[...] and has floated around the biblioblogosphere.  Chris Heard at Higgaion and Charles Halton at Awilum picked up on the idea and added some [...]

[...] a conference paper I read at Awilum that various bloggers have been giving their opinions on boring conference papers after SBL/A…. Charles suggests: Practice your paper before you give it–if you do this you won’t wind up in a [...]

Good points, Charles. In an ideal world, I’d say you’re absolutely on the money.

About the idea of being provocative and only presenting if you have something to say:

Many profs. won’t get funding from their school to attend the meeting unless they are actively participating. So, everyone tries to get something together. You’d think that all the competition would weed the bad eggs out. From what I hear, it does partly. But since most people only have to submit an abstract, sometimes really bad papers (or presenters) get on the schedule.

As for resume padding, schools demand annual reports from their faculty. Having a presentation, especially in a year that has produced little in terms of publication–because the poor prof. is doing six courses, four of which are new!, makes a person look busy. Tenure may also be on the line. Younger scholars have to get out there and gain a reputation. The extra line on the c.v. gives that impression, even if a publication would look better.

The situation is unfortunate, and it creates a lot of anxiety, pressure, and competition. I was lucky this year. I got funding whether I read a paper or not. Conference money was part of my terms of employment for the first four years in my position. I would encourage all younger scholars to ask for conference money, say for two meetings a year, as part of their terms of employment.

Here’s a question off the topic, sort of: What do people think about paper recyclers? I am of the opinion that one should not read the same paper at more than one conference unless the conferences have no overlap in interest. (I’m not talking about invited papers to seminars, etc.) For example, I’ve never read a regional SBL paper at a later national SBL meeting. The odd thing here is that the SBL seems to encourage this kind of thing–look at the regional scholars award benefits. Is the regional meeting a warm-up for the nationals? The overlap issue is a hard one to call, too. I’ve never read a paper at the AOS and then tried to get it on the schedule at SBL because I figure many of the interested persons in the SBL section were probably also at AOS. There might be some overlap, and I don’t want to be a conference hog. Does this seem too restrictive?

Alan, your comments are valid–I guess my critique is better suited to the ideal world that we don’t live in. However, if someone uses SBL as resume or annual report padding, they still should bring a presentation that is beneficial to the attenders.

I would certainly not recycle a paper given in a regional SBL and use it again in the national meeting. I would be more comfortable reading the same paper at two conferences in which I knew the attenders would be different. I don’t think you’re being too restrictive to not read the same paper at both SBL and AOS, I think you’re just being respectful of the audience and the intentions of the meetings.

I agree that the papers should actually try to be interesting; it’s in the scholar’s best interest, even when under pressure to participate or look busy, to present something that shows some creativity and at least a hint of originality.

The reason I asked about recycling is because I heard a colleague say that a title change is all the is really needed to give the same talk at two different conferences (like the regional vs. national AAR/SBL). I was pretty shocked at the suggestion and said so. The person accused me of being too “ethical.” . . . Needless to say, the conversation was a bit disturbing. So I wanted to see if others were playing by the same restrictions that I was using–which I think are quite reasonable.

Finally, I’m sorry we didn’t get together at SBL. Are you going to AOS?

Alan, I haven’t decided whether I’m going to AOS this year if I do we’ll definitely have to get together. I’m sorry also about missing each other at SBL. I ran into Jeff Cooley and he wanted to catch up with you as well…hopefully next year.

I forgot to mention, that is an interesting statement that your colleague said–that scholar will gain a less than desirable reputation if he/she keeps doing that. I think your restrictions are very reasonable and will serve you well in the long run.

As an ethical, unemployed scholar who is conscientious of what his CV looks like, here’s my perspective: In the past 7 years I have presented 10 papers in 7 different venues (SBL-3; AOS-2), and never presented the same paper twice. I have presented papers on different aspects of a broad topic (rooted in my dissertation), but in each case it took a lot of work to craft an oral presentation–quite different from the written original–that would succeed in communicating something useful to the audience. The two papers that were most alike were presented at two different conferences, two years apart.

[...] at Blue Cord, the post by Chris Heard at Higgaion, one by Duane Smith at Abnormal Interests and another by Charles [...]

[...] bibliobloggers usually wait until Thanksgiving weekend to gripe talk about what…makes…unsuccessful…presentations. But “presenting” is just a more palatable word for “lecturing,” and summer [...]

[...] how to present effectively (or at least, not crashingly boringly) at the professional conferences comes up perennially on the blogs, usually (for us Bible types) around the time of our November [...]