Processes and Projects

I write this blog post one week before an agreed-upon deadline to complete revisions to a major writing project -- a book manuscript on which I've been working a decade. The manuscript began its life as a dissertation project and technically did not evolve into the book it is now until 2012. However, I began my academic career a couple of decades after I had begun my writing career so when I embarked on the writing of the dissertation, I did so with the full intention of turning it eventually into a book. The fact that the idea was radical -- "most dissertations don't deserve to be books" is the verdict of one "from dissertation-to-book" manual I read -- didn't occur to me, then or even now.

That I have a manuscript and a probable publisher makes me feel blessed.

Furthermore, the process of working on revisions to an already complete manuscript that are in response to reviewers' comments is much more enjoyable than the agony I endured last summer when I was trying to rewrite what had been a reasonably strong dissertation with a notable narrative voice into a manuscript that I thought would appeal to the academic press that had expressed interest in it without quite knowing what the publisher's acquisitions editor and its editorial collective would want. I found myself wondering more than once what had ever made me want to be a writer, as I floundered and blundered and cried and swore my way through four months of melodrama over writing processes, research practices, and questions of personal and professional ethics as I wondered how much I was obligated to share my work with those who had allowed me to interview them nearly a decade earlier. When I finally hit the send button for the electronic version, and put the final copy of the paper version into postal mail in early November, many thought I should celebrate. I mainly felt a deep sense of relief that the book and its subject matter would be two things that I would not have to think about for at least another two months. Academic publishers (as well as non-academic ones) have a standard practice of submitting manuscripts to external reviewers for critique on the text's scholarship and potential marketability, and I had been informed that the reviewers usually require about two months to complete their reading and commentary.

The two months passed, and I received the external reviews. I felt they were overwhelmingly positive, and supportive. The reviewers praised the manuscript's overall writing quality as well as the argument and manner in which I had framed my main points. They suggested several additions that I felt would strengthen the overall text and broaden both the quality of its scholarship as well as its readership appeal. Their suggestions helped me hone in on a question that had dogged me both through the writing of my dissertation and the production of the book manuscript: What was I actually trying to say?

That question still dogs me, as I write my way to the final steps of this stage. I try not to pay too much attention to it because I know uncertainty can paralyze me. At the same time, I wonder if the very uncertainty of what that closing note is going to be is the issue that prevents major projects from coming to completion.

In journalism, one learns that one needs a captivating opening paragraph (a "lede"), a statement of what your story is about (a "nut graf") and a provocative closing sentence or word ("kicker") that leaves the reader waiting to buy the paper the next day to search for your byline, eager to read more. Academic writing is somewhat similar in organization. One needs an introduction, a thesis statement, and a conclusion.

The difference between the two formats is that journalism relies primarily on the factual material about the story to hold it together while scholarship relies on the argument that the writer is putting forth. The quality of the writing is judged not only on the basis of its readability but more significantly on the level of new knowledge that the body of work produces. One can understand the stakes involved in academic writing in both positive and negative ways. Negatively, the assertion of a need for new knowledge can be seen as inferring that if you don't have anything fresh to contribute, you shouldn't be writing the work. More positively, one can see all writing -- and the process of writing -- as creating new knowledge because one person (or a pair or group of persons) is writing about the topic of interest from their unique perspective. As one of my dissertation advisors put it so well, you can't raise your second child exactly as you raised your first one because the very experience of having already raised one child will condition  the choices you make in raising the second.

Similarly, one of things I have learned about writing a dissertation and then writing a book is that the processes are significantly different. For a dissertation, the goal often is simply to finish -- "a good dissertation is a done dissertation" -- and to establish yourself as a credible scholar worthy of being awarded a doctorate. For a book manuscript, the goal is to communicate your thoughts and ideas to as broad an audience as possible and to advance new knowledge in the area in which you are writing while doing so.  The key distinction seems to rest on the same question: "What are you trying to say?"

The ability to form an argument is essential: "What is your perspective on this topic and why?" is  often a question I ask students in offering feedback on the first drafts of their work. The idea of an argument used to daunt me until I began to understand it as stemming from a personal relationship with the material you're writing about. When there's a personal stake, argumentation is easy. But closure then presents another issue. How do you disentangle yourself from the process of digging deep into your personal psyche to explore your relationship with your material so you can pack up your project and send it off to the publisher?

Many writers advocate writing your ending first. I cannot do that, because for me writing is about figuring out how you want things to end. What happens, however, when you get to the end and you still haven't figured it out? Is that the time to throw in the towel? My sense is that's the moment when you go back to where you began.

This morning, I met with my friend Michele. I was telling her that I felt that three stories in my book that dealt with differing religions captured the sentiment that I wanted to end with, that each were offering a way to understand citizenship, belonging, and democratic activism in an alternative, more intimate way.

       "Is that like having respect for difference?" she asked.

       "Yes, but it goes beyond respect. It's actually participating, engaging, mixing it up," I said. "That's what triggers a backlash, when people transgress."

       As I spoke, I realized that that was the question that first inspired me to explore the topic that lurks at the core of my book, long before I knew I was going to write a book -- or even an essay, let alone a dissertation -- about it. "People would tell me," I said to her, "that if Hindus and Muslims could just be left alone to do their own thing their own way, separately from each other, everything would work out. There wouldn't be any violence; everything would be just fine. My response was always, 'No. That's not right. That's not getting to know each other. That's separation, not integration."

       "Say that," she responded. "That's what it is."