Fields of Play: Constructing an Academic Life (Paperback)

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Product Description

How do the specific circumstances in which we write affect what we write? How does what we write affect who we become? How can we maintain professsional and personal integrity in today's university? In a series of traditional and experimental writings, a culmination of ten years of works-in-progress, Laurel Richardson records an intellectual journey, displacing boundaries and creating new ways of reading and writing. Applying the sociological imagination to the writing process, she connects her life to her work. Deeply engaging, movingly written with grace, elegance, and clarity, the book stimulates readers to situate their own writing in personal, social, and political contexts. Laurel Richardson is a professor of sociology, graduate faculty in women's studies, and visiting professor in the College of Education at the Ohio State University.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press (February 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813523796
• ISBN-13: 978-0813523798
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #651,826 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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4.0 out of 5 stars Revealing and deeply personal look at an academic career, October 24, 2009

By	textile fiend (Auckland, New Zealand) - See all my reviews

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This book is a collection of previously published/presented sociology papers, accompanied by a reflection on each piece by the author, Laurel Richardson: what was happening in her professional and personal life when she wrote it, how the article was received, etc. This sounds on the surface like a mildly interesting read for someone interested in sociology, but in reality it is a harrowing look at the true behind-the-scenes struggle of a woman forging an academic career, from its seeds in childhood onwards. The pieces are very personal and autoethnographic in approach(Richardson mentions both Carolyn Ellis and Norman K. Denzen in her acknowledgments).

What I appreciated most in this book is that Richardson spells out the politics and unspoken undercurrents of academic hierarchies and rivalries. Richardson is brave and forthright in speaking openly about things that are usually unspoken. She shares her feelings of failure, shame, anger, rage. Richardson describes the personal effect of the changes that occurred in universities with the introduction of a business management model, and for this reason alone I think the book should be essential reading for anyone contemplating an academic career who doesn't realise what a tense, bitter minefield a university faculty truly can be.

It was interesting that I found it hard to be open to Richardson's sociological plays and poetry. I have no experience with reading poetry, or with academic prose forms other than traditional texts, so I had no frame of reference with which to approach her work. However, I enjoyed 'Louisa May's Story of Her Life' enormously: more than enough to continue to work towards a better appreciation of other texts such the script representation of the 1990 Postmodernism and Cultural Studies discussion (even 19 years later it seems unconventional).

I recommend this book to anyone interested in autoethnography, sociology, cultural studies, or who is considering a career as an academic .