More Grad School Words

People are tearing it up in the comments! so many great graduate school words I forgot about. Keep posting them! Also if possible tell me what discipline you are from, because it’s hilarious to see how clusters of words adhere to certain disciplines. Lets dig into a few of these:

teleological: I can’t believe I forgot this one. Also literally appears in my own diss probably one million times. In fact I recently presented at a conference and had a whole section on teleology that was accompanied by a slide depicting the classic Darwinian evolution culminating in a caveman walking upright, with a big heading that read “TELEOLOGY!” This got a big laugh. I think ‘teleology’ is a great word. It collects to it all connotations of goal-drivenness, culmination, things building inexorably toward a certain point. You can use it in so many different ways: to make fun of the nineteenth century; to make fun of how people always believe they are living in End Times; to discuss different kinds of stories and why different kinds of people have liked them at different kinds of times; to talk evolution and science matters but even more so to talk THE PERCEPTION of and DISSEMINATION OF evolution and science matters; etc. To say nothing of religion. In conclusion: a great word that we can all use!
Sample Sentence: “After the French Revolution, teleological narratives were privileged over the more episodic, didactic tales spun out in eighteenth-century novels.”

Which reminds me: To privilege, as a verb! Academese loves turning nouns into verbs and vice versa, an act of linguistic rebellion I firmly stand behind, because making up new words is awesome, and who says you can’t do it? Not William Shakespeare, that’s for sure.
Sample Sentence: Continental philosophy privileges modes of perception that are organized around the subject position of the white male or something

ontological: to be honest, I’ve never totally gotten this word, and have actually never used it, although I’ve certainly heard it bandied about a lot. I mean, ‘ontology’ is the study of the nature of being, but how do you thus use ‘ontological’ in a sentence? I’ve heard and seen it done but still don’t get it. Please post in comments.

But this reminds me of a word a do really like, which is tautological: I find ‘tautology’ difficult to define, but I know what it is, which makes it kind of a delicious word. It’s like, when an argument just repeats itself as proof but doesn’t prove anything. “Beethoven was the greatest genius ever born, because he was born that way.” Or something. It’s a word often used in classic rip-roaring academic feudal wars. “THAT’S A TAUTOLOGY!” or “Professor So-and-So’s argument is nothing but a weak tautology.” Then everyone goes, “Oh damn!!!”

A note on academic feudal wars: THEY ARE SO AWESOME TO OBSERVE. In many of my seminars we actually spent time reviewing classic wars of the past, because they help you “learn the field.” The famous debates between legendary scholars, waged in the pages of various journals or on the floors of various conferences. Along the way many good points are made, and alliances are formed, and also they are a great way to figure out who in your field is a jerk, who is an old windbag, who is a badass, who has a sense of humor and who does not, etc.

phallus: total oldie but goodie. Comes up more than you’d think (that’s what she said). Might be old-fashioned but still works great (that’s what she said). In heated discussions, inserting it always feels good (THATS WHAT–)

There are words like “phallus” that always get kind of an affectionate laugh. Like we know they are out-of-date and vaguely silly, but sometimes they still work, so we use them, but we also acknowledge that everyone knows the word is kind of out-of-date. At least “phallus” is still a thing that needs talking about, and can be pointed to, like, “look how that gun is so clearly a phallus.” It’s still relevant, so using the word doesn’t feel that dumb, just kind of funny. But something like “seminal” is a toughie. At least in my program (known for its constant sex-talk i.e. feminism/queer theory), to say “seminal” is to knowingly partake in the millenial-old patriarchization (<--just made that up! See how great it is) of language and lexicons. You know it is shitty to use a word that literally means "sperm-like" to describe something originary, foundational, important (especially when you're talking about something a WOMAN made or wrote! WTF). However, even after all these years of sort of feeling like we shouldn't use "seminal," there still isn't a better word that means precisely the same thing. I have suggested "ovular" but have been voted down by the academic cabal (just kidding (there IS a cabal, but they don't vote)). I usually just use "originary" or "foundational," which aren't as good. Sample Sentence: In Jackson Pollock’s seminal work (<--DOUBLE MEANING JOKE AMIRITE) blah blah blah. I guess this sentence did not help you understand this word. Whatever, you all know what it means. originary is another made-up academic word that I like.

Someone in the comments suggested all the gendery ones: performativity, homosocial, to “queer” as a verb. Those are all really good!!!!! I use “performativity” all the time. I don’t use queer so much, just because of the specific stuff I write about, but I sure would, if I were talking about opera or whatever else. queer as a verb is AWESOME. To queer something.

resonance: I like this one because it is beautiful and poetic. To say that something has “historical resonance” or to describe the “resonance” of the guillotine in 19th century Paris….that’s real nice

Then you have your active verbs, your gloss, gesture, unpack, and bracket. These are things you do in seminar, or say you’re going to do, or do when a professor instructs you to. You can also point out that the reading does them, or that a classmate just did one of them skillfully/clumsily. You can also claim you are going to do them, in an introduction. You can accuse someone of doing too much of one or all of them, like if you’re writing a book review. You can also just do them, in discussion or when writing, say, an abstract.

It’s fun to see how different words are hegemonic (!) in different fields or even just departments. Hannah brings in a bunch of words we never use, for example. She is in the same field as Gary, and yeah, I don’t know what a lot of those words even mean. But then Gary is always wandering into the kitchen and asking me stuff like “what’s a leitmotif,” so there you go. Although ‘leitmotif’ doesn’t really count, as it’s just a normal noun and not a weird made-up academic word used in fighting. I believe it’s another word Wagner invented or stole, in addition to “gesamtkunstwerk,” which means “ideal work of art” or “universal work of art” and is also the reference point for my new blog name, which is officially the funniest joke I have ever made.

Keep these words coming!!!!!!!!