Revising the Thesis

Yay! I got back my reviewers' comments on my thesis. Boy, they are good and spotted many areas of improvement. Now, I need to strike a balance between justifying why I don't want to make those changes and making them, because of the time pressure there is to quickly submit this revised thesis and get my degree.

So... I'll give myself a deadline. By this Sunday, I will put a stop to the editing I am doing. I am told not to spend so much time on this... But in my heart, each piece of work is so important to me, that I really want to make it the best that it can be... But... I have more important things to do, than improving this work.

So I must learn to balance this.

Okay, Shuyi, deadline's on Sunday!

Idea

Patriotism is surely a social concept. If not, why is it always associated with other concepts like racism, ethnocentrism and xenophobia?

I must write an article about civic patriotism one day, especially the social aspect of patriotism.

Conceptual Framework

I like this definition of a conceptual framework by Miles and Huberman (1994):

A conceptual framework explains, either graphically or in narrative form, the main things to be studied - the key factors, constructs or variables - and the presumed relationships among them. Frameworks can be rudimentary or elaborate theory-drive or commonsensical, descriptive or casual. (p. 18)

Reference
Miles, M. B., & Huberman, A. M. (1994). Qualitative data analysis (2 ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. 

I feel so embarrassed

I feel embarrassed for my nation.

I feel embarrassed that we so neatly categorized the future of our nation, our students into three neat groups or streams.

And we give each group different opportunities.

I feel so embarrassed.

That regardless how that student in the lower stream dreams of being a politician, that chance will almost never be given to him or her, unless he or she goes to an opposition party. And even so, risk being mocked for not being one of those "rags to riches" cases or not having stellar qualifications.

I don't know how to explain to my friends from around the world, why it's like this in my country.

Yes, Goh Keng Swee felt this was the way to ensure no wastage of talents, to make sure each group of people maximize out what they can do best.

I feel so embarrassed.

I feel so embarrassed that qualification, or being book-smart, is so important in my nation, when there's so many other ways to measure a Man.

Embarrassed that there's almost no way of elevating yourself, in terms of being a politician, if you are poor in English, poor in Math or poor in Mother Tongue. You will be classified as one of those who don't have the ability, and didn't work hard enough.

How do I explain this to people?

This is just the way it is?

I'm sorry, I cannot change it.

I was born into this. And I only can perpetuate it.

Holy Manuscript

My supervisor told me that the manuscript we are working on is special. We first submitted it on Christmas. And we are now targeting Easter.

Honestly, I didn't even this of this.

This fact has caused me more guilt than glee.

I've been working through my holy festivals... And you know, writing is hard work. Especially for someone like me, where it doesn't come easy and polished. You know the amount of effort I have to exert? (But writers of how to write books tend to say that it's like that for most people... If you need encouragement, hope my example encourages you, I'm not one of those who write technical scripts easily.)

I only can pray now for God's mercy on me and His help. It's not exactly a situation I want to be in. And this weekend is not exactly a very free weekend either. And also, I remind myself, dedicate this paper to Him.

I wanted to dedicated it to LKY, who just passed away on the 23rd of March. After all, this paper is about Singapore, who according to popular perception, LKY built. Dedicate, as in, let the remembrance of this individual drive my writing.

But, I think the guy that really loves me and really knows me, is not LKY, but Jesus. Jesus knew Man intimately and each one is dear to Him. LKY only knew some of his loved ones, most of his Singaporeans are probably abstract to him, only some are concrete... But Jesus, knows each one of His human beings in a concrete fashion. :)

So yes, I'm not in a nice or comfortable position, but I will make the best of it.

Writing

The thing about writing that I think we don't often talk about it the use of "tools", which I mean how sometimes an idea comes to me and I quickly latch on to it, and it leads to other ideas, but later on, I delete the first idea as it is not as relevant to my work as the ideas that followed it.

I rely a lot on tools actually. I write a lot, but I also delete a lot. It's like an expletive paragraph or sentence.

I recently read this:

We can hardly talk without the expletive, for it gives us time to shape our thoughts. But when we write, and therefore have time to revise, we ought to cast away unnecessary baggage, and that often means the expletive. We are not suggesting that you never use It is or There are - they have their uses. You just should not overuse them or fall back on them to avoid a little extra effort or thought. (Packer & Timpane, 1986, p. 219)

I'm reading up on "Writing with Economy" now...

It's something I strongly believe in... That as writers, we can respect our readers' time and energy, by writing as clearly and directly as possible. I would like to invest as much effort on copyediting as for this purpose. I believe it's not enough to have good ideas, but you need to express them well and in a timeless manner as well.

Packer, N. H. & Timpane, J. (1986) Writing worth reading: A practical guide. St. Martin's Press and New York: A Bedford Book

(This is actually surprisingly a book I really like. Not a sit down to read finish it book like Wolcott's but a now and then I need a little probing and direction, I refer to it type of book.)