Annual Meeting: General Information

Getting on the ASA Meeting Program: A Practical Guide

by Peggy Pascoe and David Gutierrez &
revisions by Philip Deloria, Ann Fabian, and Anthony Lee

In 1996, Program Committee co-chairs David Gutierrez and Peggy Pascoe wrote a particularly useful article outlining the workings of an ASA program committee, and explaining the ways committees go about building a program. Pascoe and Gutierrez detailed submissions procedures, explained decision-making processes in the committee, and offered useful tips for those planning to submit proposals. Nearly a decade later, the 2005 co-chairs were charged with revisiting the original article. Many elements in the process remain unchanged (and we’ve left most of David and Peggy’s excellent advice exactly as it was offered), but other aspects require additional comment. What follows is our updating of the original article, in light of our experiences in 2005.

The American Studies Association enjoys a proud tradition of broad and extensive participation in its annual meetings. In the spirit of that tradition, we’d like to offer advice for faculty members, independent scholars, public practitioners, and graduate students planning to submit their first paper or session proposals. We have specific suggestions for how to increase the chances that your proposal will be accepted and how to make your panel a success after it has been accepted, but both will make more sense if you understand how the ASA Program Committee works.

Each January, the American Studies Association receives several hundred proposals for papers and sessions. Between half and two-thirds of these proposals are for panels complete with paper-givers, chairs, commentators, (or, in the case of “conversation” panels, a list of participating panelists); the remainder are for individual papers. The number of proposals has grown steadily over the years, and the advent of electronic submissions in 2004 has resulted in a boom in proposal submissions.

In 2005, the committee evaluated 400 full panel and 506 single paper proposals. After receiving basic handling by the ASA office staff, all these proposals are passed on electronically, via a restricted access website, to the Program Committee. The committee consists of a dozen scholars representing a wide variety of fields and approaches to American Studies, led by two or three co-chairs. The Program Committee divides itself into three subcommittees, and then divides the proposals among those subcommittees so that each subcommittee receives about a third of the total. In early February, each member of each subcommittee reads every proposal given to that subcommittee and assigns it a numerical rating on the basis of academic merit. The scores are automatically totaled and averaged by the electronic submissions system.

After this initial round of readings has been completed (usually in early March), the Program Committee convenes for an intensive three-day meeting to make its final decisions. Proposals that fall in the top third of the numerical rankings are ordinarily placed on the program without much debate, and those that rank in the bottom third are ordinarily rejected. Proposals that fall in the middle are discussed in depth in individual subcommittee meetings. Two of the three subcommittees focus their attention on panel proposals, making tough decisions about which panels to accept and which to reject. The third subcommittee considers the individual paper proposals; its job is the hardest of all, because it not only has to decide which papers to accept, but also has to group those papers into panels, suggest appropriate chairs and commentators for them, and then actively recruit those additional participants.

After the three subcommittees have completed their work, the Program Committee reassembles to go over the entire program. At this stage, the committee adds panels sponsored by the various standing committees of the American Studies Association and special sessions sponsored by the Program Committee itself. Session proposals from ASA caucuses are entered as part of the regular submissions process and are considered alongside other proposals, using the same criteria. The committee considers questions of program balance and representation, and panel overlap, and it inevitably struggles with the fact that, at any given conference hotel, there are only so many meeting rooms and so many hours in the day. Although the proportion of proposals to available rooms varies a bit from year to year, the program committee always receives far more proposals than it can or will accept. The odds are not in your favor: in recent years, acceptance rates have ranged from about one in every three proposals submitted to one in every two.

At the 2005 ASA Annual Meeting, for example, the rate of acceptance of session proposals, which includes task force, caucus, committee, and affiliated association proposals, was 52% (189 accepted out of the 400 proposed). For individual proposals, the acceptance rate was 31% (156 accepted out of 506 proposed). Those accepted individual proposal were then turned into 51 panels and assigned chairs or chairs and commentators.

If you want to increase the chances that your proposal will be among those accepted by the Program Committee, here are some things you can do:

1. Start early. The deadline for proposals usually falls in January, but smart proposers begin their work long before this. Putting a panel together involves several steps: approaching prospective panelists, collecting electronic abstracts and c.v.’s from each of them, molding the papers into a cohesive theme, and contacting and securing commitments from prospective chairs and commentators. Keep in mind that everyone you deal with will be busy with many other projects, that most academics travel frequently (and when they do travel, tend to be away from both phones and computers), that phone tag is a game that can go on for weeks, and that email is only faster for people who receive fewer than a half-dozen messages each week. A good rule of thumb is to make your most generous estimate of how long this process will take, then double it, and plan accordingly.

2. The American Studies Association must enforce a firm cut-off time for the submission of proposals. That time is midnight—Pacific Time—of the deadline date. Do not wait until the last minute of the last day to submit your proposal. If you do, you will invariably find that your server is down, your submission is mysteriously bounced back to you, or that some other electronic catastrophe has ensued. Read carefully the directions for the electronic submissions system and double check your entries. Make sure that you do not submit a proposal with empty fields or missing abstracts or vitae. Please do not submit the proposal multiple times “just to make sure.” Once is enough. If you submit early, you’ll have a confirmation email from the ASA to put your mind at ease.

3. Make sure your panel and paper abstracts are of appropriate length. A brief 4-5 sentence paragraph does not give evaluators enough information to make an informed judgment, and such proposals are easily dismissed. An overly long abstract taxes the patience—and, dare we say, the good will—of your readers. The electronic submissions system makes submitting a proposal as easy as dashing off an email—and this is not often to your advantage. Take the time to craft abstracts carefully in a separate format, rather than writing them online as you go.

4. Submit a proposal for a complete panel rather than an individual paper. It’s tempting, we know, to opt for the individual paper option, which seems faster and easier, and which seems to save you the chore of approaching a lot of people you’ve never met and may hesitate to impose on. But if you submit an individual paper proposal, you will significantly diminish your chances of acceptance. And if your individual paper is accepted, you’ll find you have very little choice about the other members of your panel or who will be commenting on your paper. If, however, you decide to submit a proposal for a complete panel, you’ll get your own chance to choose and make important new professional contacts. This isn’t as hard as it may sound, because the ASA has developed a variety of mechanisms to help you get started. See the Works in Progress section of this newsletter to see what panel proposals are in the works. Other possibilities include using the electronic resources of H-Amstudy or the ASA Crossroads project, either of which will put you in touch with American Studies scholars who may be interested in your topic.

5. Make your panel as diverse and interdisciplinary as possible. One of the reasons the ASA has a reputation for putting on exciting conferences (presumably one of the reasons you want to be on the program in the first place), is that the ASA actively promotes interdisciplinarity and racial, ethnic, and gender diversity. Program committees can and do favor panels that assemble participants from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds over panels on which the participants come from the same discipline, background, or institution.

6. Write a good panel abstract. When you’re rushing around trying to get a panel together, it’s easy to convince yourself that filling out the forms and assembling the individual paper abstracts together is enough to add up to a good proposal. If, however, you were faced with the task of reading several hundred proposals, you’d realize right away that it’s cogency, not bulk, that impresses program committee members. The best proposals begin with a panel abstract that connects all the proposed papers to an overall theme; they are accompanied by clearly focused one-page paper abstracts; and they end with short, carefully condensed c.v.’s. The proposals that make the biggest impression on program committees tend to be panels that identify and try to answer challenging questions about the state of the field(s) of American Studies. An example from the Pittsburgh conference is a panel that posed the question, “Does Cultural Studies Neglect Class?”; it drew a standing-room only audience. An example from the Kansas City conference is the panel, “Marginal Like Us? U.S. Multiculturalism and its Transnational Others,” which received the highest possible ranking for every member of its subcommittee because the proposal offered such a cogent explanation of way each paper fit into a larger critique of the transnational limits of American multicultural frameworks.

7. Choose the best possible chair and commentator. For many first-time proposers, choosing a commentator is the most daunting aspect of putting a panel together because it involves approaching a well-known scholar and asking them for a favor. Hard as it may be to do this, steel yourself to make the effort, because making the right choice will: 1) help you draw a good audience, 2) let you bring your work to the attention of a scholar you want to get to know, and 3) help produce lively discussion at the panel. Accept the fact that it may take more than one try. Most of the people you approach will be in such demand that they aren’t able to accept all the requests they get to comment on panels. If you want to make your request one that they will accept, you need to give them enough information to really capture their interest. Instead of phoning them out of the blue, send them, well in advance, a copy of the materials you’ve collected, including paper abstracts, panelist c.v.’s, and the panel abstract that brings it all together, then call to talk it over with them. Most scholars will help you if they can, so remember that if they do turn you down, it may be for reasons (like illness, family commitments, lack of funding) that have nothing to do with you or your panel. Be prepared to try again if necessary, and don’t settle for someone you already know well. Except in the most exceptional circumstances, it’s entirely inappropriate to choose a good friend, your advisor, or nearly any faculty member from your institution.

8. Meet the institutional requirements and follow the ground rules. The ASA Program Committee will refuse to consider proposals from any person whose name appears on more than one proposal per year, so submit only one proposal, and make sure your panelists, chair and commentator are committed to your panel and your panel alone. The paper you propose must be new and original. You should never plan to give the same paper at two different conferences, and you should never submit proposals for the same panel to two different conferences at the same time.

Once your panel has been accepted, turn your attention to the next challenge: that of making the panel itself a success. It’s nice, of course, to see your name listed on the program, but one of the first things you’ll notice about any academic conference is that panels vary dramatically in quality. The best panels engage the audience in exciting professional conversations, show the work of the panelists to good advantage, and leave everyone eager for more. The worst panels are the stuff of academic satire, consisting of endless, unintelligible papers read in a monotone by bored scholars in front of restless audience members who shift in theirs seats while they count the minutes until they can duck out for their next cup of coffee. No one who sits through a bad session ever wants to repeat the experience. Fortunately, though, there are some simple but effective things you can do make your panel a good one:

1. Keep your commitments. Make your plane and hotel reservations well in advance and allow plenty of time for travel emergencies. If you think you’re not going to be able to go to the conference, don’t submit a proposal in the first place. By the time your panel has been accepted on the program, the other panelists are depending on you, and your panel is taking up space that (believe us) could have gone to other worthy scholars. If you must- absolutely must- withdraw from a panel, make sure you notify all the other panelists, the Program Committee Chairs, and the ASA office, and do so the moment you know you have to withdraw. If you withdraw from a panel, you’ll be disappointing your audience and your fellow panelists, some of whom may have to spend time and energy replacing you, so explanations and apologies are definitely in order. Expect people to understand if you have a medical emergency, but don’t expect anyone to accept excuses like, for example, an overload of work, that are either predictable or avoidable.

2. Stick to the time and page limits set by the panel chair. A month or so after your panel is accepted, you should get a letter from your panel chair outlining the maximum length of your paper presentation. Most of the time, the limit will fall between 15 and 25 minutes (perhaps 9-12 double-spaced pages). Once you discover how short a time that really is- and how difficult it is to say anything of substance within its limits- you’ll probably be tempted to present a longer paper. You may imagine that you can rely on the good will of the chair to let you continue to the end of your paper or that, if worst comes to worst, you can edit your paper as you speak. Resist these temptations. Here’s what will happen if you take more than your allotted time: the chair will begin to get nervous, the audience will start paying more attention to what’s going on between you and the chair than to anything you’re saying, and the other panelists will think you’ve been unfair to them. If you edit as you speak, you’ll have to concentrate so hard to do it that you’ll lose your connection to your audience, which will quickly tire of hearing you mention that you’re skipping over this or that part of your paper. If you go so far overtime that there’s no time left for discussion, you will have single-handedly turned the panel into a bad experience for the audience. The best way to avoid these dangers is to make your paper the right length in the first place. Read your paper out loud and time yourself. If it is too long, cut.

3. Send your commentator the exact same paper you intend to present. Don’t send a longer and more elaborate version, because if you do, your commentator might end up in the embarrassing position of commenting on a section of the paper your audience hasn’t heard. (If you’re worried that your paper is so short that your commentator won’t understand the range of your work, put a description of your larger project in your first footnote.)

4. Give your chair and commentator a chance to do their best for you. If your chair or commentator doesn’t get in touch with you, get in touch with them yourself - more than likely, they’ve been given a wrong or outdated address and are as eager to find you as you are to find them. Once you’re in contact, send your chair a copy of your c.v. for use in intro-ductions. Send your chair a backup copy of your paper, too, because an experienced chair will follow along in your text while you present your paper and so be in a position to rescue you from last-minute disasters like missing or lost pages.

5. Do your very best to meet the month prior deadline for sending your paper to the commentator (Deadline for the Oct 16, 2008’s Annual Meeting is September 15, 2008.). Comments written after three or four weeks of consideration tend to be much better than those scribbled while en route to the conference. In agreeing to comment on your paper, someone you respect has agreed to put time and energy aside to consider your work, but that person can’t get started-much less do a good job- until your paper arrives. So if you’re going to miss the deadline by even a couple of days, call and let your commentator know exactly when your paper will be arriving. Get in the habit of meeting conference paper deadlines right from the very beginning. The benefits are worth it. Not only will you help (and impress) your commentator, but once your paper is in the mail, you’ll be able to stop worrying about revising and relax and enjoy your trip and the conference.

In some circumstances, chairs and panelists can mutually agree on other, alternative deadlines, but it is best, as a matter of professionalism and courtesy on your part, to submit your paper one month in advance. One month is considered the general rule within the profession, although some organizations suggest that papers be submitted even farther in advance.

6. Send a copy of your paper to the other panelists. No professional association we know of requires you to do this, but it’s one of the best ways we know to encourage effective discussions. If the panelists are familiar with each other’s papers, they can point out connections and contrasts that will bring the whole panel together and enliven the discussion section, making the whole experience much more pleasant for the audience.

7. Don’t forget the audience. Remember that oral presentations are - or at least should be - different than written texts. Frankly, there’s less margin for error. Ask a friend to listen to your presentation so you can be sure you’ve provided enough directional signals that the audience won’t get lost. If you’re a nervous speaker (and in the beginning almost everyone is), practice giving your paper out loud so that you can make sure you’re not reading too fast or reading in a monotone. The more details you work out before the conference, the more likely it is that during the panel, you’ll be able to concentrate on what’s really important- the interchange with other scholars and the audience that makes for a really good conference session.

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