Remember that political science is a scholarly community of students, teachers, researchers, and practitioners
Recognize that community members can be a part of different subfields
Political science is a discipline of students, teachers, researchers, and practitioners. But instead of thinking of political science as an academic discipline, we can think of it as a community, or better yet, a social network of individuals that associate it groups. The relationships within groups of students, teachers, researchers, and practitioners typically consumes our time and attention. For example, if you are a student, you may have disagreed with a classmate said during an in-class discussion. You may have wanted to respond, but the class ended, so you needed to wait for the next class to offer your perspective. Another example comes from a doctoral-level graduate student who is presenting their research for the first time at an academic conference. A graduate student is typically nervous about this experience because it is one of the first times they are interacting with faculty beyond their university. This example is slightly different because it demonstrates the interaction between groups.
The social network of political science is dynamic and the interactions between groups help shape the discipline in meaningful ways. For example, the American Political Science Association’s “Political Science Now” blog featured a blog post titled “APSA Announces the New Editorial Team for the American Political Science Review”. The American Political Science Review, also known as APSR, is a flagship journal for the discipline. This means that many political science researchers seek to submit and have their articles accepted for publication in the journal. What is notable about the new Editorial Team is that it’s all women: the first time in the Association’s 100+ year history for this to occur. To many, this represents a sea change in the discipline to not just ensure description representation, but also substantive representation. Now, this sea change is only possible because the political science community is increasingly diverse and interacting regularly.
In addition to the social network of political science, there is also sub-disciplinary networks of students, teachers, researchers, and practitioners that engage in the acquisition, creation, and dissemination of knowledge. At the core of this sub-disciplinary networks are the subfields of political science: American Government and Politics; Comparative Politics; International Relations; Political Theory; Political methodology; Public policy; and Political science education.
Each subfield is populated by students, teachers, researchers, and practitioners. For example, you may be a 2nd-year political science student at a community college. For your fall semester, you are enrolled in Introduction to International Relations and Introduction to Political Science Research Methods. This means you would be a student in two of the seven subfields for the term. And your professors are teachers within those subfields. You may discover that your professor of Introduction to Political Science Research Methods also conducts Political Science Education research, so that would also make them a researcher in another subfield. Individuals can be a part of different subfields in different roles, and you as a student, are beginning to discover the communities of individuals that make up these subfields. Consider another example: You decide to write a paper in your international relations class about the number of indigenous people who have served as UN representatives for countries around the world. To complete this paper, you will explore scholarship in international relations, comparative politics, and perhaps even U.S. government. Thus, as a budding political scientist, you traverse the sub-fields as well.