Corey L Bechtel

PhD Candidate in political science - currently on leave while finishing my dissertation research, with plans to defend in March 2020. In my dissertation, I apply several common themes of ethnosymbolism, an interdisciplinary approach emphasizing contextual factors and the significance of deep history to enrich analyses with various social sciences, to examine how nationalism took hold in Thailand, one of a few modern states in the Global South never too be formally colonized but where the sense of nationhood, national identity and nationalism is strong. My focus is demonstrating how the nature, orientation and potential variation in nationalism is a result of nations/proto-nations existing long before modern times and deeply embedded within different civilizations and ethnie. As a critique of modernism, it questions the treatment of 'pre-modern' history as irrelevant by demonstrating how deeper historical processes are key to developing specific understandings in any given case.I have majored in Comparative Politics and minored in both International Relations and Agricultural Economics - and have passed my PhD preliminary examinations in each field.  My MA in International Studies from the Josef Korbel School specializes in the Political Economy of Development and Sustainable Global Environmental Policy while I have also spent time, in days that feel all-too-distant, as a philosophy major at Millikin where I received an incredible education.I am deeply committed to interdisciplinary and qualitative understandings of the world, moving beyond the quantifiable and engaging philosophical underpinnings of the increasing reliance on regression modeling, prediction and how best to understand a world undergoing incredibly fast, epochal changes throughout every aspect of global politics, our relationship to space, communication, cyber warfare, genetics, physics, etc. Perhaps the best means of prediction lay in deep knowledge rather than modeled outcomes tied to a very specific sample, set of proxy variables and time period without any assurance as to continued relevance due to the inherent temporal issues posed by assumptions regarding continuity in causal relations as largely a given - and thus continuity in underlying context. Perhaps that worked in the time of the Cold War, but the world is not static and the degree of change occurring renders generalizations from specific findings problematic despite claims to external validity (which lacks any clear meaning in temporally removed and contextually different situations). MOST Important to me, however, is education - both as a student of the world and as an educator about it. I have spent much of my time at Purdue serving in the capacity of an educator - and have taught several different courses, both online and especially in the classroom, as a fully independent instructor. I am committed to the role of professors as educators - of PhDs legitimately being focused on being educators to both students and the broader public. We need, as a discipline, to recognize the changing needs of higher education - to recognize the faults with the traditional approach and bring reform. A PhD is necessary to teach undergraduates, yet graduate students teach undergraduates independently - if lucky - for purposes of funding with the PhD typically not requiring any teaching skills or experience. It doesn't make sense for the degree that recognizes one as a proper educator to not be predicated on teaching skills or experience. Research as the paramount concern due to the cut-throat publish-or-perish and post-doc focused nature of departmental and university revenue... not only diminishes the quality of undergraduate education across the country but also creates the very classism, identity ascription and barriers-to-entry many of us advocate against.These have become systemic problems promoting rushed research, attention focused on easy questions and a lack of attention to actually training the coming generation with the skills expected of a good, knowledgeable graduate with a BA. While I have been fortunate to receive this experience, many are not depending on school and discipline. We need teaching oriented PhDs within all disciplines if we want to maintain a sustainable, intellectually vibrant and properly motivated future for political science and social sciences more broadly. The topics studied by each are intricately connected to the other - and the ability to explain, excite and engage students on these issues is perhaps the biggest contribution that many of us will ever make. While I finish my dissertation work, I also intend to further flesh out my pedagogy in formal terms while continuing to engage issues of import to myself and to students seeking high quality education.
Supervisors: Mark Tilton
Address: Purdue University, Dept. of Political Science
Beering Hall of Liberal Arts & Education
Office 2216 H