Most job candidates who are new to the academic market treat conferences like some sort of extended job interview. I once heard those folks called “conference squirrels” because their cheeks (briefcases) were stuffed with nuts (CV’s). When I became a department chairman, I always cringed when conference organizers put my title on my nametag because I knew I was going to be a magnet for the duration of the meeting.
That’s not to say I haven’t solicited my share of CV’s at academic meetings. They are prime ground for networking, but it’s a fine line to walk. Nothing sours search-committee members quite like an overeager job seeker who has buttonholed them in the doorway to a reception or a restroom.
What advice can you offer applicants who want to network at conferences?
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9 Responses to Advice for Conference Squirrels
electronicmuse - November 11, 2011 at 8:11 am
Bierce: ya gotta admit the man had a way with words . . . I found his rant more hilarious than anything else. “Criticism” that features this kind of vitriol could never be taken seriously, and therefore tends to be less pernicious than some “reasonable” approach at character assassination. That is, to paraphrase Will: ” . . . methinks the gentleman doth protest too much.” Such verbiage calls into question the ranter’s motives . . . and actually directs attention away from the target, toward the critic. (Isn’t this what Bierce actually wanted, after all?)
Too bad Oscar Wilde lived before Eric Clapton’s time, for he would have benefitted from Clapton’s retort when told of some critic’s complaint about his guitar playing: ” . . . critics’ opinions of me are none of my business.”
Great fun, and I have to concur that compared to Bierce’s rant, anything I’ve ever attempted makes me look like Little Lord Fauntleroy.
Chris Marrou - November 11, 2011 at 9:03 am
Every time I read anything by Bierce, I think it’s a shame Prozac wasn’t invented in 1885. Somebody was seriously short of serotonin.
droslovinia - November 11, 2011 at 2:18 pm
I stand in awe of a true master of the art!
jffoster - November 12, 2011 at 12:04 pm
An alternative rant, or maybe in this case a “cant”, which many, including Oscar Wilde’s biographer, though was inspired by him, is in the 1st Act of Gilbert & Sullivan’s PATIENCE, or BUNTHORNE’S BRIDE.The lines are those of the fleshly poet Reginald Bunthorne.
Recitative:
Am I alone, and unobserved? I am! Then let me own I’m an aesthetic sham! This air severe Is but a mere – Veneer! This cynic smile Is but a wile – Of guile! This costume chaste Is but good taste – Misplaced!
Let me confess! A languid love for lilies does not blight me! Lank limbs and haggard cheeks do not delight me! I do not care for dirty greens By any means. I do not long for all one sees That’s Japanese. I am not fond of uttering platitudes In stained-glass attitudes. In short, my mediaevalism’s affectation, Born of a morbid love of admiration!
Aria:
If you’re anxious for to shine in the high aesthetic line As a man of culture rare, You must get up all the germs Of the transcendental terms, And plant them everywhere. You must lie upon the dasies And discourse in novel phrases Of your complicated state of mind, The meaning doesn’t matter If it’s only idle chatter Of a transcendental kind.
And every one will say As you walk your mystic way, “If this young man expresses himself in terms too deep for me, Why, what a very singularly deep young man This deep young man must be!
Be eloquent in praise Of the very dull old days Which have long since passed away, And convince ‘em,if you can, that the reign of Good Queen Anne Was culture’s palmiest day. Of course you will pooh-pooh,whatever’s fresh and new, And declare it’s crude and mean, For Art stopped short at the cultivated court Of the Empress Josephine.
And everyone will say As you walk your mystic way, “If that’s not good enough for he which is good enough for me, Why,what a very cultivated kind of youth This kind of youth must be!
Then a sentimental passion Of a vegetable fashion Must excite your languid spleen, An attachment a la Plato for a bashful young potato Or a not-too-French French bean! Though the Philistines may jostle, you will rank as an apostle In the high aesthetic band, If you walk down Piccadilly with a poppy or a lily In your medieval hand.
And everyone will say, As you walk your flowery way, “If he’s content with a vegetable love Which would certainly not suit me, Why, what a most particularly pure young man This pure young man must be!”
rrhersh - November 12, 2011 at 11:43 pm
I would have to go back and check, which is probably more effort than is merited, but I think some of John Simon’s language rants might hold up to this standard.
jffoster - November 13, 2011 at 1:18 am
Right I’ll bet you are. And many of Simon’s rants were about English and language in general and he knew almost nothing about them.
goeswithoutsaying - November 14, 2011 at 3:50 pm
A good ranter has a fantastic vocabulary, a fine and nuanced of the extreme, some good sense about what is right (in the senses of correct and just), an arsenal of “things wrong” ready and waiting to be strung together and lightning-quick mind that can make those connections for the delight of others. Cherish the person with this rare combination of talents.
dank48 - November 15, 2011 at 2:53 pm
Whew. Hard to believe that’s from the man who defined “incompassible. adj. Incapable of existing at the same place and at the same time, as, for example, the poetry of Walt Whitman and God’s mercy to man.”
But even if you eschew rants, you still have a future as a surgeon. It’ll be a long time before I see a more apt comment than “Dan Brown does things to the English language that would be illegal if done to an animal.”
ulyssesmsu - November 25, 2011 at 2:17 pm
This seems to me to be more of an INSULT than a rant. A personal attack–ad hominem. Insults are bad. Rants are good, sometimes.