Research Woes

I recently attended a third academic conference in 2024. Don't get me wrong, I love conferences. I love how each session I attend inspires me, provides me with new theory and methods, and introduces me to other scholars in my field. I love the happy hours, appetizers, and group meet ups. I love getting to explore a tiny part of a new city.

Most of all, however, I love sharing my research. Every conference I attend, I hope I get enough feedback on my work to revise it and make it publish-worthy. This may be the most different in-person conference experience I've had so far in my academic career.

I have learned to not expect too many attendees for each panel or roundtable I've been on. The one with the most attendance would probably be a tie between a roundtable on motherhood I presented at during NeMLA 2022 or a panel called Fabricating the Body I moderated during MMLA 2022. The rooms were packed to the brim and after the presentations, there were plenty of questions, discussions, and perspectives to be shared among the panelists and the attendees. I loved it. I now long for similar experiences whenever I present at a conference.

Until my most recent conference, the panel I presented on with the least amount of attendees was a panel on mental health and musicals at NeMLA. We had about 3 attendees not including us 3 presenters. However, with small turn-out, we still had really cool discussions and shared perspectives on different musicals. Our research intertwined a bit so we shared some sources. It was close-knit and felt special, especially as my first presentation at a large national conference.

Now, I have a new low. The panel on equity in the writing center, which was moderated and organized by my colleague and close friend, had a mere 2 attendees. One of them was my advisor. I'm not going to lie, I know I'm not a major or even average writer in my field. Still, everybody I told about my presentation mentioned their interest and hopes of attending. None of them showed up. I think something that made it worse was the room itself. Other panels I had attended were small rooms with 3 rows of 8 chairs, some of which had been so packed I needed to drag an extra chair from outside to the panel. Our panel, however, was a bit out of the way but in an exceptionally large room with at least 10 rows of empty chairs. I wondered if this was by chance or if the organizers had originally thought that our presentation would be popular and well-attended. I also thought the timing was perfect. 2 p.m. was after the lunch rush, not too early in the morning, and a day in the middle of the conference. None of the logistics seemed to match the outcome.

I should probably be happy less people were there. I think I choked half way through and started speaking way too fast and I went over my time limit by about 3 minutes even though my colleagues said my presentation was great. It just didn't make sense to me. I don't write my papers and research until they feel as perfect as possible just for me to gain the CV line (which is nice either way I guess). I want to share my research with others. I want to have good discussions that inspire my next revisions. I want to learn about sources I didn't originally find. I want to see what others are pursuing related to the same field of study. I want to eventually get published. I felt like a joke presenting to an empty room of chairs with my advisor and one attendee. Who knows if any of my research would inspire them or make any changes in writing centers outside my own university.

I am thankful that the one new attendee gathered around in front when I awkwardly invited them to come close and join our already small group. I hope she did get something out of the presentations. I hope they inspired something within her.

At the end of the day, I will not know if anything I presented on made a difference in anybody's personal or researcher lives. However, this presentation just felt especially disappointing. It made me feel as if nobody cared about our topic, which I thought was extremely important as pretty much every school has a writing center and they could always be more equitable. I'm hoping for a better turn out at my next conference presentation, which looks like it will be at PaMLA 2024 in my hometown of Palm Springs.

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