Presenting at the 2015 PopCAANZ Conference (Wellington, NZ)
Next week I’m heading to Wellington, New Zealand to present at PopCAANZ 2015 (AKA The 2015 Popular Culture Association of Australia and New Zealand Conference).
It’s my first time presenting at an academic conference (and also my first time visiting New Zealand) and I feel surprisingly prepared. That’s the result of a conscious plan mind you. I could very easily see myself sitting in my hotel room the night before my presentation sweating over the fact that I still hadn’t really nailed down what I was going to say. So, I built in a couple of pre-presentation presentation commitments to make sure that, if I was going to have that horrible night before, it was going to be the night before some other, lower-stakes event.
And it worked :) Which is not to say that I’m 100% happy with the presentation I’ve written. I know it’s not a good reflection of where my thinking about my project is actually at. But, it will do. It’s prepared, it’s thoughtful and it’s good enough. Funnily enough, learning to take a step forward when I feel like what I’ve got is only just good enough is likely to be one of the best outcomes of doing a PhD for me.
Now, back to work and those many, many chapter words I need to write and interview transcripts I still need to finish!