Kalamazoo 2009

HMMM...well, I got Internet service back last Tuesday and have been catching up on email and the blogosphere, and well, actually writing....I noticed that there were a few posts complaining about the lack of history in the 2009 CFP and that its becoming a "literature conference" more and more every year.

Huh? Have you people looked at the same CFP I did? I counted 214 Sponsored Sessions, of those I counted 61 organizations, or 28.5%, that are offering specifically and unquestionably history sessions. Nor are the remainder "literature", the field isn't divided into history vs. lit: there are sessions on Philosophy (not literature), theology (not literature), Biblical Exegesis (arguably having something to do with literature, but just as arguably having something to do with intellectual history, and thus, history), Art, Music, Science, Manuscript Studies (of the 5 people from whom I've learned the most about manuscripts and related topics, 1 is in English, 1 is an historian, the 3rd was a PhD in history and then librarian specializing in rare books, the fourth is a museum curator, and the fifth is in an art dept---so I count Mss studies as truly interdisciplinary, but also a discipline in itself, and so not literature or history), linguistics, digitation, teaching the Middle Ages, sessions in honor of specific scholars, sessions on or using interdisciplinarity to approach a topic (Boydell's history as lit, lit as history) and of course medievalism topics (such as Tolkien at K'zoo). Take all of those away, and yes, there's a nice chunk of literature left, 57 by my count not including medievalisms. So it looks pretty even to me.

Harder to classify are those sessions like Latin Antiquity I-III, that could as described involve anything. I didn't count those in either category.

What is underrepresented is LATIN and EARLY medieval (other than Anglo-Saxon studies). Easily fixed by sending in a plethora of early medieval papers to the General pile. Or offer sessions on early stuff next year.....which might be more problematic than one expects.....

OK, next post taking up Worcester Frag A again.....

P. S. I might add that in the Special Sessions I found some 34 sessions dedicated to history or historical subjects. Probably more literature sessions there, but then there are also a smaller number of sessions altogether.....