identification: sammy

I grade enough of these damn things that perhaps it would be useful for me to write one every now and then. Here goes:

Sammy (that would be me) is currently a first-semester MA student in European history at a public university better known for partying than academics. She is a grading assistant for post-1500 world civ; the professor she assists, Doug, has proven to be one of the best, most inspiring teachers Sammy has ever encountered--and she's had some fucking incredible ones.

She is contemplating pursuing a PhD (her MA program is a terminal one, and her uni does not offer PhDs in history), but has read many, many blog posts about the academic job market in the humanities and is therefore quite uncertain about whether she should bother. She has a dissertation topic chosen, just in case.

Sammy started this blog to improve the ease with which she could comment on the many blogs she reads. At the moment, she is uncertain if she has anything substantive to add to the discussion (by that, she does indeed mean any discussion, anywhere, ever) and doubts she will post much; such posts as there are quite possibly will merely be seeking advice from others who are or have been in the academy.

As she writes this, Sammy is procrastinating. There is nothing unusual there. She should be doing historiographic research for a paper due in 42 hours, but feels intimidated because she has never written a paper longer than eight pages, nor done a research paper in the past decade. The paper on deck depends heavily on primary sources--which Sammy has never before used. In case it's not obvious, she's questioning the value of that BA (with a double major, no less) from one of the top five public universities (top 30 overall) in the US. That would, however, be a topic for another day.

As you were.