Organization of American Historians
Click on the keywords to navigate the site.

Chat Rooms
2003 OAH Annual Meeting
Memphis
3-6 April 2003

Each year we hear from members that they appreciate the many opportunities at the annual meeting for impromptu conversations, discussions of professional issues, and new contacts and plans. At this year's Annual Meeting, session rooms will be available to registrants who would like a place to host informal discussions. We invite you to suggest a topic—some burning issue; new goal; interesting perspective; future project; ideas for future conferences, workshops, or symposia—for you and other colleagues to address.

Samples of previous Chat Rooms included:

  • Teaching “Hot” Topics. How to teach about religion, sexuality, and other historical issues that have contemporary political significance and which can elicit deep emotional reactions from students.
  • The Future of Labor History. How the journal, Labor History, can help to reinvigorate the field, tap the talents of a wider labor constituency, and how labor historians should expand the thematic boundaries of the field.
  • Is the Internet a Disservice to Historical Research? Does it change researchers’ expectations and cut face-to-face dialogue with curators and archivists?

Proposal Procedure

  1. Proposers should tell us by email what their topic of discussion will be. Proposers are the point persons who agree to be responsible for finding the room assigned, greeting the other discussants, and beginning the conversation. Chat room proposals should be no more than 150 words in length and should speak to the purpose and potential audience of the planned discussion. (Chat Rooms are public and open to anyone who registers for the 2003 Annual Meeting.)
  2. Chat room proposals that arrive and are accepted by 1 September 2002 will appear in the Annual Meeting Program, on the OAH web site, and in the Onsite Program, which is distributed to registrants at the annual meeting. Proposals that arrive and are accepted by 1 February 2003 will be posted on the OAH web site and listed in the Onsite Program. Rooms will be filled on a first-come, first-served basis.
  3. Send proposals and inquiries to <chat@oah.org>.