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3 Comments

  1. Stephen Tuffin
    24/05/2021 @ 6:59 am

    This is wonderful. Like coming home.

    Reply

  2. Jess Sturman-Coombs
    06/11/2021 @ 10:03 am

    I so want to move forward with a PhD but negotiating the territory and completing the application shouldn’t be the hardest step.

    Your post truly encapsulates the working class experience, the feeling of displacement, the inadequacy, the stress and anxiety around not belonging, not possessing the dialogue, the accent, the confidence to speak up and out when you’ve aways been encouraged to tone your expression down, to downplay your talents in fear of appearing arrogant and inflated – something deemed much much worse than failure and constant financial and emotional struggle.

    This is an area that fascinates me beyond words. So much so it’s almost painful how much I want to unpick it and contribute to new knowledge. And that brings me back, full circle, to my opening concern: how can just completing the application feel so hard.

    Thank you so much,

    Reply

  3. Gemma
    11/04/2022 @ 3:02 pm

    I felt every word of this. My values come from being working class. I refuse to leave my community and my life for a job. I refuse to abandon everyone who’s gone before me and erase the pains of poverty and a childhood and early adullthood so different to most in academia.

    Reply

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