After a tutorial at CSM, feeling more lost than ever, realising that what I was worried about is actually true and I need to fix it with 3 weeks left to submission. I had the same reaction to my paper that I have when I kept rereading it: booooring. Dry. Too much like a Manifesto, too much information. Where’s the juicy bit? Where’s the Village?
She really did say what I was thinking but didn’t want to admit that to myself because I just wanted the paper done, finished, submietted, get it over with.
After a long conversation about RESEARCH PAPER VER 4, 5,… I revisited the RESEARCH PAPER VER 1 and found the Village: my thoughts after the interview, the quotes, which was all missing from my paper entitled: Does ti take a Village?(apparntly not). I am now faced with the perspective of taking apart the 4000 words I have and breathing life into it by inserting the Village that is missing. I have no idea how I am going to do that, ideally I would love to have 6000 words, it would make everything sooo much easier.
I was advised to create a map, a graph, where I will put my village in one section, put my dry economics and feminist facts paper in the other section and I will attempt to combine the two while simultaneously not exceeding 4000 words.
I think in my desperate attempt to prove that I did the research, that I red the books and put in the work to write a cohesive, rational paper, I lost myself, I lost the Village, I became someone I’m not, someone I thought I was expected to be. The pressure and feeling of responsibility, of writing a “good paper” stamped allover imagination, freedom of thought and creativity. That was a really tough realisation.
But maybe also one I needed to hear when I came in ready to just cut out 50 words and be done with it. Back to the drawing board I guess.