Graduate student involvement (was Re: GALA and BWLG)

[Kenneth Allen Hyde]

On Mon, 14 Jun 1999, Alice Freed wrote:

> For example, I have mixed feelings about "the involvement of graduate
> students at high levels" depending on how this is defined.

Well, for what it's worth, you have at least one graduate student involved
in GALA right now (in the sense of an active participator in the process
of discussing and forming GALA): me.  I'm an ABD graduate student.  I plan
to remain as active as possible in the formation and continuation of GALA,
since I feel very strongly that the existence of an organized professional
group is an important step in Gender and Language academic research.

> Graduate students are usually under a considerable amount of academic
> pressure and to give GALA (or any organization) the attention it will
> need will force them to put their studies aside.

Not necessarily.  And certainly not any more than they might be called on
to juggle other commitments.  Just as an example, for anyone who attended
NELS 29 (last year), that was a conference that was organized by,
essentially, five graduate students.  Somehow, we not only survived, but
we managed to get all of our academic work done too, plus our teaching
and service commitments.  Admittedly, a student who wanted to be involved
in the more burdened (I think that sounds better than "higher", don't
you?) aspects of GALA (steering committe, conference organization, etc.)
might have to choose not to be involved in other service activities, but
it could still be done.

This brings up another point.  While it may not be true everywhere, at
many schools, graduate students have teaching commitments which include
gender and language related classes.  I know that here at UD I have been
the only person teaching gender and language classes for the last four
years (since I'm the only gender studies scholar in the UD Ling. dept., I
don't know what will happen to the class when I leave--I just keep hoping
that someone with an interest in G&L will be admitted to the program).
This is one of the reasons that I am so committed to GALA: I have
keenly felt the lack of feedback and discussion about gender and language
issues with my colleagues.  I think that, if GALA is to meet the needs of
all of its members, it is important that they be represented at all
levels.

Kenneth Allen Hyde     |  No matter how subtle the wizard, a knife
Univ. of Delaware      |  between the shoulder blades will seriously
Dept. of Linguistics   |  cramp his style  -- Old Jhereg proverb
kenny at Udel.Edu         |  A mind is a terrible toy to waste! -- Me

//www.ling.udel.edu/hyde/prof/ken.html