Hi , it has been a while since I posted an article on my blog. This is partly because I am too busy to think of what would be a good blog post.
But now, i am in Portland , Oregon for a the annual meeting of Western Political Science Association. This is probably the most Western conference it can be on political science and it is also the most Western point I have ever been in my life. The most eastern corner that I have visited remains to be the city of Erzurum where my elder brother served for army for eight months.
Let’s get back to the conference. It takes place in Marriot Waterfront hotel that is very close to the river and walking distance from downtown. I am staying at a hotel that is six-minutes away from the conference hotel and there is basically no traffic in Portland. Tomorrow, I will present my paper on local voting rights of immigrants in Europe at 8 am in the morning. I am planning to share feedback here in my blog tomorrow. If it is too critical, I might have to sleep over it for a while before writing a blogpost:)
I have attended two panels so far. In the first one, there were only two panelists and I was late and missed one. The second one was the following:
What is Freedom? An Existential Critique of Western Liberalism and International Affairs in the ”War on Terror”
Radheshwar, S. Jovian, sjradheshwar@gmail.com, University of California – Santa Barbara
I think Phd Candidate did a very good job in making his point and criticizing liberalism , actually how liberalism diverted from J.S. Mill and it has become a source of many problems in the political world. I recommend you to follow his career. He is surely a passionate academic who has a wide view of the politics around the world. Other then him being a little unclear on how he defines what ‘freedom’ is , he was very clear and articulate.
In the second panel I attended, the discussants suggested that the way we measure public opinion and the way we use dummy variables for race and ethnicity is wrong. I think that was my take away point. Not that i am convinced, but i will certainly pay more attention.
Palmer and Paterson (2012) , borrowed pyscological explanations on political participation and tested whether five major traits are significant in explaining the political outcomes.
During the lunch break, I visited Powell’s book store and it is really huge. My friend, Ege, told me about it but it is really huge. I felt like I should buy books and grabbed two from Politics section:) not surprisingly…
Currently I am enjoying Starbucks coffee at the lobby and about to go to a panel that is very similar to mine tomorrow , actually in the same room:) and my discussant is going to present a paper.
updated at 3pm on March 22nd, 2012
and now it is a Friday afternoon, and I am certainly enjoying the feeling that I am done with my presentation and now have time to interact with people and attend several lectures.
My presentation went well. There was a technical issue and I could not connect my computer to the large screen. I recommend everyone to take care of themselves in the conferences. There was a connector cord for non-apple computers, but for Macs, the conference was not prepared. I am now at the lobby and half of the people use Macs, so I think I have a right to complain, here.
The discussant of the panel was Robin Harper from City University of New York and Dvora Yanow from University of Wageningen was the chair. Robin Harper really helped to place my research in a general framework of social science and I certainly would enjoy that input. There were also obvious problems that I already knew and I justified why I used the variables that I used etc.
Later on I attended Bingham Powell’s talk. I am surprised that he could only attract 10-15 people in a conference of this scale. I think he has a lot to be learned from.
By the way for visitors of Portland in the future, I will suggest a great restaurant, called Dick’s Kitchen. I absolutely loved the place and its food and its friendly service. It made my day before the conference. Tonight is my last in Portland and i will just try a new place but Dick’s was seriously to good to ignore even though it would be two nights in a row.
Tomorrow , I am flying back to Binghamton with a long chain of flights, from Portland to Seattle, from Seattle to D.C and finally to Binghamton.
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