This covers Friday of the Conference.
Today I had the full experience, from 8:15 am all the way to closing at 5:45. I decided this morning that I would just go the the panels that sounded the most interesting, rather than those that I might get the most out of in an academic-political sense (looking specifically for panels that had U. Chicago scholars, for example). Obviously then, the first panel I went to was fairly uninteresting, with the exception of the panelist who discussed an examination of The Prince that I had not heard before. I should have gone to the ISA Innovative Panel on mapping IR theory, which is a general topic that I am very interested in. Alas, I did not. Oh well.
In the break between the first and second timeslots, I considered my options. There was a panel with Ikenberry that…well, it had Ikenberry, an important scholar whose work is well known and received around the IR literature world, read in intro to IR classes, etc. But fuck that. I had a plan, and the plan was "go listen to interesting, fun things that *I* like, not that I 'should' see. In that vein, I went to a roundtable discussion on Cybersecurity, and I HAVE NO REGRETS. It was fascinating, talking about many aspects of the issue, and I have a few pages of notes and questions that I'd like to talk about further at a later date. It actually sparked an idea for a paper that I'd like to write sometime. Anyway, that was extremely awesome, though somewhat scary and depressing. I realize that the defense department has a point of view that is more doom-laden than the average scholar, but from just the facts, the situation does seem rather unstable.
Third on the list was an event called "Critical Security Studies Methods Cafe" which was an informal, inclusive discussion session between a bunch of different scholars and a few methods specialists. I spent most of my time at the Practice-Based Approaches table, listening to people talk and ask questions about the method, how it fits in to their research, and so on. Most of the scholars seemed to be PhDs, working on their dissertations, or junior scholars working on their books. I won't lie, it was a little intimidating. I listened, mostly out of my depth, (the SFSU IR program is great at a lot of things, but none of those things are methods training) but after an hour of listening I had gotten a small sort of handle on it and was able to make a few meaningful contributions. The positive response I got was really encouraging, I wish there were more opportunities like this.
Last for the day was a discussion of a new book which is actually an old book: a translation of Morgenthau's 1933 The Concept of the Political. As you might know (if you were in 550 with me) I used Morgenthau extensively for my research, and would like to read more of his work. I really think a lot of what Morgenthau had to say is still relevant to the field of IR today, especially given contemporary Realism. It is moving in this stark, "material factors, pure power politics, no items, fox only, final destination" direction, and I really feel that reopening realism to the blurry normative considerations it once thought important is theoretically useful. This is a really awkward paragraph, but I think the meaning is clear. And I even included a Smash reference, but one that is just perfectly apt for the situation.
That was Friday. Tomorrow is another outer space/cyber space panel (should be awesome), as well as another discussion of Realism as a theory, where I should be able to introduce myself to Mearsheimer. There are also about 50 papers I'm interested in reading. I HAVE SO MUCH READING TO DO. Looking at the field from the perspective of an undergrad is frightening, I won't lie. There is SO MUCH you have to catch up on just to be considered appropriately read in the field. Not even well read. Just as read as the average scholar. There is so much important scholarship being done every day, I don't know how anyone really stays on top of it all. If all the papers written for this conference are worth being read, hell if even HALF are worth being read, there are something like 2000 serious academic papers from this ISA alone. To read them before the next Annual Conference, you would need to go through about 5.5 per day, EVERY DAY. Let's say that only one in four papers are about something that you are interested in…that STILL means over one paper per day every day of the year, and you have to keep up that pace every year to stay current. And of course this does not include the important books that are published, or anything written from last year, or any of the classic pieces that every scholar should read. This is why I'm shocked anyone knows anything about what anyone is doing. How do you keep track of all this? I guess people heavily invested in the scholarly lifestyle really don't have a lot of outside hobbies. I doubt there are many PhD candidates that also play professional Starcraft. But that's the life I'm working for. Wish me luck.
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