Dr. Ayse Zarakol of the University of Cambridge joins the Hayseed Scholar podcast. Dr Zarakol chats with Brent about growing up in Turkey, her decisions to attend college in the US, become a political science and classics double-major, and pursue a Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin (and her dissatisfaction before it with work as a paralegal). She talks about graduate school, developing her dissertation and choosing her dissertation chair, her success on the job market before the financial crisis in 2008 eliminated a lot of options, publishing her first book, and her eventual move to where she is today at Cambridge. Dr Zarakol also shares how she approaches writing, her research, exercising with weight training and boxing, and what she thinks will be the lasting impact of the pandemic on International Relations going forward.