Exposé

Since I've gotten some questions (and apparently since I'm procrastinating from doing my real work), just thought I'd whip up a quick update on the exposé last night, which went quite well despite my lack of a voice, haha.

Anyway, my big concern on the presentation was that since I was giving it to a room full of unabashed sociologists, I sort of figured the feedback I'd get at the end would be on the order of trying to turn me into a straight sociologist as well. So I thought long and hard about how I wanted to frame the presentation so that the audience would understand that the literature is at the heart of my topic and that the sociology is a means to an end rather than an end in and of itself.

And overall I think I did a good job framing it that way. It made sense in my head, and I thought I communicated that idea well. I spent a long time developing the topic and explaining my logic in how I came to the joint methodology. And I think some people got it, but a lot of them didn't. haha. So yeah, I pretty much called it, got lots of feedback trying to turn me into a sociologist. One guy said he was "disappointed" that I didn't do more quantitative analysis on the dynamics of the field. I almost said I was "disappointed" he didn't get my topic, HAHAHAHA. He also wanted to know what my theoretical foundations were, since he thought I needed to be incorporating more sociology of literature. I had a lovely moment of satisfaction when he asked me if I knew work by Gisèle Sapiro and I was able to say that I'm putting her on my committee, haha. Of course I haven't popped the question to her yet so I damn well better do so this week so that it doesn't get back to her that I'm announcing her as a member of the committee before she even knows she's on there, hahahaha. But we get along great and I'm working quite closely with her on her latest project, so I can't imagine there will be any problem. I will get on that now!!!

Anyway, the other highlight of the evening came after the presentation, actually. There was this kid who kept asking me the same question over and over, and the question made no sense. I had no freakin' clue what he was trying to ask, and he was slightly condescending and kept saying "ok, I'll rephrase it." Eventually the prof in charge of the seminar cut him off and moved on. Afterwards, the prof leaned in close to whisper to me, "sorry about that, he's one of my students who never ceases to say stupid things, he always wants to apply anachronisms, using today's language to talk about stuff in the past, so I cut him off so he wouldn't waste more of our time." Love it!

So there you have it, all in all it was fine. Not necessarily life-changing, but fine. They complimented my style, saying the relaxed atmosphere was "very American." And they meant it as a compliment, that I wasn't trying to be super formal or anything. And a few of the participants came up to me afterwards to talk about some other related topics. They're the ones who actually got the presentation, so it was great to engage with them afterwards. I was absolutely beat by that point, though, so I basically just went home and collapsed.

Now it's back to work, though, haven't done much of that recently! Will update on the trip soon!