Things have been quiet on Breaking ABD for the past few months. The same has not been true for our apartment. Five months ago today, my wife and I welcomed a happy and healthy baby girl into our family. She is, in part, responsible for this extended blogging hiatus, but also more joy than I […]

This last week I’ve been contemplating the cumulative effects of decisions I make about what sources, stories, and perspectives to include in my dissertation. These questions came up for me last week when discussing a draft of the chapter I described in my last post. This chapter touches on how warfare in the mid-nineteenth century […]

Chapter three was supposed to be one of the easy ones. In my pre-ABD days, I completed a couple of research projects that I had high hopes for converting to dissertation chapters. One of these actually dates back to before I arrived at my current institution. Eventually, I did a little more research, revised it […]

Throughout graduate school, I’ve made the habit of at least glancing over job announcements that find their way into my inbox. In past years, I’ve selfishly rued those that advertise especially attractive positions, wondering if maybe they could have afforded to wait a couple more years. Now, as summer winds down, those announcements are taking […]

Yesterday on MSNBC Rep. Steve King of Iowa suggested that no group besides “old white men” has made any significant contribution to the history of civilization (video below). Obviously, this was a controversial comment, and it looks like from the video that King meant it to be. Sadly, though, it was not all that shocking, […]