This is just a short blog post to let all my readers know, in case you haven’t seen it on my social media yet, that on Wed, August 14th, I successfully defended my PhD Dissertation. Pass with minor corrections!

Let me reintroduce myself to you all, I’m Dr. Robyn Lacy, PhD in Archaeology!

Of course, this was just the defence and I do have some corrections to make before officially submitting to my university for graduation, but when you pass your defence they call you ‘Doctor’ right away, so I’m rolling with it. I’m partway through the corrections at the moment, and if all goes well, I’ll get to convocate in October this year with my husband, parents, and best friend in the audience!

I wanted to write this short blog post to sort of go over the defence process (defense? writing it either way looks wrong at this point), now that I’m on the other side and it doesn’t look like quite as huge and scary of a monster. And because I’ve been away from my computer for a bit now and a blog post is a good way to get back into the writing mindset.

I completed the first draft of my dissertation in pieces, submitting each chapter to my supervisors as I went as early as February 2023. They sent them back with edits as I went as well, and I made changes. The full second draft was completed before Christmas 2023 I believe, and I sent it off for more edits before finishing my Hexfoil book edits and sending that manuscript back to my publisher as well. More edits came for the dissertation in the new year from my two supervisors (bless them for reading my behemoth of a dissertation so many times), and I got all those changes and tweeks done. Then we sent it off to my external supervisory committee member, and once their comments were back and changes were made, I officially submitted my dissertation for examination in May 2024. Date unknown, everything is a blue and my brain may have leaked out of my ears at this point.

In June I indexed my hexfoil book and approved copy edits, while waiting for examiners to be lined up, given my dissertation, and for a defence date to be set by the School of Graduate Studies. I’d heard horror stories about students having to organize their own defences, so I’m really glad that at this point, it was all out of my hands! Then I went on holiday with my husband and my parents around Shetland, Orkney, and the Highlands of Scotland for three weeks (blog posts to come!).

After we got back from holiday, there were a scant 1.5 weeks to go over my presentation and review my dissertation before it was time to defend! I rehearsed my presentation once a day, not on the weekend, leading up to my defence, and tried to make sure I was getting lots of good food and lots of sleep in the days leading up. I’m not someone who can cram work into the last minute, so I had my presentation 99% done before we left for Scotland, so I wouldn’t be stressing about it too much on our holiday.

I didn’t know who my examiners were going into the defence. Apparently some places they tell you that beforehand, but at MUNL it’s *meant* to be a secret. I was really excited to see some familiar faces examining my work, scholars’ whose work I really admire, which made me less nervous immediately. I was also so fortunate to have a bunch of friends and family who took time out of their day to watch my defence, and that was so special. I felt really supported, thank you everyone!! I signed onto my Webex defence at 1pm, and my presentation wouldn’t share! Great start! I could feel my eyes prickling a little with the frustration, and one of my examiners stepped in to suggest I log off, double check any settings, and log in again. That was a good chance to take a few deep breaths, and when I logged in again it was working fine! Phew.

My presentation was about 25 minutes (it had to be under 30), and then the examiners each got time to ask me questions in two rounds, with a 15 minute break between them where I ran to the washroom and then paced around my house nervously. The entire thing took 2.5 hrs, and my cats were not impressed to be locked out of the office. Guests were all kicked off before the deliberation, and I was put into a breakout room to wait. I had time to stand up and leave the room for about a minute, and then they called me back and told me “Well, that was a short deliberation! Congratulations, Dr. Lacy!”

There was a bunch of grinning, lots of thank yous, we took a screenshot with the examination committee which I’d love to get set to me by whomever took it, and then it was over! The second I exited the meeting, I burst into tears! What a ridiculously huge milestone, and two weeks later as I’m writing this, it still doesn’t really feel real! I’m in the middle of my minor revisions at the moment, and once those are finished I’ll be able to apply for convocation this fall, but the huge step is really the defence.

The best advice I got before my defence was the same as my comps, once you are in that room, you’re the expert on your topic and for the most part the questions people are going to ask you are out of interest. They are not trying to trip you up or humiliate you. I got a fair amount of questions about my literal writing style which I wasn’t expected at all, but overall the questions were really interesting, and I took a bunch of notes to apply to my final revisions now that everything is finished. It was overall less stressful than I was expecting, while also being the most stressful thing at the same time, but now it’s done!

#PhDone!