Workshops, redux
posted by Kaimipono D. Wenger
A few weeks ago, I posted a request for information about where colloquia or workshopping programs are. (There were not a whole lot of responses at the time, perhaps because of AALS timing — please feel free to weigh in if you haven’t yet done so.) One reader, a junior professor, e-mailed the following question which I thought was worth a follow-up post:
I saw your post about Solum’s suggestions about getting around and workshopping papers. Was there any discussion of whether it is permissible/proper/polite/good etiquette to contact schools about doing workshops? I always had the sense that (somewhat like lateral hiring), schools found you. Am I wrong about that? Because I agree with Solum that workshopping is the best way to get your name and your stuff out there. Just curious.
What is the best way to put out feelers or contact a school about workshopping? Do any of our readers or participants have suggestions or comments?
January 19, 2007 at 8:45 pm
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Responses (2)
anon - January 20, 2007 at 12:44 pm
Unless you are a big name person at an elite school, it’s pretty tough to arrange your own workshop gigs. There are exceptions, of course. By all means, contact your friends who are chairs of their school’s faculty enrichment committee and let them know you have a piece you are workshopping if they are interested. You could do the same for other friends not in such positions, but it’s going to be difficult unless you are at a higher ranked school than your friend (in which case it might be considered a “coup” for your friend to score a workshop with you). Asking the chair without an in, however, is likely going to be as successful as sending your resume blindly when you were on the market. On the other hand, you should submit reprints and draft working papers to the organizers of any colloquia specifically in your area of research (in recent years, these include especially tax, law & economics, IP, legal history, international law). At the very least, even if it doesn’t lead to a workshop invite it may get some of the leaders in the field exposed to your work. Other potentially successful strategies, not in any order of priority: (1) Submit to AALS calls for paper from individual sections and from the Junior Scholars award, (2) Submit to the Stanford/Yale Junior Faculty Forum Call for Papers when one of your areas is up (they alternate between public and private law, roughly speaking), (3) Offer to present at the Southeastern AALS junior scholars workshop (if your school is a member) or the Central States AALS (not specifically for junior scholars, but very non-elitist), (4) Submit to ASLH, ALEA, Law & Society conferences – the latter of which is essentially open admissions, especially if you submit as a panel. The value to presenting at conferences is that your name gets out and people you don’t know may see you and think to invite you in future years (5) Seek an invite to the various junior scholars workshops that have sprung up in specific areas (tax and employment both have them; Virginia has had a general one for a few years), (6) Seek out workshops in your university’s other departments if you do interdisciplinary work, or (7) ask your associate dean to help (better if s/he is associate dean for research or faculty development). In recent years, many schools have set up faculty exchanges with roughly peer schools. You can try to get on that list. If none of that works, think like a young associate. Just like a young associate’s “clients” are partners, your audience can be a subset of your faculty. No reason you can’t set something up with them – they’ll usually be willing to help. Alternatively, call all of the juniors together at your school and set up a workshop series brown bag. If it’s successful, expand it to juniors at neighboring schools. It won’t look as good on your resume (except as a testament to your organizational and entrepreneurial skills), but it might help the paper more.
Another Anon - January 24, 2007 at 12:46 am
Post a lot of stuff on SSRN. Get to know people. Go to conferences. You’ll start to get on lists, and calls will come.
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