I must admit the guiding force of this project is anxiety – anxiety about not finishing the project in time, anxiety about not finishing my doctoral program, anxiety about exceeding the temporal limits set forth by my University. The Texas Christian University (TCU) 2023-24 Graduate Catalog describes it as follows:   "The work for the Ph.D. degree must be completed within six years after the student has been admitted to candidacy. Extension of time must be applied for in writing through the chair of the major department who will then make a recommendation to the appropriate dean. The letter should explain why the degree was not completed within the time limit and should present a schedule for completing the program."[1]   On time. Time limit. Within six years. Schedule. The temporal bounds of academic life, and the pace of capital – which is the motivating force of such temporal bounds – are fundamentally unsustainable. In “The Ethics of Pace,” Moya Bailey importantly explains that “Efficiency and productivity drive the pace of life, and the ethics of that pace – the demand it makes on the human body – is rarely if ever questioned.”[2] Not only will this project question this pace and the effects on my/our bodyminds, but it will ignore the rulebooks, written or unwritten, governing the production of dissertations – whether in the context of the discipline[3] or the University[4]. This project will, in the words of Stacey Waite, “commit rhetorical disobedience.”[5]

Late-night cramming is not an effective studying strategy!

Note the difference between pace and cadence. Pace is 1/speed in (eg. min/km) whereas cadence refers to steps/minute

when you want to emphasize something, you need to slow the reader’s pace with shorter sentences and bolder punctuation.

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