Annotation & Other Things

In case you didn’t spot it at the time, I was interviewed a few months ago for The PhD Life Raft Podcast! Dr Emma Brodzinski runs The PhD Life Raft and hosts the podcast. I was a returning guest, having appeared back in 2021 as well.

It was great fun to talk this time about all things viva prep, but in particular thesis annotation and the kinds of practical steps candidates can take to get ready for the viva – topics that regular readers of this blog will know I am very interested in.

Take a listen when you have half an hour: we talk a lot about viva prep and the viva – as well as Keep Going, the Viva Survivors anthology I published last year!

Community Support

July was a busy month for me!

I tried to promote two lovely things when they happened but realised I hadn’t shared them via the blog. Do indulge me today while I share these with you in case you’ve not seen them and in case they help.

 

First: The #VirtualNotViral Tweetchat!

The @PhD-VirtualNotViral community has done amazing things in the last year and a half, building a regular space to support PhD researchers around the world. The #VirtualNotViral tweetchats have covered many topics with guests contributing their insights and responding to questions. I was very flattered to be asked back on July 5th to respond to questions about the viva and share ideas to help. The archive of that discussion is available as a Twitter Moment here. We cover a lot of viva topics and if you’re interested in this blog then the Moment will be of interest to you.

 

Second: The PhD Life Raft Podcast!

By chance, the next day an episode of The PhD Life Raft Podcast was released by Dr Emma Brodzinski which featured me as a guest! We recorded this several months ago, and it was lovely to see it released. Emma asked brilliant questions and it was great to be part of her podcast. It brought back happy memories of the old Viva Survivors Podcast – though I’m glad I was just being interviewed because I also remember the hard work of editing that goes on behind the scenes! You can listen to the podcast episode here – do take a look at the archive, because like Pat and Anuja of @PhD-VirtualNotViral there’s a lot of great work that Emma has been doing and this kind of project needs to be shared widely.

 

It was a lot of fun to do both of these and it’s got me thinking…

Do I have space in my work and life to do a regular Viva Survivors tweetchat?

Do I have space in my work and life to do a regular Viva Survivors podcast again?

More broadly, do I have a little space to do a little more to support others?

 

And do you have a little space to do a little more for your community, wherever you are?