Paraphrase where you can and only use quotes to add punch when necessary. The commenter’s advice will help you strengthen your work as a historian and conference presenter. The standard presentation of your work that you once knew is no longer good for the etiquette that is necessary for a conference. Paginate. What I should have done was save my snide comment for later (in my defense, I was very quiet, and nobody overheard me), and quietly slipped out to try another session that, ideally, I would already have scouted in the program and marked for quick reference. All rights reserved. Note: Your abstract management software probably offers a service to send your call for papers. I think that the best advice I have ever received about writing came as a result of attending a writing conference. Think about who is going to be there; you will be addressing peers and even distinguished scholars in your field, but you may also be delivering to an audience that is unfamiliar with your field. Your main goal at the end of your presentation will be to emphasize the arguments you have made and why they matter. Ask a fellow graduate student or someone who can give you constructive feedback to comment on your paper. Forget all of the inclinations and preconceived notions you have acquired in the past about what a presentation is supposed to be, conferences have a structure all their own. It can be difficult to clearly project other voices in your narrative. Your personality and cadence are the determining factors between boring and engaging. Listeners also have a difficult time understanding deviation from the narrative so be sure to use examples sparingly. Your overall tone will improve and you will be able to naturally emphasize the words that you find most important. It allows me to use my own time at the conference more judiciously. The commenter is there to help you. Here you write down the main idea of your essay and structurize all arguments into paragraphs to make sure you won’t miss anything while writing. Touch on your topic sentences for the rest of the paper and then finish strong with your conclusion. Now that speakers have developed reputations in my own mind, I refer to these past programs before attending a conference, and make a point of avoiding speakers I’ve previously categorized as "bad" and seeking out those I’ve identified as “good.”. As a general rule, you will want to read directly from your paper during the conference. As a presenter, I prefer a tough, even combative, question to having to deftly parry some mope who’s done nothing more than spend two minutes reciting everything he’s ever read in order to make a comment on my paper that I can’t quite determine the relevance of. This will keep you from straying off topic, forgetting vital information, running over time, or rambling. Therefore, editing your paper will be necessary to present your work in full considering the given time restrictions presented to you at the time of your acceptance to the conference. These tips will help you accomplish those goals. If it takes you longer to read, then shorten your paper. The question-and-answer period is not a time to advertise yourself. When I attended my first major academic conference as a graduate student, I made myself somewhat notorious within my grad program. Even the most seasoned professionals feel anxiety about speaking in front of large groups of people and this is a signifier that you are taking this form of scholarly discourse seriously. Don’t try to attend every session, but ... ... attend a meaningful number of sessions. It’s fine to ask a tough question, as long as it is relevant, asked politely, and doesn’t involve any grandstanding. They are largely empty gestures, and generally don’t help students learn by observing more experienced experts. Grabbing an aisle seat will make it much easier to make a graceful, unobtrusive exit if necessary. You want to be remembered for the content of your work and not for the blunders of your presentation. Write as if you are talking to the reader. Do not let this happen to you. Do not miss the deadline to submit your paper. For the average speaker, one double spaced page takes about two minutes to read. They may begin to feel lost if you introduce too many persons, especially if they are not as familiar as Poe, Lincoln, Wolfe, MLK, or Joyce. One reason I enjoy conferences more now than I used to is my note-taking. Be respectful to those you meet, but don’t be a sycophant with anybody. Leadership essays, in general, are going to be pretty different than the essays you’re used to writing for class. Your time restriction will guide your editing process. This will prevent you from delivering a boring paper. One of the most obnoxious conference attendees is the one who asks a question at the end of a panel, usually eagerly, and uses the moment as an opportunity to: a) recite their own esoteric and usually irrelevant knowledge; b) mask some sort of comment in the guise of a question; c) baldly self-promote; d) disparage the presenter; e) all of the above. Print. Why Can't My New Employees Write? Remember to breathe and take the questions in stride. If the warning comes earlier than expected, this may be the only instance where improvisation is acceptable. Some useful formatting techniques you can adopt for your paper include: If you consider using any of the above formatting techniques, remember to practice with them extensively. It is unprofessional and will reflect poorly on you. Remove clauses which can be lethal, turning them in to more simple, declarative statements that are easy to understand and easy to read. Embrace the experience, know you are among academic friends and know that as a scholar, you are better for it. Try to attend those sessions that seem to directly address your own areas of research. I’ll slip out to a less crowded session. Socialize with people from within and without your own program, no matter how daunting it may seem. It might help to write down the question being asked before you attempt to answer it. Please submit your paper to the scholar who will be commenting on it in a timely manner. © 2020 NC State University. Conference Proceedings -- a collection of papers published as part of an academic conference or other gathering of professionals. MLA guides: Format | Website | Journal | Book | Book Chapter | eBook | Bible | Blog | Database | Dictionary | Encyclopedia | Image | Interview | Magazine | Newspaper | Report | Thesis | YouTube Video, APA guides: Format | Website | Journal | Book | Book Chapter | eBook | Bible | Blog | Database | Dictionary | Encyclopedia | Image | Interview | Magazine | Newspaper | Report | Thesis | YouTube Video, Chicago guides: Format | Website | Journal | Book | Book Chapter | eBook | Bible | Blog | Database | Dictionary | Encyclopedia | Image | Interview | Magazine | Newspaper | Report | Thesis | YouTube Video. Prior to the conference, you want to edit your paper according to your time restrictions and make it as lean and clear as possible. If you know in advance that you will be at risk of running over time, you should make additional cuts. © 2001-2020 EasyBib, a Chegg service. We also want to include conference information (name of conference, date, and location) if not already stated in the name of the proceedings. Leaving in the midst of a session is somewhat more awkward at small, intimate conferences, and so I’d use more discretion at those. Be natural; write as if you are talking to your reader on paper." Prior to a graduate conference, many students remember the days of undergraduate when they were told not to read off a paper when presenting. On the one hand it is useful, but on the other hand coping with this complex assignment is a problem linked to permanent time shortage and study loads placed on students. If you're looking for how to write a conference paper, look no further. While in the audience at a presentation, I leaned over to a friend, muttered a snide remark, left mid-presentation, and walked 30 blocks to a Manhattan fly fishing shop. 350 Withers Hall, Campus Box 8108, Raleigh, NC 27695-8108. I left, but I blew off the whole conference for the whole day instead of finding another session. The Q&A can be scary. If it’s absolutely awful, politely slip out and to a session you’ve designated as a backup. Similarly, I’ve often decided not to attend brilliant sessions because they were too crowded. After the preliminary edits, you will begin the second phase of editing which is only determined after you begin practicing reading your paper aloud. The more you practice reading your conference paper, the more familiar you will become with it. They are not there to embarrass you, but to support your work and push you further with their inquiries. Clearly state your argument, almost to the point that you declare that you are stating your argument. I try to do a bit of both.) Networking, as much as the exchange of information, is really the function of academic conferences. Title of conference, Location, Date of conference. Typically, most conferences allow each presenter approximately 15- 20 minutes, though this is not always standard and times may vary. You do not want to read so quickly on the day of the conference that your audience may find it distracting or worse yet, they may not be able to follow what you are saying or miss key information that is essential to your argument. For you to perfect your writing skills of a position paper, you need to be exposed to different position paper samples. Follow a lark – attend a session that doesn’t on the surface appeal to you on the recommendation of a friend, or simply on your own whim. If you feel the urge to improvise or speak off the cuff, remember that you will have an opportunity to speak extemporaneously during the Q & A portion of the conference. This is simply an average. When presenting a paper at a conference, you will be delivering a document that was originally far lengthier than what you will be reading. Therefore, editing your paper will be necessary to present your work in full considering the given time restrictions presented to you at the time of your acceptance to the conference. A journalistic essay is a combination of journalistic reporting and personal essay writing. Even the most seasoned historians still deliver a conference paper by reading directly off the page. I never was, and am still not, a fan of conferences designed specifically and exclusively for graduate students. Try to keep your hands on the lectern, perhaps using your finger to help keep your place as you move your eyes from paper to audience. Home > Guides > Citation Guides > How to Cite Sources > How to Cite a Conference Paper in APA, MLA or Chicago. The presentation was indeed terrible, but my real problem was that I hadn't yet learned how to attend a conference strategically. Not hearing or remember all parts of a person’s question can increase your anxiety when answering and cause you to misspeak. Even though you will most likely be nervous, try to avoid showing any indication of discomfort through fidgeting or the use of your hands as you speak. You could loose track of what you are saying and your speech could become tangential. This not only is a discreet way to move your pages, but it also gives you the advantage of seeing what is forthcoming. Consider your audience. It allows me to use my own time at the conference more judiciously. This will leave you an upside down stack in the order in which you began. Like a normal conference proceedings, we want to include the name of the entire proceedings, and if there is a specific presentation or paper being cited, include this information as well. Global Warming or Global Meltdown? It means that you know that you have a certain amount of time to convey the most important aspects of your work. Be careful not to ignore one side of the audience. But it will be challenging to do. Nothing could be worse than forgetting what one of your silent signals was supposed to mean. It’s also important to leave your comfort zone and introduce yourself to new people at conferences. That added nervous energy can actually be of benefit to you. Like all citations in a works cited, try to incorporate as much information as you can find. They will then circulate it to the appropriate persons. So, be willing to leave, politely and quietly and discreetly, but you need to have already identified some alternative sessions to quietly and politely arrive to late. If you do not cite anything word for word, use "Works Consulted". The smallness also makes meeting and socializing with new people more possible, less awkward, and less intimidating. Familiarity is essential because it will allow you to naturally project the rhetorical nuances you want to incorporate in your reading. Quick Tips for Productive and Pleasant Conference Attendance: Be the first to know.Get our free daily newsletter. (Incidentally, people I know are very split on whether to attend all your friends' sessions, to support them, or to venture into the unknown. Humanities and Social And keep your question CONCISE. After you have extracted a rough draft of your paper in this way, go through and edit for clarity. Making use of such a system of course also means that you check out the conference program ahead of time. You may run out of time before you are able to completely present your work. Upload a paper to check for plagiarism against billions of sources and get advanced writing suggestions for clarity and style. Finally, a pet peeve of mine, and many others I know, concerns the question-and-answer period of a conference session. Sciences, Instructors, Graduate Teaching Assistants and Student Workers, Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies. How your paper looks to you will also be important. Using some of these suggestions could be helpful, but using too many could be distracting. Enjoy a nice or local or exotic meal if you can, preferably with others. As a general rule, you will have time to make one major point. Sentences with semicolons or dependent clauses may be hard to understand for your listening audience. I love the routine of going through a program very thoroughly as I fly in to a conference, if I can get an advance copy. To avoid this, the “sliding method” should be employed. See some of the city you’re in, but perhaps not by conspicuously walking out during the middle of a session. If you make substantial changes to your conference paper after you have already submitted it to the conference committee (say you find new sources that better evidences your argument), send an updated version of your paper directly to the commenter with a polite note addressing what changes you made and why you felt the need to make them at this time. I recommend hitting a few small, focused conferences, even if they aren’t necessarily in your primary area of expertise. It depends on the time frame, How the shift to remote learning might affect students, instructors and colleges, Live Updates: Latest News on Coronavirus and Higher Education, 10 strategies to support students and help them learn during the coronavirus crisis (opinion), We are retiring comments and introducing Letters to the Editor. Then proceed to slide the second page onto the first. Be careful that you continue to face the audience when you refer them to your visuals. You want to provide them ample time to reflect on your work and make a good impression on anyone and all attendants of the conference. The purpose is to inform a wider audience of the papers presented at the conference and to document the work of scholars who have participated in that conference. | Just Visiting, Advice for students so they don't sound silly in emails (essay), Trump administration proposes major overhaul to student visa rules, Online learning fails to deliver, finds report aimed at discouraging politicians from deregulating, How to write an effective diversity statement (essay), Are states disinvesting in higher education? Sure enough, you can write an essay without outlining it. Organize your information in a highly structured The more transparent your structure, the more likely an audience will be able to follow what you are saying. State it, develop it, and repeat it. This will help you digest the question in full and allow you to answer it thoroughly. Many speakers “side” unconsciously. Many students agonize over the strict adherence to reading directly from the paper for the fear of it being boring, this does not have to be the case. A publishing executive said at the beginning of her talk, "To write easily and well, simply be yourself. Making use of such a system of course also means that you check out the conference program ahead of time. Practice making eye contact with your audience.