On Rejection

Careers in academia depend on one's ability to publish research. For most academics young in their careers, 'publication,' 'publish' and anything to do with 'journal article submissions' are loaded words. They wreck havoc in one's level of confidence, cause nightmares and otherwise loom over graduate students' heads like the guillotine. Or at least... that's how I like to imagine it sometimes. Publishing doesn't scare me, but I've learned to be careful in how I use the terms depending on the person with whom I'm conversing. Some professors I have met who are early in their careers avoid talking about publishing at all costs. Someone mentions the word, and said professor directs the eyes toward the spot where the wall and floor meet in a corner. This eye movement may be met with mumbling, followed by protruding lips and an abrupt change of subject. Graduate students on the other hand, either ignore the matter completely or panic to the point of dispair. I tend to belong to the second group of graduate students, whereas the majority of others in my cohort belong to the first group.

Knowing that Geraldine will be fully developed within a year and a half, I know that my time is running short. I need a few publications on my CV before I start applying for jobs, if I want to be considered with the other expected 100-200 applications for each linguistics tenure track job posted for fall 2013. I place a lot of pressure on myself, but not to the point of losing sleep over it. I know that my first publication will happen when it's suppose to, and that if I continue to work hard and give myself the opportunity for feedback on my research, I will produce quality work.

Nevertheless, I don't think that anyone who knows me would describe me as an optimistic person. Rather, I look for and expect the worst and hope for the best. Perhaps this is why it didn't surprise me when I opened my e-mail today and found the response to the conference abstract I submitted in early November. Rejection! And it's my 3rd rejection in a row. Had my abstract been accepted, it would have meant a conference proceeding-- not a highly ranked publication, but a step up from nothing. Even though I received 'no' as an answer today, it didn't bother me. I was happy to find that the response from the organizing committee included comments from three anonymous reviewers, which is a very rare inclusion for conferences in my field. The comments I received were both encouraging and helpful. Being that I couldn't decide whether or not to submit my abstract to this conference in the first place, I was pleased to receive feedback. I'm sure that my reviewers recognized my work as the equivalence of an undergrad's all-nighter term paper (after all, I wrote it in about an hour and submitted it before I had time to rewrite it 3 or 4 more times AND I hadn't written my paper yet), but I am grateful for their comments and feel encouraged to try again.

I spent the afternoon rewriting my abstract from scratch and I've pleased with the resulting product. It is 10-times better than what I submitted in November and I now have a much clearer picture of the claims I make in this research. I already have another conference picked out to which I will submit the new version of my abstract, and I feel confident that it will not only be accepted as a paper presentation, but that it will be considered for one of the top 4 student abstracts for the conference. In the case that it is one of the top student abstracts, I would be awarded $200 for the cost of attending the conference. Thus, I don't see this rejection as ego humbling, rather it is a gentle reminder that I still have a lot of room to continue to develop and refine my research. This rejection encourages me to keep trying, and I am thankful for what it has taught me about writing abstracts. Furthermore, I'm glad to have another opportunity to receive more feedback on my work, which I eventually will submit to a journal for publication. It will likely be rejected a few more times in the process, but by the time it is published, it will be polished and a work of art to which my name will be attached to for the rest of linguistsic history. And should my anonymous reviews read my work at that point, they can take great pride in helping me find my way.