First symposium, sounds fun?

Welcome back. Since you decided to come back here, great! I believe your fond of confessions, and I seem to enjoy confessing. 

The last time you visited, you read about my first week at uni and how excited I was (and am!) with the topic just opening eyes like a newborn baby in the world of research. But now, let’s go on a day trip, to Southampton (yay) for a symposium! (umm) 

For those of us who aren’t familiar with what a symposium is, it is a meeting or a conference were people of the same discipline come together and discuss their work. Now mind you, these people are R.E.S.E.A.R.C.H.E.R.S which means they have not just written the paper, but have been at a point in their life where they’ve dreamt, breathed and lived thinking only about their work, with all of its how and what and whys. So, basically, they are individuals who are well learnt in their fields and are brave enough to not just present it to other intelligent, critical and analytical people in the room or hall but are also ready to answer any questions and are, more often than usual open to ideas and changes – which at that point may seem challenging and more daunting. It’s the “those shoes with that dress.. wow” feeling. You get it now.

Now let’s confess about the symposium. The symposium was held and conducted at and by the literature department at the University of Southampton, on work done on colonial, postcolonial and decolonial cultures, languages, and history. As the topic suggested, it was a symposium discussing work and research done in the field of literature and history rather than one focusing on linguistics, or language teaching or ELT. Though this wasn’t an event which was directly related to my field of work, I attended the program for 2 main reasons

1. It was my first ever symposium as a research student, which means I would learn a lot from others, network and gain experience
2. The symposium was on my field of interest(s)

Attending a symposium which isn’t from the same discipline as my current and future work, may sound and seem irrelevant at this time but the main purpose was to learn about what being a researcher is, the work and effort one needs to put into their research papers, the skills they hold and understanding that it isn’t a child’s play but serious work, and most importantly, to prove as to why you chose this topic and how you can add to the field. And this is exactly what I learned. Your work stands out when you prove it to be outstanding in your ways and justifying with enough knowledge as to you as the researchers believe in your research work needs to be “your baby” so to say. There were around 10 papers submitted and presented that day, all of them unique and enlightening in their way. 

While listening to the speakers/ researchers present their papers, with their in-depth knowledge of the subject area, specialization and their careful description of characters and objects, made me question myself, whether I had the required skills of critically analyzing a text and looking at a line, phrase or character, beyond the obvious. I think it’s time to look into what skills I need to develop further and learn from what I’ve seen.