And it is lonely. More lonely than I expected.
I entered into this process knowing that it would be isolated and individual. But I’ve been surprised at the depth of that loneliness. Even though I have a family to come home to at night. Even though I have friends, both local and in various places around the country. Even though I’m well-supported by the staff and faculty here at Brite. To be a PhD student is to be lonely.
The isolation can be physical and emotional. Yet most of the loneliness is in my mind. When you study, you are locked in a constant struggle between what you know and what you are learning. If you don’t know anything about a topic or issue or event or concept, the process is relatively struggle-free (unless the material is rather dense). If you do know something about the material, it can be difficult as you decide what to keep and what to remove to make room for new understanding. And since this struggle happens in the mind, the PhD student is adrift in a sea of concepts and arguments that very few see or hear.
This isolation has some merit, though. The PhD process allows people like myself to live on dangerous borders between the accepted and the unknown, the ecclesial and the academic, the safe and the dangerous, the possible and the impossible. This journey has allowed me to anchor myself to a point and swim into murky waters and obscured currents that I would have otherwise avoided.
The PhD student is not some super-person who can easily deal with difficult information; I am often rocked by what I learn and experience through my studies.
But this work is necessary. This work is important for communities, some of whom I have yet to know.
Enough of the existential. Let’s transition to something more concrete. For my area of research, I have shifted slightly from my previous path. Now, I am concerned that some (predominantly white) Christian traditions are not aware of a period in our nation’s history: 1863-1877 - the period of the Reconstruction and Post-Reconstruction (the periods directly following the Civil War). I am concerned at how certain theologies that arose during that time continue to impact our present understanding on issues of justice, especially racial injustice. In other words, I want to investigate how certain pockets of Christianity used the texts of the Hebrew Bible to dehumanize the Other, particularly African American men. And this is a timely issue (even without all the turmoil stirred up by Trump’s campaign). On October 7th, the documentary “13TH” was released. The central argument is that the 13th amendment, which is regarded as the amendment that abolished slavery, merely transitioned slavery from the landowner to the prison industrial complex. I won’t go into details here, but I implore you to watch it (though it is graphic at points).
Why focus on this? Because our theology creates a language and that language reinscribes a reality. What we believe impacts how we live. It’s important to know how Christians have interpreted the texts of the Bible because any ignorance, whether willful or accidental, will result in a repetition of previous mistakes. When those mistakes indict how certain theologies have treated of people of color and other marginalized folks, I cannot think of a more important research topic that addresses how churches today should decry and dismantle systemic problems like racism in order to fulfill the commands of Jesus to love our neighbors and to exercise compassion as we stand in solidarity with oppressed peoples.
This is only half the update: here are some pictures (as narrated by Larissa) of the past two months. :)
Someone turned 30!
Happy Birthday Daddy!
We had a great time at the Fort Worth Stockyards
Isaiah got to ride a pony...
And Zoë rode a bull. ;)
Zoë has been in school for 2 months and she is LOVING it! It has taken our family awhile to get used to the new school routine and other additions to our schedule as a family, but we are getting there. I am seeing the influence of the Montessori Method on Zoë's play and work at home. She is continuing to blossom in her creativity through building, artwork, music and writing. Outside of school, she enjoys playing with friends, dancing at ballet, playing piano, tumbling at gymnastics, and coming up with her own "projects."
"Turtle" from art class
Ra-ra TCU Frogs!
"Peacock"
Isaiah is fully embracing his goofy side. He loves to make others laughs and thoroughly enjoys laughing at himself. He loves cars, puddles, trains, construction machines, riding his bike, Paw Patrol and Mommy. He really wants nothing to do with Daddy, or anyone else for that matter. :p Isaiah has been talking up a storm and using an extraordinary vocabulary for being not-even-two-and-a-half-years-old!
Cars and puddles = great combination!
Look at him go!
He sat here at the Rhino exhibit for a really long time.
We finally got around to seeing some animals.
When they are not fighting, they are best of friends. ;)
