Playing with some initial ideas about academic writing, scholarship and time in the academy

1. TIME AND THE ACADEMY:
INITIAL REFLECTIONS ON MAKING TIME FOR SCHOLARSHIP
IN THE MODERN UNIVERSITY.
Phil Wood
1st Feb, 2018

2. Initial reflections and thinking.
Very much a work in progress (practically and conceptually).
Some initial reflections, points of interest
• How is academic writing experienced in relation to time in an education department?
• What are the experiences of academics in relation to acceleration of activity, and are such shifts in
work patterns always seen as a negative?
• Given the complexities of modern academic activity, do we need to understand the temporal basis
for our work in multiple ways if we are to create conducive and sustainable environments?
• Are potential alternative processes of scholarship, such as ‘Slow’, sustainable or desirable?
• What are the ethical aspects which relate to how we navigate scholarly time?

3. Reflections on temporal and associated issues from pilot interviews
someone says “Well, why don’t you do an hour a night?” Well, I can’t, it don’t work like that because I’ve
got to sit down, switch off, re-engage with what I’m doing, probably spend about an hour trying to work
out exactly where I was, and then I start work. So, I’ve lost the time, which is why I’m using these long
periods of time on a Saturday
Reflections on the Rhythms of Writing
It’s … the work, when we were doing assignments, assignments tend to be very focused on a particular
aspect, so that’s not so bad really, because what you’re doing, you’re reading on a particular aspect,
which I read in bed, so that covers that bit. And then I make notes while I’m there as well, so that
prepares me for when I want to type, so everything can be done in short spurts. The problem with this is
because it’s, it’s such a big narrative, if you like, the whole thing, it, I couldn’t do it like that. Because
you really need to get in to a point where could start picking up on it and then say carrying on, you
know. So, there are two different, entirely different things, I think, the assignments looking back, and
they weren’t, but I’ll use this word, they were easier to do in bits.

4. …the Saturdays’ been there about three months now, four months or something, but I’m struggling to get
any other time, but like I say, the reason I don’t nibble away at it now is because we’re really at the point,
is I’ve got to read, I’ve got to go back to where I was, you know, maybe look at your comments, maybe
look at my notes, I need to read it again, and you don’t just read it and start writing, you think ‘Okay and
what ...?’, you know, and at this level, and it’s possibly just me, at this level I have to put a lot of thought
before I start.
Transitional time for writing

5. This is priority, though my mortgage doesn’t say that. You know. I’ve – a colleague still expects me to do
everything I do, I have got to show my face at home at some point, you know, and do odd bits, and you are,
you’re trying to satisfy everyone, really, in a limited amount of time. And also I don’t want to fail, you know,
and that’s always on your mind.
Time pressures
Yeah, no, anything else, it would just be, that would take, I’d have to do that first, before I could sit down and
write, because otherwise, I’d just be working my way back around and I wouldn’t be able to concentrate, so …
It’s that sort of, I think it’s that sort of business, isn’t it? You’re sort of worried, you want to get all the little
tasks out the way, all the sort of niggly things, and then you can go ‘Right, okay, I’m going to write, and sit
down and think about things properly.’
Interviewer: to what degree do you see it as a priority?
Respondent : Personally, it’s very high on the priority list. I think, I think the job demands contradict that a little bit, but I
think even with the immediate teaching, the immediate marking, the immediate emails, I think it’s the sort
of priority, you know, if you’re managing your time, but personally I think my writing’s quite high on the list.

6. Accommodating Time Pressures
With the assignments, I’d nibble away at them every day. Every day there was something done at some
point. Normally late at night. So, but at that time I was taking work home from the college. What I try
and do now is ensure that I have time, there’s set times in the week, there’s agreements with the good
lady that a Saturday, I’m not there, okay?
Interviewer: So is … So what you’re saying is, certainly in the early days, or up until quite recently, you
were trying to find time, small pockets of time over the week, or when you could or …
Respondent: Yeah, yeah, well, it’s different at different years, I mean timetable was quite good a few years
ago so I used to come here on a Monday afternoon.
Interviewer: And how do you, how do you overcome that tension?
Respondent: Fitting it in, in like two hour slots, like today, I was just like, ‘Quick! Let’s go! Let’s get
something down.’, which is actually quite useful, I’m finding, because the time pressure
of having just two hours to write, is forcing me to abandon some of these safety
blanket things that I do where I think, ‘Right I’ll leave that sentence for a minute, I’ll
come back to it’, just get on with getting something down, getting something on
paper.

7. Altering Rhythms – the acceleration of the writing practice
But I’ve started to think it’s useful, starting to see whether, starting to wonder whether
it might be a practice to adopt, something in the future to sort of say, ‘Well, you can
just give yourself these time blasts’, because the PhD was just, I could write for days, I
could write all day and there wasn’t any restriction. Obviously now there is, so, and it
is quite useful. I’m wondering whether that might help with the, not speeding it up, I
don’t want the writing process to be sped up, but I just want it to be a bit more
efficient. If that makes sense, instead of all this weird procrastination that I’ve sort of
built into the process.
I don’t think this, my actual way of writing is feasible with this job, and what I have,
you know, and looking after xxx at home so I don’t think I can carry on writing like this,
and otherwise I just wouldn’t get anything done at all, it’s just going to carry on being a
bit of a mess. So I need to bridge that gap. It needs to become a bit more streamlined
and needs, definitely needs to be a bit more, it needs to be less scatty, that’s the only
way I can describe it. It needs to be a bit more sort of, ‘Right, this is what I want to say,
let’s get on with it’, and get rid of the emotions side of it, so I think one thing is I need to
shut down voices; ‘You should probably do this’, or ‘This isn’t good enough’ or
whatever, I need to just get on with the writing and remove myself from it

8. Some emerging themes from the data
- Identifying the rhythms of writing, entering the rhythm of writing, and
considering how to alter them
- A number of responsibilities, some of which seem to clash in terms of time
- Feeling of time pressure regarding the process of writing, particularly in terms of
the number of other responsibilities and the need for ‘productivity’
- How to accommodate time pressures

9. Reflecting on time
• We tend to think of time in a restricted way – clock time.
• Constant recourse to measuring time in a linear and reductive/quantitative
way
• Leads to the focus on workload. In turn leading to ‘bucket-filling’
approaches to the planning of academic work
• But other notions of time exist – intensity/density, rhythm, acceleration.
• A rich concept which can perhaps give us better ways of understanding our
work and the complexities of its character
• Need new imaginaries which take us beyond narratives of ‘quantity’ and
‘efficiency’

10. Thinking through the concept of rhythm
• Clock time is an abstract concept, measurable, but linear. Moving forwards only.
• Rhythm is focused on periodicity and duration, and can be cyclical in nature. Hence,
may be repeated patterns of activity over different periods and different durations.
• Lefebvre (1992) argues that the social world is composed of rhythms, in turn
‘characterised by repetition and difference...and their affect across a polyrhythmic
ensemble.’ (Blue, 2017: 16)
• Because different work/activities make up the polyrhythmic ensemble, there can be
interference between the rhythms – leading to a lack of rhythm – a state of
arrhythmia (perhaps akin to high temporal densities)
• Therefore, rather than focusing on the ‘simple accountancy’ of workload models
which only see time from a quantitative and abstract perspective, do we need to think
more in terms of the polyrhythmic ensembles of the tasks and activities which make
up our academic work?

11. Time pressures – the impact of temporal densities
Temporal density accounts for experiences of
time that
can be described as ‘juggling’ and ‘multi-
tasking’.
Southerton and Tomlinson, 2005:235• Some days are packed with activities,
whilst others are less pressed
• The result of multiple responsibilities
which can overlap within a given time
frame
• Can lead to a feeling of loss of control, time pressure, and ‘temporal dis-
organisation’, all leading to feelings of ‘harriedness’. A state of arrhythmia??

12. The wider context – social acceleration and the academy
Hartmut Rosa (2014) has written much about social acceleration, the idea
that society and societal processes are experiencing a continual increase
in their pace, or rate of change. In this way social acceleration and
change are intertwined processes
Rosa argues that the drivers of social acceleration are:
1. competition, the need to constantly speed up research and production
processes to gain an edge on competitors;
2. the promise of eternity, the notion that the more we can achieve in
ever shorter periods of time, the more we get from life;
3. the acceleration cycle, a feedback system driven by forms of social
acceleration which feed into ever faster cycles.

13. Three categories of acceleration are identified by Rosa,
- technological acceleration
- acceleration of social change
- acceleration of the pace of life
However, Wajcman (2013) points out that acceleration is not ubiquitous, or equally intense.
There is great variation dependant on context and perception
Vostal (2016) emphasises that some academics enjoy the experience of acceleration and
speed, particularly where this can be controlled. The feeling of competitive advantage,
making quick decisions, engaging in rapid communication, especially electronic.
‘The hyper-professional, fast academic rarely ‘switches off’ and is prepared to speed up (or
slow down) depending on circumstances and institutional/subjective agendas. Here
acceleration is understood as a nearly compulsory modality’ (Vostal 2016: 131)

14. Alternatively, there are others who argue that there is a need to decelerate, particularly
around some of the aspects of academic work such as reading and writing.
Hassan (2012) argues that accelerated patterns of reading fundamentally changes its nature,
from critique, reflection and understanding to ‘information harvesting’.
Boulous-Walker (2017) reflects on the lack of time to reread. Argues that rather than
acceleration, we need ‘excess time’
Here, there appears to be an implicit tension concerning feelings of control and autonomy

15. Accountability, standardisation and the perception of haste
• UK universities increasingly driven by reductive accountability systems
• Standardisation is central – in terms of practices and also workload models across
institutions
• This leads to several negative impacts
• Simplistic structures for activity and work
• Clock-driven notions of time, simplified and abstracted, not recognising the
experiential nature of ‘polyrhythmic ensembles’
• Drives for efficiency and intensification of work – audited notions of ‘required
task time’
• This leads to loss of control, autonomy and feelings of professionalism.
• Steen-Olsen and Eikseth (2010) argue that it is this loss of a feeling of control and
autonomy which can lead to professionals feeling time pressured.

16. So how about ‘Slow’?
• Emerged from the slow food movement
• Characterised by a desire to slow down activity, to increase the ‘quality’ of processes
rather than fixating on outcomes
• Argues against standardisation and performativity and for a ‘natural pace’ in activity
• However, does not identify the different rhythms inherent in academic work. Some
activity might not fit a ‘slow’ agenda
• Is this an understandable reaction to a feeling of lost autonomy and control and the
feeling of constraint? A way of reasserting professionalism?
• It seems to be couched, at least some of the time, as an ethical argument about well-
being and the sustainable activity.

17. Finding a way forward
• Initial results on academic writing suggest:
• A feeling of pressure in relation to other activities
• A feeling that writing requires a longer duration and tempo in terms of rhythm
when compared to other academic activities
• That writing can occur in different rhythms depending on the nature of the writing
• That there is a pressure to speed up the rhythm of writing to meet other agendas
and in some cases to ‘dehumanise’ the process of writing to make it faster and
more efficient
• These insights suggest degrees of constraint and loss of control.

18. Alhadeff-Jones 2017 discusses and debates the role of rhythm as a temporal process for
educational emancipation. In considering how emancipatory practices might develop in a
temporal sense, he argues,
‘Morin’s autonomy-dependence principle encourages one to systematically consider
emancipatory practices as a manifestation of the complex interplay among complimentary,
contradictory and antagonistic forms of self- and mutual control’ (145)
leading to the need to foster,
‘capacity to purposefully regulate the trade offs that may always exist between rhythmic
autonomy and temporal constraint.’ (145)

19. This poses questions about:
• The variety of practices which individuals engage with and will see as sustainable.
Suggests the need for equitable, negotiated flexibility rather than standardisation
• The need to recast engagement with temporal issues through ‘rhythm’, not merely
abstract measurement of time, ‘slow’ or ‘fast’
• A dialogic approach to organisation and change which grapples with the nature of
autonomy and constraint as a way of navigating the complexity of temporalities as an
ongoing emancipatory process.
• How the idea of ‘polyrhythmic ensembles’ might allow for consideration of work at
different scales and over different periodicities
• The ethical dimension of work and time, for both academics and their managers. The
ethical imperative of scholarship (as well as pastoral roles) and collegiality as a basis for
flexibility
• Is there an ethical imperative to ensure sinus-rhythms for academic work/writing?