I just defended my thesis. Leading up to the presentation I wanted to either pee my pants or vomit. I was literally on the verge of shaking. Here is the play by play (this is for me to remember in the future, feel free to skip past what I said for a shortened version of this post)...
1.) I was the first on the call at 5 minutes prior which made me super nervous. Finally, others started to join and chat. I was amazed at what people didn't know, like whether we were allowed to use first person language, how long we were suppose to present, whether they would be questioned, etc. In fact, one of the females started to kind of rag on her advisor. I chimed in and reminded everyone their advisors could be on the phone call and to be honest, I think they were.
2.) Five minutes after when we were suppose to start, the faculty joined the call. At this point we realized there was a loud buzzing and everyone had to hang up and call back. There was still a buzzing so the faculty changed rooms. We ended up starting 15 minutes late.
3.) When they finally took role there was one person who no-showed! Which is insanity. One of the faculty started the defense by explaining this was really a celebration. This is a little funny to me, because I have been to a lot of celebrations and never felt this nervous! One of the students told everyone on the call she was not prepared at all. Apparently, she didn't prepare her speech for this so-called celebration. There was one person who went before me and she didn't even tell us the name of her thesis or what she did. She sort of got nailed for that when they got to question her.
4.) When it came to my turn, this is what I said...
Good afternoon, title of my thesis project is: Communication: Perception, Projection, and Personal Peace. I would like to begin by thanking my advisor HC and my mentor AS.
The concept of integrating communication and personal peace was inspired by Gandhi’s quote you must be the change you want to see in the world. I recognized that if I wanted to make a change in feeling at peace in my environment, it had to start with me. I also realized that understanding the connection between perception, projection, and personal peace was crucial. Ultimately, I chose a project because I wanted to give this topic as much reach as possible. I decided a course curriculum would be the way to satisfy this desire to educate people on interpersonal communication and how it relates to personal peace.
The goal of this project was to study both personal peace and communication and determine how they were connected. After reviewing this literature, the curriculum was created.
This study and corresponding curriculum is important because it stands to serve individuals by offering them increased personal peace through ethical practice and greater understanding of interpersonal communications.
To lay the groundwork for this project, it is important to understand a few terms. The first term is perception which was considered to be the way we perceive or take in the world around us. Projection is the attribution of one’s own attitudes, feelings, or suppositions to others according to Pickett. Personal peace was thought of in terms of the feelings or calmness that arises out of being content with ones actions.
To gather a better understanding of the topics guiding this project, I referred to several literary works. Naturally, I wanted to support this thesis project and ground it in a theoretical base. I chose two theories, Existential Theory by Carl Rogers and Blumer’s Symbolic Interactionism Theory. Rogers stated that the behavior of the human organism may be determined by the influences to which it has been exposed, but it may also be determined by the creative and integrative insight of the organism itself. This ability of the person to discover new meaning in the forces which impinge upon him and in the past experiences which have been controlling him, and the ability to consciously alter his behavior in the light of the new meaning, has a profound significance. The significance of Rogers proposition is especially interesting when studying the relation of how we perceive information, project information and have the ability to alter our perception or projection to increase our personal peace. The second theory was Symbolic Interactionsim. Blumer described his theory by noting that it rests in the analysis of three premises. One was that human beings act on things on the basis of the meanings that the things have for them. The second is that the meaning of such things is derived from or arises out of the social interaction. The third premise is that these meanings are handled in and modified through an interpretive process used by the person in dealing with the things they encounter. Specifically the things that Blumer was describing were people or institutions. We can take this theory and look closer at our actions in relation to how we perceive the world around us and project our thoughts, feelings, or attitudes. By taking a closer look at these actions we can analyze what we can do to potentially increase our own personal peace.
Regarding perception there was one piece of information I found particularly interesting. According to the Journal of Positive Psychology the more abstractly people tend to view important aspects of their lives, the more satisfying they tended to rate their lives. Regarding Projection the most interesting part was discovering more about how Freud viewed projection which was to view it as a way for an organism to manage internal stimuli that threatens quiescence or peace. One of the ways projection can be manage is through ethical communication. When it came to personal peace I thought that a parable from Buddha put everything together. That parable said better than a speech of a thousand vain words is one thoughtful word which brings peace to the mind. One of the reasons this was so profound to me was it connected really well with Aristotle’s concept of being in a contented state of happiness in accordance with virtue and one can not be at peace, unless they have virtue. In regard to creating a course curriculum Kirkwood’s work pointed out that individuals need to be taught to develop their emotional capacities just as they are taught math or science. Just as critical thinking is taught as part of argumentation so too something like ‘educated feeling’ would seem to fall to rhetoric in so far as pathos is a major element in argumentation, public speaking, persuasion, and rhetorical analysis.
To create a new course there were a few questions to be considered that I drew from the book teaching communication: Theory, Research, and Methods. This course is new in the sense it takes an interpersonal communication course and focuses on personal peace. The curriculum is intended for students who are just beginning to learn about the field of communication on college or university campus. The role of the teacher is to facilitate the course curriculum and encourage students to engage in dialogue that will leave an impression that reaches far beyond the classroom. The course is a skills based course which includes several opportunities for discussion that will encourage students to recognize their relevant communication processes and phenomena in their own relationships and interactions are hopefully prepared to be skilled communicators through better recognition, analysis, and response to daily situations. Using the Rogers theory the learner is as the center of the education and encouraged to draw upon their personal experiences to better understand the concepts presented. Symbolic Interactionism also discussed the idea of learners gathering information through interaction. The course tackled this interaction through group work, dialogue, and collaboration with members of their community.
The course was broken into four modules. One focuses on Communication, one on perception, one on projection, and one on personal peace. Students complete writing prompts such as describing how a topic relates to current events or personal situations, write an ethical dilemma paper, complete a group project on the perceptions of students on campus regarding a current event, write a disclosure research paper and present the information, participate in numerous class discussions and activities, complete tests, and write a final paper that combines all of the information they have learned. The course text is Understanding Interpersonal Communication: Making Choices in Changing Times by West and Turner. This text spoke to the heart of the curriculum.
This project will hopefully serve as a springboard for future research and evaluation. Ideally this course curriculum will be presented and revised by individual educators based on student feedback and further refinement. I hope this thesis project adds to the field of communication and can possibly have a positive impact on our world.
5.) After my presentation which lasted just over 8 minutes, I was open for questions. One of the faculty who is actually my academic advisor asked me to further explain projection and how psychology and communication were expanded on in this project. I was able to explain this and had actually expected this question. The next question was from the head of the department who asked where I got this topic from and whether I had discussed my work with any universities to see if they were interested in my curriculum. Fortunately, I had talked to an old professor who was really excited about my work and was able to speak to that. Finally, another faculty member started suggesting local universities who might be interested in my curriculum! I was very flattered by this.
6.) That's it, that's what I went through. I think it went fairly well, but I still feel jitters in my stomach. Now I get to hang out on the call for another hour and listen to other student's defend. I think I sounded confident and well versed. I am still in shock that I just defended my thesis. This is so surreal!
P.S. At the end of the call, all of the faculty clapped and cheered for us. I felt like a million bucks! It was so awesome!
