Academic Hair Association ...

The American Historical Association will meet from 6-9 January in Seattle and some of the Cliopatriarchs will be there. In fact, some of us expect to meet for the 2nd Annual Cliopatria Banquet at the convention. The 1st Annual Banquet at last year's AHA convention was canceled at the last minute, when I was struck with a humiliating illness and had to cancel out on the convention. But this year, we're doing it. The major problem is that we've never actually met each other, so how will we recognize fellow Cliopatriarchs among all the mere mortal historians at the AHA convention?

I was thinking about that when I read Fontana Labs' account of his experience at the Eastern Division meeting of the American Philosophical Association in Boston. He wasn't actually there,* but his account of it rang so true of all academic conventions that I'm just plagiarizing his whole thing over here at Cliopatria:

I couldn't liveblog it, sadly, but here's what it would have been like if I did:

Tuesday night: arrive in Boston, find the hotel, run into some old friends, have dinner. I see Cornel West back in the lobby, but I resist the temptation to ask him if he lists his CD on his CV. I stop by the reception ("the smoker" if you're old-school) and run into at least three people who are demonstrably smarter than me and have either no jobs at all or really bad jobs. I resolve to be a less terrible person in the new year. I drink several cups of the bad (but free) beer the APA hands out at this thing while resenting that I'm one of the only people tipping the bartenders.

I make this solemn vow: I will never have extravagant academic hair, the kind of hair that makes you look like you're trying too hard to look eccentric and brilliant, the kind of hair that everyone who knows better laughs at.

Later Tuesday night: hit a nearby bar with the old grad school cronies. Some of these guys are as-yet unemployed, so I put everyone on my tab. Suddenly my friends start drinking Chivas.

Wednesday morning: I wake up around 10 hating myself for having too much to drink. I console myself with"Dawson's Creek"-- Joey finally gets laid! Dawson handles euthanasia! I wonder just how pleasurable it would be to punch James Vanderbeek in the face.

Wednesday afternoon: I make it to the gay marriage session. I'm a little scared by Cheshire Calhoun's hair, but her paper is mildly interesting, if not really philosophical. Claudia Card: still hatin' on marriage. I notice that Richard Mohr, professional homosexual, is wearing a leather tie. I resist the temptation to ask if he's still getting royalties for"My Sharona." Ralph (say"Rafe") Wedgwood is there, and, as usual, looks resplendent and contemptuous at the same time. I admire his pants in a heterosexual sort of way.

Overheard in an elevator. Civilian:"is there some kind of convention here?" APA guy:"it's the American Philosophical Association-- mostly philosophy professors." Civilian:"Oh, that explains all the beards."

Wednesday night: a nice dinner with friends, then another round at the reception. I make some attempts to schmooze, but my heart's not in it. I see one prominent philosopher grab the ass of another during a hello embrace. Sweet. We head to a bar, have trouble finding one, and make it just before last call. Fortunate: this lets me catch my train the next morning without any problem.

Note to all the other Cliopatriarchs: I'm the one with the extravagant academic hair.

*Correction: Ogged tells me that Fontana Labs actually was at the eastern division meeting of the APA. He just wasn't liveblogging. It sounded pretty much like most academic conventions I've attended.