subject: Doctoral Scholarship: Modern Apprenticeships as Personal Growth [print this page] Whether its the humanities or the hard sciences, you are following the footsteps of the skilled apprentices of the past. And at the end, you will have to meet certain expectations.
When apprenticeship was the main way artisans were trained, everyone knew that there were standards that a student had to meet before they were declared a full master. Each discipline would have its own secrets and its own standards. These traits would always be specific. It became a fingerprint of sorts, identifying the individual but the lineage of instruction that produced the individual. Doctoral scholarship does the same things for the doctoral candidate.
It is naive to think that scholarship is limited to the production of research. Doctoral scholarship is a personal quest that changes the researcher. They will become something more. It is impossible to everything that can, or will, result from seeking a Ph.D.. Did a herpetology grad student realize that he might save a child's life with his ability to identify poisonous snakes from the smallest piece of their skin? Or how about an anthropologist who was able to advocate for an indigenous people? Did they know that going into the program?
Now as before, apprenticeships are a form of acquired power. There are no shortcuts this kind of power. The one to do it for you. You cannot find it. You cannot buy it. You have to put the time in learning the skill, learning the detail and learning that ends and outs of the discipline before you can call yourself doctor.
In the end, it comes down to a matter of holding to a set of standards. Sometimes, these standards are codified by law. The most obvious example of this is the medical doctor. But the secrets of the discipline, of any discipline, is that you will be known by the skills you present and the product you produce. And this notion pervades all of this kind of scholarship.
Doctoral Scholarship: Modern Apprenticeships as Personal Growth
