ASA Religion Caucus Announcement

This message comes from Rebecca Barrett-Fox

(if you are interested in swinging by southern California for our regional conference, you can hang with me, Adam Golub, Elaine Lewinnek, Sarah Azaransky, and lots of other great folks).


The 2013 Annual Meeting of the American Studies Association (November 21-24 in Washington, DC) is themed "Beyond the Logic of Debt, Toward an Ethics of Collective Dissent." This topic promises to be of special interest to those who study American religion, and so the Religion and American Culture Caucus of the ASA is organizing panels for submission to the ASA programming committee.  Potential topics include religious banking programs; charity; financial planning and religion; religion and austerity; the gospel of wealth, race, religion, and money; religiously motivated giving; international debt and missionary influence; debt forgiveness and religion; metaphors of debt and wealth in religion; intentional poverty and religion; religious solidarity with the poor; labor and religion; the body, money, and religion; religious education and money; structural opportunity and religion; and more.  Historical and contemporary topics are welcome, as is methodological innovation and diversity. Scholars of traditionally underrepresented groups, including but not limited to indigenous religions, Islam, and non-Western religions, are encouraged to apply. 



Presentations of all kinds--traditional papers as well as round tables, Pecha Kucha presentations, readers' theaters, workshops, even service-learning in the DC setting, and more--are encouraged.  Potential participants should prepare a brief (250-500 word) abstract, along with a biographical paragraph, and post it to the RACC Facebook page, or they should visit that page in search of other panelists.  Panels should include at least 3 participants, and traditional panels usually include no more than 5.  Unlike in recent years, RACC will not be matching panelists to panels but will instead be welcoming would-be participants to connect via Facebook.

That said, RACC members are happy to assist panels as they submit their proposals to ASA. Only fully formed panels may be submitted to ASA for consideration. A completed proposal will include a session title of no more than 15 words, a session abstract of no more than 500 words, individual presentation titles of no more than 15 words, individual presentation abstracts of no more than 500 words, biographical statements about each participant, and keywords selected from list provided by the ASA programming committee.

At the time of submission, at least two members of the panel must be members of ASA, including the person managing the online submission process. If the panel is accepted onto the program, all other panelists must become members of ASA. All participants are also responsible for conference fees (which vary), including the expense of travel to the conference. In a time of limited funding, participants should look ahead to their 2013-2014 budgets to insure that the money for travel is available.

Because panel submissions are due to ASA by midnight Pacific time on January 26, 2013, interested persons are encouraged to post their abstracts promptly in order to insure adequate time to find fellow panelists and craft strong session abstracts. RACC members are eager to help draft and edit such documents if needed.

You can learn more about the ASA at theasa.net.

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