Social Media for BCUR14 | bcur14nottingham

For any conference these days, such as ⌗BCUR14 or really any other academic conference, the game plan for delegates and presenters has changed enormously withe the seemingly unstoppable rise of the internet- enabled phone and tablet. Basically, what has happened is that conference attenders can now use Twitter, Facebook and a wide range of social media platforms to offer live commentaries and analyses about papers being presented. If down well, the availability of such commentaries allows scholars who are not able to be physically present at the conference to follow discussions and even contribute. It also allows delegates who attend, lets say, session A, to look at tweets about Session B, or where somebody collates a storify, to catch up with discussions that way. Its pretty amazing really.

just how much good tweeting can do to enrich a conference experience, is demonstrated by the quote below:

Perhaps more importantly, I also know that others benefited from my live-tweeting. I have a fair number of followers, the vast majority of whom are not Classicists. One might have expected them to voice some dismay as I merrily filled up their timelines with conference chatter, but their response was quite the opposite: I received nothing but enthusiasm from them. Simply by being at the conference and sharing a small sliver of my experience, I was able to generate real excitement for the field of Classics amongst people who would otherwise have very little exposure to this kind of material. One individual even mentioned that it had helped finalize their decision to pursue a Classics degree. I don’t mention this to brag, but instead to illustrate that the power and promise of Twitter is in just how vast an audience it can reach, and how varied that audience can be, including everyone from authors under discussion (as in the case of Caroline Lawrence) to students considering their futures. Though live-tweeting obviously can’t offer a follower the whole experience or advantages of attending a conference in person, there are clear benefits to actively engaging with these external voices.

In the absence of Twitter, my trip to Reading would not have been wasted. Too many people worked too hard for that to have ever been a potential outcome, and I’m grateful to everyone who helped make the conference possible. In the simplest terms, I’m sure I would still have met many people and learned many things – but reflecting on the examples I’ve shared, I’m also quite sure that without Twitter, my experience would have been much less rich overall. Far from being a frivolous waste of time, Twitter was in fact key to me making the best use of my time in Reading, and I’ve no trouble believing it would prove equally useful to others.

(Robert Harris is currently an MA student at the University of Birmingham. He intends to start a PhD this year and tweets under the name @foalpapers. For the full story, follows this link.

This process of live-tweeting though works best if a number of basic rules are adhered to, and here I would like to acknowledge Dr Liz Gloyn (@lizgloyn) as the author of a “tweeting Guide’, linked to below. Gloyn’s superb piece was written for the Classical Association 2014 Conference, but her advice is equally valid for ⌗BCUR14. Just change her hashtag to ours, and we should be off. Add any advice you have through the comments:

Tweeting the CA Conference ⌗CA14

Gabriele Neher (@gabrieleneher)

In the run up to the conference, things are really getting exciting now. On Thursday 14th April 2014, the University of Nottingham published the following press release:

Nottingham showcase for fledgling researchers

Here is a little look; for the full story, click the link above:

Research undertaken by students as part of their undergraduate degree studies is to be showcased at an international conference to be held at The University of Nottingham later this month.

The event, which will feature posters and presentations from students from 20 countries from around the globe, will offer many participants their first taste of a genuine academic conference as well as an impressive addition to their professional CV.

The British Conference of Undergraduate Research (BCUR), which takes place on University Park campus on the 14th and 15th April this year, aims to highlight the top quality research which many students undertake during the final year of their first degree — work which in the past has been often largely overlooked.

@gabrieleneher

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