Welcome to an experiment in making a research community. Hook & Eye is going to host its first-ever live event. We’ve never done this before, but we’ve never been so in need of community and connection.
I’ve been thinking about doing this ever since I had an alarming conversation last week where I realized that I had become profoundly disconnected from my research. I had agreed to chat with a university librarian about my research for a survey they were doing. I couldn’t even remember the most basic nouns connected to my work, never mind the name of the book I’m trying to finish. It was scary. I felt like a toddler learning to talk — except that it was about the things that I have spent a decade researching.
We know that women are submitting fewer journal articles, and that women’s research productivity has plummeted since this emergency began. Mine certainly has. I also know that I am more likely to do something if I promise other people that I will do it with them. We also know that many of our students study better by watching someone else study. We can learn a lot from our students.
So, if you’d like to join me, let’s try working together apart. Let’s pretend we are going to a beautiful library to work for a while.
Here’s what it’s actually going to look like.
On Monday, May 25, 2020 at 11.30am EST, I will commit to doing one whole hour of research with you.
If you want to join me, please sign up here. I’ll send you the details of where and how to find me the night before.
When you arrive, you will see me at my desk. I’ll chat for a few minutes but will get to work at 11.35am EST on the nose. I will be closing the virtual door to our virtual room at that point so please be on time because I will be focusing on my work and won’t be looking up to let latecomers in. Sorry!
Once we close the door and start working, I will be muting my mic as well as yours. This will be like being in the library but with less whispering.
I’ll leave my video on but please don’t feel that you have to as well. We know that one of the most exhausting things about a virtual meeting is looking at yourself. I won’t be looking at my own video.
I’m probably going to be listening to some music on my headphones. You might want that too. Or you can listen to the sound of being in a not-quiet library in New York, or the sound of a slightly quieter library (pages turning, keys clicking, chairs being pushed around once in a while). Whatever works for you.
At the end of the hour, I will look up and wave good-bye but won’t say anything in case you are in a happy work groove and want to keep working.
And, even if you can’t join us, find a few minutes or an hour, or even a few hours, and open up that document that you haven’t seen in months, or read that book or journal article that has been patiently waiting for you to come back to it. Know that we are are cheering you on in our own quiet and distant-but-close ways.
Hook & Eye 
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