I Put it to You, and I Leave it to You.

Am faced with challenging dilemma.

But YOU can help!

What do I name my dissertation (proposal)?

Here’s the thing. My dissertation is not written. It won’t be done until 2009. However, I am expected to have a working title at least by August of 2006. Preferably, I should have something by which it can be known when I start handing in rough proposal drafts in March…

What else could I do? Call it “Untitled Holly Project”…? That solution may work on IMDB, but doesn’t really seem appropriate for a dissertation title.

The thing is this: the dissertation will be my defining document for many years. Possibly for the rest of my life if I never publish a book, leave a “I’ve gone out the window” note, or write the script I always dreamt of (Citizen Kane II: Leland’s Slinky- think about it).

What I name this dissertation will be written on every CV, every bio, and every rap sheet ever written about me. It has got to be spectacular. The name is, perhaps, even more important than the dissertation itself. Around 6 to 10 people in the entire world will read the dissertation text. Everyone from cleaners to loved ones to repomen will read the title! This is important stuff, here.

OK, to give you guys something to work with – I will give you some parameters and background. My MA thesis was on the good-evil dualism found in the 5th century BCE, Aramaic Dead Sea Scroll “4Q Visions of Amram.” For that title, I took a quote from Jane Eyre, and I called it “The Guide and the Seducer: Dualism in 4QVisions of Amram,” or something like that. Catchy, literate and descriptive. Plus, I made my Religious Studies department use the word “seducer” in their publicity, so that’s pretty fun.

My PhD dissertation is in the department of Religion and Culture in a fairly erudite, but not stuffy, department in English Canada. The scope looks at how North American films have depicted Jewish-Gentile intermarriage (films by either Jews or by Gentiles… haven’t really figured that part out yet), with an eye to how Jewish difference (whether racial, cultural or religious) is dealt with through these narratives. I will be dedicating each chapter (around ten or so) to different “tropes,” or representative stories, such as Annie Hall and Alvy Singer, Baby Houseman and Johnny Castle (gotta get the classics in there), Svengali and Trilby, the Beautician and the Beast, stuff like that. The point is to see how America sees its Jews (and how American Jews see Gentiles, I guess) by how these stories are presented. Get it?

So you have your assignment. Go and find me a pithy and memorable title, my bright and creative reader. My favourite type is one of those clever-title-that-means-nothing-followed-by-a-concise-subject-sub-title titles, such as you commonly see on scholarly lists these days. However, I am not picky and will consider anything. I am that desperate.

Think along these lines:

“Getting Raped by Cossacks: Jewish-Gentile Relationships in North American Film”

See, here we have a quirky line that will be understood only by people who have bothered to memorize Annie Hall, followed by a colon, and then an actual attempt at a descriptive title. Savvy?

Only let’s try not to offend anyone…


“When a Bird Loves a Fish: Romance Between Jews and Gentiles in American Cinema.”

Again, we have a quote, and now completely “rape” free. Good. This time it is from Fiddler, so you know people are going to recognize it, only here it is inverted somewhat into a “When a Man Loves a Woman” parody.

Also, I like the word cinema… Makes me sound like a student hanging around Paris’s left bank community, trying not to get the clap, while musing about the beauty of Buster Keaton’s trajectory gags versus the artistry of Chaplin's dance. Yes, good word, indeed.

Still… this one is kind of boring, no?


“Mixed Marriage? We Aren’t Even Allowed to Mix Flax with Wool!: Jewish-Gentile Marriages in American Cinema.”

This isn’t a quote from a movie… But it should be. Funny, and with hard biblical fact (Leviticus 19:19). That’s a title you can learn something from, and it runs on good observational wit.

However, it also runs a little long, I think.


So, there are a few examples of what you can come up with. If any of your suggestions make it into the final draft, I swear you will get an acknowledgement in the preface of the dissertation. Not that you’d read it, really. However, you’d get a kick out of skimming the title…

I am depending on you, folks.

Get those brains working.