I just had a funny realization about a big mismatch between grad school training (in my experience at least) and actual research practice (1):

In grad school everything was seminar based--essentially in person conversation, debate, posturing, whatever. And this was basically the model for intellectual engagement and working through issues (2)

The way intellectual practice actually works, though, is basically by correspondence. We write drafts, circulate them, and people write comments or reviews and send them back to us. Occasionally we hop on the phone. Sometimes we go to workshops or seminars. But (3)

Mostly, it's all done, the actual production of articles and books and essays and the like, asynchronously via correspondence (4).

I'm sure someone's realized this before, but it just struck me--most of what I do is correspond. Send attachments, and write letters. It's all epistolary. (5)

What's kind of crazy about the difference between these two modes of producing ideas is that they require completely different sets of emotional labor. Seminars reward quickness and (often obnoxiously) taking up space, corresponding (seems to) reward deliberation and care.