Dissertation Update

I met with Ana today. She is a fairly new committee member; she's only been on for about a year. This was our first meeting in person. I knew a bit about her in advance--she's an urban ethnographer who does work with Puerto Ricans and is even working in Newark, where I did most of my research. I knew she was kind, well-liked and skilled.

But I did not know that she would have so much encouragement and hope to offer me. She told me that she loved my work and thought I was a very skilled writer and ethnographer. She told me that she had actually believed my dissertation to be ready to defend right after she had finished reading it, although Louisa's request for revisions would indeed make it much stronger.

She told me that she was so moved after she read the Preface that she almost called me to tell me how wonderful it was, and that she wishes that she had actually done so. She loved the chapters that incorporated ethnography.

She told me that my work moved her immensely---and that as a person who was both an excellent ethnographer and theoretician, I was one of a very small group of anthropologists.

She told me that she was looking forward to the book very much, and that this would be ana powerful book and an important addition to the field.

I didn't cry while I was in her office, but I cried right afterwards. Happy tears---really happy tears.

Thank you, Ana.