Organization of American Historians
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OAH Awards and Prizes

2009 OAH/IEHS John Higham Travel Grants

History Without Boundaries:
The One Hundred and Second Meeting of the Organization of American Historians

Thursday, March 26
to Sunday, March 29, 2009

Seattle Sheraton Hotel and Washington State Convention Center

Call for Papers

With the theme of "History Without Boundaries," the 2009 Organization of American Historians program committee seeks an eclectic program that will highlight the creative use of history in research, education, the media, and public presentations. We seek proposals reflecting the broad chronological and subject diversity of American history, including race, gender, disabilities, social, cultural, political, diplomatic, and military studies, by those teaching at four year colleges, universities, community colleges, and secondary schools, public historians, and independent scholars. Meeting on the West coast, the program should feature sessions on the history of the West and the borderlands, rural life, Native Americans, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans, and issues of immigration and environmental policy. We encourage international participation, and sessions that emphasize oral history, museums, archives, and broadcast and electronic media.

The program committee invites the submission of panels and presentations that deal with these and other issues and themes in American history. We welcome teaching sessions, particularly those involving the audience as active participants or those that reflect collaborative partnerships among teachers, historians, and other history educators at all levels. We encourage presenters to post their papers on the OAH website before the meeting, in order to deepen the discussion in Seattle. We prefer to receive proposals for complete sessions, but will consider individual paper proposals as well.

The program should reflect the full diversity of the OAH membership in the U.S. and abroad. Wherever possible, proposals should include presenters of both sexes and members of ethnic and racial minorities. Panels also should represent a range of historians, public and academic, and other history professionals, wherever they are employed and at varying levels of seniority in the profession.

Registration and Membership Requirements
All participants must preregister for the meeting. Participants who specialize in American history and support themselves as American historians are also required to be members of the OAH. Participants representing other disciplines do not have to be members.

Repeat Participation
OAH policy prohibits individuals from participating in two consecutive annual meetings in the same role and limits individuals to appearing only once on the program in a given year. If you have questions about this policy, email the OAH meetings department.

Submission Procedure
Proposals should be submitted electronically beginning October 1, 2007. Please download proposal system instructions before beginning your submission. Complete session proposals most often include a chair, participants, and, if applicable, one or two commentators (chairs can double as commentators if you wish, and you may also leave commentators out if you wish the audience to comment). All proposals must include the following information:

  • a complete mailing address, e-mail, phone number, and affiliation for each participant;
  • an abstract of no more than 500 words for the session as a whole;
  • a prospectus of no more than 250 words for each presentation (for paper sessions and, if you wish, for roundtables -- panels and workshops do not allow for individual presentation abstracts); and
  • a vita of no more than 500 words for each participant.

The deadline for proposals, February 29, 2008, has passed.

2009 Program Committee
Donald A. Ritchie, Senate Historical Office, Cochair
Leslie Brown, Washington University, Cochair
Adrian Burgos, University of Illinois
Alexander X. Byrd, Rice University
Kirsten Fischer, University of Minnesota
Donald Fixico, Arizona State University
Juli Jones, San Diego Mesa College
Susan McGrath, Georgia Perimeter College
Katherine Ott, Smithsonian National Museum of American History
Nan Elizabeth Woodruff, Pennsylvania State University

Last modified:
11:46 AM, 04/25/08