t even know who Thomas Paine was.
I like the idea of spending my days being paid to read books and write down what I think about things, under the guise of it being “research”. Maybe I’d have to occasionally turn up in a lecture theatre and tell some lazy students about whatever it is that I know about, but the vast majority of it could basically be very prestigious slacking.
I could even pop up as a talking head on the news or in the papers as a rent-an-expert whenever my specialisation is in the media, and provide some undoubtedly insightful analysis on what’s going on. I might even be able to set the news agenda myself by releasing a press release to try and justify my latest research grant: “EXPERT UNCOVERS NEW EVIDENCE THAT SITTING IS NICE”. Maybe I could even come up with a meaningless formula describing an every-day occurrence that could capture the public’s imagination and make an excellent “And Finally…” piece, like a formula for the perfect cup of tea or perfect parallel park. That sort of thing.
One thing I really like about academics is that they specialise in really specific areas of knowledge – its almost like being paid for being a nerd. For example, one of my lecturers is an expert on domestic German politics and another knows all about the French Presidency – I’ve vivid memories (it was a shocking and formative experience for me, clearly) of attending a university opening day back when I was in the sixth form, and having the academic who was doing the tour explain that she was an expert on The Break-up of Czechoslovakia in 1992-1993 – which is pretty damn specific.
I think if I were an academic, I’d like to specialise in general knowledge – I don’t really know enough about any topic to say anything insightful or useful, but I know a little bit about a lot – so I should play to my strengths. The best bit would be being the only PhD-educated person in the world who when asked what they specialise in, answers “oh, nothing in particular”.
Specialising in general knowledge means that I’ll be able to spend the vast majority of my time arranging my bookshelf and filling it with important and impressive sounding books. The sort of books that don’t even have a colourful dust-cover with an eye-catching slogan, but have a blunt and specific title like “BRITISH ECONOMICS: 1973″ or “REALLY DIFFICULT SCIENCE”. I’d make a point of framing all of my articles that appear in academic journals, and hanging them right next to a shelf containing all of the stuff people might want to borrow, so that if anyone comes in asking to borrow my stapler, I can simply wave my arm and say “yes, it’s over there right next to my award winning article about night tending to follow day“.
Do any universities do MA courses in general knowledge?
Post to: [ del.icio.us ][ Digg it ][ Furl ][ Netscape ][ Newsvine ][ reddit ][ StumbleUpon ][ Yahoo MyWeb ]Categories: Columns, Silly Stuff |