By Shuting Xia, 5 October 2020
I remember from my very first meeting with my supervisor Dr Brendan Burchell back on 17th May 2017, he specifically mentioned ILM, a reading group he set up decades ago. After introducing what ILM was and how people were involved in, he proudly told me that a tradition of ILM was to go to Southwold for a three-day intensive reading retreat every year in May. Hoping to engage in some insightful discussions and learn various ideas from the smartest brains, I curiously and nervously took part in my very first ILM meeting in November 2017.
The next May, we went to Southwold. I found that the retreat was not as scary as I’d expected with a lot of thinking and fun. Since then, the biweekly ILM discussions have been a real joy to me and the highlight of my academic experience at Cambridge. This year, I was especially looking forward to the Southwold reading retreat because I’d missed the previous trip because of fieldwork. Unfortunately, whether next year’s retreat would be there is an unsettling question now.
The pandemic fundamentally changed the norm for everyone. I missed the ILM meeting due to a precautious self-isolation after coming back from a Spring Festival quarantine this February in China. I did not have to. According to the NHS advice at that time, only people from the epidemic centre in China or people with symptoms should isolate themselves. But I knew how serious it was in China but the alarm in other parts of the world was not loud enough. I felt so relieved and grateful when I was back to ILM meeting. We keenly talked about this year's Southwold retreat. I was thinking to challenge myself to swim in the sea, something that I’d held back from because of the cold water in May 2018. Everything was going well until March. ILM marked the end of the Lent term with a film and discussion in the MCR of Jesus College. After watching Sorry We Missed You, there was a moment of silence. I think it was partly because of the cloudy uncertainty of where the gig economy will bring people to in the future of work, and partly because of the inexorable reality we were all in. The number of confirmed cases of coronavirus in Europe were growing exponentially.
With everything becoming virtual since the lockdown in the UK, our ILM meeting moved online as no great surprise. Everyone looked a little heavy on our first Zoom meeting on 2 April, but our thinking was not off as we were confined to our homes. We shared concerns about how the pandemic would shape sociological research and talked about whether the inequality of employment would be mitigated or widen. A silver of a silver lining is that the virtual ILM has provided a chance to read more than we used to – we even finished a book! We also had new members join in who we haven’t even met in person yet. Although we can’t do the BBQ in Southwold, share snacks in meeting room 1 at the department, continue our discussion at a nearby pub after the meeting, nor punt along the river Cam with Brendan's instruction on how to use the pole, we still share our recent reflections on a weekly basis. We discuss with ILMers who are in Hong Kong, Beijing, Delhi, Cambridge and other parts of the world. We know each other through the shared background with which we showed up in front of the camera, an angle that we’d never had before.
Yes, pandemic sucks. But ILM is still always uplifting.
