If you’ve read my blog before, you’ll already know about my slightly schizophrenic simultaneous existence as music librarian and postdoctoral researcher. Depending on the day of the week, I’m either Music and Academic Services Librarian at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, or postdoc on the AHRC-funded Bass Culture in Scottish Musical Traditions project.
Feeling somewhat squeezed between my two careers, I’ve stepped back a bit from extra activities with my library-related organisations, but that doesn’t mean I’m not still engaged with my profession. Proof? I got back from Norfolk this evening to discover with pleasure that my Fellowship of CILIP (Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals) has been revalidated. I should explain that I did a mind-bogglingly, inordinately over-enthusiastic amount of CPD last year, so I thought it would be sensible to log it, write about it and get revalidated so that all this effort was actually recognised! Nailing my colours firmly to the mast, I presented myself as scholar-librarian and would-be teacher, for I did the Teaching Artist short course at work last year, and later this year will commence a PGCert to build upon that.
Before my trip down south, I attended the Nineteenth Century Music in Britain conference – hosted by my own institution. I was on the organising committee, so I chaired a session and did my best to be generally helpful, although our very excellent conference organiser and her colleague did most of the work – I felt a bit of a fraud by comparison!
I felt a little warm glow, however, when one of the keynote speakers referenced my Ashgate book, and by the end of the conference – not because of the reference but because I felt enthused – I was thinking again about the feasibility of writing a second book. That needs quite a lot of thought before I attempt to write a book proposal, but it would be very satisfying if I could pull it off.
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