Q & A with La Historiadora de Moda, Part II

A couple of weeks ago, I answered your questions about my personal life.  Now, as promised, here are the answers to the questions that you all asked me about my professional/academic life.

 (My messy home office in my old apartment)

Sal asked: What will you miss most about being a grad student?
To be completely frank, there's not much I will miss about being a graduate student other than the friendships that I have made in graduate school.  I don't want to give a negative impression of my program or experience in grad school.  I have been very lucky with my advisers and the number of opportunities that I have had to do research, to teach my own classes, to present at conferences, etc.  However, I've definitely reached a point in my life and in my career where I am ready to move on. 


adressandabike asked: What attracted you to academia?
As an undergraduate, I had some great history professors who were enthusiastic about their teaching and their work, and that enthusiasm was contagious.  Also my late father was a teacher and later in life a professor (in the biological sciences), and I'm sure that influenced me.  My mom has produced evidence in the form of marked up elementary school textbooks that show an early obsession with history, especially with that of Spain.

Julia asked: If you weren't in your field of academics, what kind of career would you like to have?
I honestly don't know, which is probably why I'm so panicked about the possibility of nothing working out for me on the academic job market.  I love doing the kind of research that I have been trained to do and what I have been doing this year as a visiting faculty member.  If I didn't have such a black thumb, going to work on an organic farm would intrigue me as a back up plan.

A-C asked: What is your PhD thesis on/what is your specialty?
I'm not going to go into too much specific detail here, but my PhD thesis is about commercial theatre in early modern cities and drama's relationship with political culture and public opinion.  My specialty is Europe 1500-1800, but my research focuses mainly on Spain and its empire.  If you want to know more, you'll have to wait for the book.  :P

Anna asked: What courses are you currently teaching? If you could teach anything, what would it be?
Currently I am teaching a course on pre-modern Western Civilization and one on The Reformation.  I'm really enjoying teaching the Reformation and would love to do it again.  If I could teach whatever I wanted, I'd love to teach a course on medieval and early modern Spain and one on early modern cities.

KC asked: What is your favorite book?
I wrote about my favorite novels in the last Q & A post, but I figured I owed you one favorite academic book.  Peter Burke's Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe really shaped my thinking in my early years in grad school.  


And you didn't ask, but here's a typical work outfit¹ for me these days:

1. Dress - Teeze Me (Filene's Basement and remixed)
Cardi - Target (remixed)
Tights - HUE (remixed)
Belt - From another dress (remixed)
Boots - Fluevog (remixed)
Necklace - Boutique in Santiago de Compostela (remixed)
Earrings - Etsy (remixed)

My hair is still not super long, but it's getting long enough that I can experiment and play with braids a bit more than I could a few months ago.

What is your field of specialty?  If you aren't an academic, what was/is your favorite subject in school?