Check-in 3

Being a senior is far more exhausting than I had expected. The closer I get to graduation the more I want to take a quick jaunt in time to my freshman year anxiety and be like "do you even lift?"

Now, freshman year was a tough time, and is a tough time for everyone, but honestly my freshman year was a walk in the park when it comes down to how much work there is to do for me right now. Don't get me wrong, I love what I'm doing and what my life is like right now and I have a strict policy about time travel anyway, but I also sometimes miss the days where I had time to actually read a book that wasn't for work or class.

Speaking of class, I turned in my annotated bibliography and about 4 pages of analysis on specific portions of my research. The bibliography took much more time than it should have. I was struggling for a while to find sources, because I simply haven't done a large research paper since last fall. That isn’t to say I forgot how - trust me when it comes to working a database or pulling from the stacks I've still got it - I just needed a little adjustment to get back into the searching and skimming mindset. I also am 110% grateful that I have a carrel this semester because dealing with all of my library books otherwise would be a nightmare. Between my Sor Juana research, my poetry course having 8 textbooks, my pragmatics research and the fact that my Greek book is bigger and more complicated than Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix I would have snapped my back in half by now.

I'm still debating what I want to do for my research project for my pragmatics course, but I think I have settled on something to do with the differences in the use of 'se' in Spanish, the 'se' impersonal and 'se' passive in particular. I'll be using Harry Potter: La Colección Completa as a source of corpus data, which should work well enough for a class project. Plus this means I get to read Harry Potter (and by read I mean Ctrl+f the word 'se' and ignore reflexives) for homework!

I do like my regular readings too though, we just finished up Petrarch, who was a nice read after Ovid and Catullus, who were a bit too raunchy with their love poetry for my taste. Still didn't quite enjoy him as much as Sappho, but that's neither here nor there. Every poet has their own style, and reading things in translation also confuses things.

I'm going to cut this post off here because have a test tomorrow that is worth 10% of my grade, so I've been studying hard for that, even though I do feel slightly unprepared given everything else I've had to do this week. My stress levels have been pretty high lately, so I think I'm going to make myself a nice cuppa and review my flashcards before getting a good night's rest.

Cheers,
Talia

Check-in 2

This semester is doing its best to crush me, but I won't let it. I was ill last week, leading up to the weekend, and it caused me to get slightly behind on my work. That said, I was a little bit ahead before this, so I suppose things have just evened out. I still need to get caught up in Pragmatics and Love Poetry – those were the two classes I missed last week – and so right now I'm working through our second homework assignment for Pragmatics, which includes some interesting wordplay involving unicorns, and recreating a Sappho poem for my Love Poetry course.

Our assignment for Love Poetry is to take what fragments are left from a Sappho poem of our choosing from the Anne Carson translation I mentioned before, and 'fill in the blanks' as it were, recreating the poem as if it were written in Sappho's time. Currently I am struggling with this as I fight the urge to modernize the poem and as I try to find a voice not my own.

Speaking of poetry, I have recently undertaken a new project. I know, I know, I don't exactly need more things to keep me busy, but I have to have fun sometimes right? This side project can definitely be considered fun. When I was at Bread Loaf early in the summer I had the privilege of attending many panels and talks, as well as individual/small group meetings with various editors and agents. One of the people that I ended up talking to was Chad Post, who was there as a publisher/editor for Open Letter at the University of Rochester. In addition to publishing, Open Letter runs a weblog and international review source called Three Percent. After leaving Bread Loaf, I decided that I would sign up to write occasional reviews for Three Percent, and I received my first book today (October 4th) and so far I love it. It's a book of poetry, but I shan't say more than that here. Once I finish writing the review and it goes through editing I will be sure to post a link to it on this blog.

On the topic of editing, my work in the Student-Scholar Partnership is going well, and I continue to be very happy with this project. To have a paying job, part-time or no, that is in my desired field is an absolute dream for someone my age, and I'm very thankful for the opportunity.

Literary Translation is my dream, as readers of this blog may know, and as readers will also know, my thesis is centered around Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz and translations of her poems. At present I have scaled back the active translations as I am focusing a bit more on the content of my secondary source material for the critical introduction, although I of course work on bits and pieces when I have those rare spots of free time. I have an annotated bibliography of sources for my research seminar due next Monday, so I have also been working continuously on that.

Another research project that I am working on this semester is for my Pragmatics course. I'm still not entirely sure what I want to investigate yet; but our initial proposal (topic & research question, methodology idea, list of proposed papers) is due on the eleventh, so I'll have to come up with something soon.

Although I enjoy all of my courses and projects, I am developing a soft spot for my course on Ancient Greek. Learning this new (to me) language is a bit like solving a puzzle and slowly unwrapping a gift, and seeing all the pieces come together and getting a closer look at the prize is very enjoyable to me. When I am stressed out over bibliographies and papers and poems, untangling a sentence is oddly therapeutic.

Getting out all my thoughts on paper (or on screen I suppose) has a similar affect, so in a way I feel indebted to this blog for helping me process my strengths and weaknesses this semester. I hope you enjoyed this little peek into my mind.

Cheers,
Talia

Check-in 1

Hi All! I had a really busy weekend and completely forgot to upload this! I've put reminders in my agenda though, so hopefully I'll have something posted on time for the next update (which is currently tentatively scheduled for Sunday October 1st).

This semester I am working on many projects, and trying not to get overwhelmed. In terms of classes, I am taking four this semester, in addition to writing my thesis. One of those is a research seminar, which thankfully has some overlap with my thesis, although they are not exactly the same, since the class is taught in Spanish, and my thesis is being written in English.

I am taking a course on love poetry, which I quite like. We just wrapped up reading some Catullus, and are now continuing on with Ovid. Our first poet was Sappho, whose work I thoroughly enjoyed, although I lament the fact that there is so little left for us. For anyone who wants to read her work (which honestly should be everyone) I recommend the Anne Carson translation If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho, which is the one we use in class.

Speaking of Sappho, I'm enrolled in an introductory course of Ancient Greek, which I am enjoying immensely. Declensions aren't as scary as I thought they would be, and finding my way to meaning in this ancient language is like solving the best kind of puzzle. There are a LOT of sentences about Homer's brother, but I can deal. My professor is awesome, and is the same one I had for my Classical Mythology course last semester.

The final class I'm taking this semester is Pragmatics, and it is yet another repeat Professor as I had her for Semantics last semester. This course is much easier than the last, since there is as of yet no set theory, and it plays more with actual language, which is something I missed in Semantics, as we worked more with logical data in that course. I missed in Semantics, as we worked with more logical than raw linguistic data. Both are important to the domain of linguistics studies, and I am glad to have taken Semantics for enriching my general linguistics knowledge, but so far pragmatics has been much more my speed.

Outside of actual class hours I am of course keeping up with my homework assignments, but also working on my thesis, which is official now, and will be concentrated on translations of selected poems of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, accompanied by a critical introduction. Working on those translations is a joy, but hard work. Many of her poems are quite long, and the one that I am currently focusing on is 152 lines and they are tough ones.

I have recently started working with one of the scholars at the Women's Studies Resource Center at Brandeis, Mary Berg, on her translations, which I greatly enjoy. Right now she is working on a bilingual edition of short stories by the Cuban writer Laidi Fernández de Juan. It's an exciting project, and one I am glad to be a part of.

So that's it for now! I just wanted to give you a small taste for the content of the blog this semester, and I will update again soon!

Cheers,
Talia