Religion Scholar and Single Girl - oxymoronic?

I have been a horrible blogger recently, but forgive me Olivia for my sins...
See what I did right there? Religion joke. Problem #1 for single and ready to mingle me.
I've noticed that being a religion scholar has a few drawbacks. (I did not choose to call myself a "religion scholar," but once your friend starts calling you a colleague, you are no longer allowed to deny it). I'm not referring to qualifying exams, comps, intense thinking/arguing sessions in classes, head-hurting philosophical and theoretical readings, trying to write an acceptable thesis, etc...
I'm talking about meeting people, romantically-speaking.
Take, for example, my experience last Friday at Starbucks. While working on my ethnographic research on an evangelical Christian theme park in Orlando, FL, I tend to live at Starbucks. I love my friends' apartment, but she doesn't have a desk for me to spread out my notebooks, camera, and recording devices. So Friday, an hour into an excruciatingly long transcription of an interview with a Roman Centurion (I kid you not), a cute guy comes and asks if he can share my table close to the electrical outlet. I say sure and continue with my work. I make a phone call to a consultant and leave a message. Apparently, my phone etiquette prompted this question from my table-mate: "are you in sales?"
No, I am not in sales.
"What do you do?"
I'm getting my masters in religion. I'm doing research here in Orlando.
"Oh"
Shocked silent and absolutely perplexed, he went back to his own work for a couple of minutes.
Then, the next, in a long line of questions: "So, are you like, really religious?"
No, I study religion, specifically American religious culture.
"Oh, so like history?"
Yes, but I focus on religion in history.
"So, do you have like a real job?"
Well, I'm a TA (teaching assistant) during the school year, but I'm here doing research.
"Oh, so do you party?"

And y'all thought he was confused... I understand the question needs to be asked because not everyone understands the study of religion as a humanities subject. And many people think I study theology (which I don't). But really?

Of course I party, I jokingly inform him that religion scholars need to drink more than others to be able to study it.
Small laugh.

So why does this happen? Why does my work effect conversation partners more than other jobs? Is it because we are told to never discuss religion, politics, or money and asking questions about my job breaks a cardinal conversation rule? Then why don't politicians or accountants have this problem?

Why do people assume that I am either horribly pious and thus live like a nun (any nun-like comparisons are not intentional on the part of the author)?
Why are men so perplexed by my career/field that they assume I'm going to become a clergy member?

These are just a few of the MANY questions I have concerning romantic/conversational stylings of the opposite sex. Someday, I hope to find answers.

Maybe next time, I'll tell him I'm in sales.

Just the facts...

This may sound hypocritical and unusual coming from a TA in a Comparative Religion department, but I just want the facts...
I am currently grading my REL101 midterms. The class is American Religious Encounters and on the midterm we covered Protestant Christianity, Catholicism, and Judaism from colonial period to the present.
We introduced the different traditions with background about the European origins of these religions and we also discussed the relevance of these traditions to contemporary life - clips from Doubt, discussions of the ordination of Gene Robinson as the first homosexual Episcopal Bishop, impressions of Mel Brooks by Peter Williams... We focused on the historical aspects and implications of these religions, how they have influenced and been influenced by America through various eras...
So why, when I ask them to write about 1 tradition from the colonial period to present, do I get an opinion paper about the downfall of Christian society due to the negative influences of American culture????
Please students, just write the facts...where is your evidence from the book for these statements? This is NOT AN OPINION PIECE. You are not a commentator for the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal, trust me, your writing is not that good.
Why don't you proofread? Why don't you spell check? I could handle these minute issues if you could clearly explain why you chose to support your discussion of the Scopes Trial with "Now I hear that many schools do not even allow their elementary students to sing the Pledge of Allegiance." WHY???

Unfortunately, I do not see this trend ending soon. With the Texas Board of Education "re-writing" history, I will only continue to read students' sentences like this: "Our nation was founded by great Christian men that wrote our Constitution based on the bible as there source, but in todays world no one focuses on every day God and religion and it becomes more absent from our lifes everyday."

I literally ran to my tissue box this morning reading this student's paper...what did I do wrong that my students cannot comprehend a historical analysis instead of an editorial?
I just want the facts...
This has made me even more sure that this is what I want to do...teach college students how to understand religion in America not just based in black and white opinions, but in the gray areas of real life.
*All of these quotes are exaggerations similar to actual students' papers...

Perhaps unrelated note: I'm running for Grad Student Association President - any thoughts?

a scholar? who? me?

Last weekend, I was VERY fortunate to travel to my home-away-from-home...TALLAHASSEE!

First and foremost, I have INCREDIBLE friends...Joanna, Beth, Mike, Ellyn, Julie, Liesl, Marie, Kellie, Amanda Ga, Britt, Mary, and Dr. K (to name a few)...you all made my visit amazing. I had/have been feeling so down lately and in the few moments we could all spend together, I remember what I loved about undergrad, FSU, and Tally...
You are all the best friends a girl could ask for (even if some of you had given up gossip for lent...a little less religion, please)!

The REAL reason I went to Tally was to attend/present a paper at the Religion Department Graduate Symposium. Earlier in the week, I had given my presentation on Purity Balls (call for details) to Liz Wilson's "The Question of Marriage" class. It had gone pretty well, but what do they know, they are Honors Freshies?!?!

Unfortunately however, they boosted my confidence. So I began my trip not nervous about my paper. Not being nervous made me nervous...was I too arrogant? Who the heck am I to be presenting here? These people were PhDs and I am a mere mortal - a first year masters student...
PLUS, the respondent to my panel was none other that Kathryn Lofton! For those of you who have not heard me mention her yet - here it is: SHE IS AWESOME...someday I wish to be academically just like her. Her upcoming book is about Oprah, she is funny, articulate, intelligent, and as I would find out, a genuinely kind individual.

Well, I put on my most adorable outfit and just did it...I was the final presenter on my panel (not a good sign for those who know me) but I managed to only be slightly intimidated by the brilliant people around me. My presentation did seem to get the most laughs, even though I spoke way too fast. In her response, Kathryn Lofton even called me a "theorist" and said that my approach - categorizing Purity Balls within the evangelical subculture - was bold and risky, but a risk that more scholars should take...


I'm not going to lie, I was SHOCKED...me, the girl who basically failed her qualifying exam, a theorist? (We can discuss the semantics of failure another time). I just assumed that everyone was going to be addressing those themes. I had no idea you could write anything differently...I'm not certain I want to be a theorist, but my CV will now have the line "Kathryn Lofton called me a theorist" at the bottom of the page.



The rest of the weekend flew by in a whirlwind of reconnections, schmoozing, and walks down memory lane. The weather was beautiful and 1 Fresh StirFry was just as I remembered it, but it wasn't the same.
It never will be again.
My only hope is to re-create something similar here, in OH or the next place I move.

Now is the time to make that happen...I am a scholar now, so I can do anything!

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day... I have a new way of looking at this holiday from a religion scholar, interfaith-family-member perspective.

Valentine's Day is like Christmas for a Jewish daughter with a Catholic parent. I love the holiday, I love the decorations, the treats, the goodies, the sentiment, but it is not my holiday. I celebrate with others - those who are participants in the religion of "couple-dom." I get cards, I talk to loved ones, but it is not my holiday.

Here's the kicker, though - I want to convert. I have been knocking on the door to the temple of couple-dom for years and no answer. It's worse than Jews making you ask three times, it's as if the clergy of couple-dom know who I am and they are ignoring my calls.

Someday, hopefully soon, I will convert to couple-dom. But for now, I must wait it out, loving a holiday from afar.

And Single's Awareness Day - that is just as foreign and silly to me as Boxing Day is to non-Brits across the pond.

Millennials

Let me begin by stating proudly that I am a millennial student. I may be an anomaly for my generation, but I do not think so. I was in a conference discussion recently and the group of professors began listing the traits of the millennial generation. While some positive attributes were listed, like being tech savvy and passionate about topics, most attributes were taken as negatives. Yes, our parents may be overly involved in our lives and we may be stressed; but look at our role models. We live in a baby boomer centered society and the media focuses on their anxieties and fears. As millennials are so invested in social communities, we see these stresses online and on television. If adults are worried about the economy, so are we. But as they have been through depressions before, we have not. We are not equipped with the historical context to understand our situation, so when we our understandings of the world are berated, it could be because no one has helped us understand the context.
Yes, millennials may have short attention spans, but we can work on it. Yes, multi-tasking may be seen as a negative, but what about serial uni-tasking, as discussed in the section. Is it not a positive thing that we can have multiple focuses in our lives? Won’t that better prepare us for a future of globalized learning and living? Yes, we are impatient because of the immediacy of technology and how we were raised, but couldn’t that be seen as a positive? We are impatient with our situations and the situations of others and will not wait for changes to be made…millennial impatience may be the key to accomplishing many of today’s social justice, intellectual, and human rights tasks.

Flying

When I was younger, Peter Pan was my favorite film...not just the Disney version, but also the Mary Martin one...I always wanted to be able to fly, to explore new places, travel, and see the world...

I have been flying on airplanes since I was 6 months old, and somewhere along the way, I have developed this fear of flying.

I hate the feeling you get before lift-off and the descent. Every moment of turbulence leaves me clinging to my seat, praying to every god I know (and as a student of religion, I know a LOT of gods). On a recent and quite turbulent flight to London, I kept repeating my mantra of "healthy, safe, and happy flight." The person next to me must have thought I was really special.

Being with people I know does not help, as my family will tell you. I don't like being alone, yet I get cranky and annoyed with people talking to me...at the same time, too quiet a trip and eerie feelings take hold.

I hate waiting for planes, I like to be the first one to disembark, I even hate the smell of musk, used air, and vomit...

As I leave today to go to Montreal with my pals Jim and Olivia they should just know this: my normally bubbly personality vanishes and all that will be left of me is a trembling little girl clinging to Olivia's hand...

Halloween

Hello friends!

Topic for today: Halloween.

For your reading pleasure, a poem I wrote in third grade in Ms. Andruchow's class:

On Halloween, the cold crispy air comes

And wild witches go whistling through the winds.

Black cats prowl through the gates,

Children trick or treat

Not knowing what awaits.

Then all of a sudden, the children disappear,

Ghosts come out and have the fun that the children had feared.

Then the ghosts and goblins,

Witches and werewolves,

Black cats and crows,

Circle 'round and 'round,

Till the sun finally rose.

Man, I was brilliant when I was younger: alliteration, imagery...

All gone now.

I love Halloween, the pagentry of vice and mischief-ridden parades, the community of door-opened neighbors, the abundance of sweets leading to a sugar-induced coma for young and old.

I have always loved "dressing up." The concept of becoming someone or something new merely by changing your outfit is a fascinating concept. And while I wear clothing in everyday life as a way to identify and present myself to the world; the concept of acting, or existing as something else is a methodology I will have to employ if I want to become an ethnographer of religion.

But I don't know if I want to do that, or if I want to go on to get the PhD, or if I even can...

So for now, I will put aside my everyday costume of "Religion Masters student" and become Rachel from Glee for this Halloween...