Tuesday, December 13, 2022

Behold! A PhD.

As the title says, I am no longer a historian-in-training. I am now a doctor, and in the Western academic tradition, that is the end of the road. It has been a long journey, but comparatively short compared to the average. I finished my PhD in five years, whereas the average time to completion is somewhere between 6.5 and 8 years for history. There are a number of reasons for this, and I recognize that I have had some advantages not available to many graduate students. I chose to study a topic geographically close to me, making research travel simple. I lucked out when it came to funding (not that it's ever enough, but everything helps). That funding let me take a year off from teaching, giving me uninterrupted time to process research and to write.

I have chosen not to place an embargo on the dissertation. I didn't see the need and I know that some people were eager to read it. You can too! (Be warned, it is very long). A PDF can be downloaded from the University of Toronto website here: https://hdl.handle.net/1807/125081.