News and Events

Banff!: AHS 2013 Registration is Now Open!
Registration for the 2013 Agricultural History Society's Annual Conference is now open.

Please click on the Annual Meetings tab on the left side of the page where you will find information about registration, lodging, and more important details about this year's conference.

See you in Banff!

CFP: Coping with Crisis: Re-Evaluating the Role of Crises in Economic and Social History
26 - 28 July 2013, Durham University, UK

Coping with Crises will bring together researchers exploring various forms of economic and social crises across traditional time periods to generate a greater understanding of the meaning and usefulness of the term crisis within history. Different forms of crisis have been explored in nearly every strand of history, ranging from agrarian famines to epidemiological outbreaks, and from financial collapses to disasters precipitated by conflict and trade disputes.

- The historical concept and meaning of crisis

- The transformative nature of crisis and its role in economic development

- Contemporary perceptions, interpretations and responses to specific crises

- The mechanisms of crises and the importance of exogenous or endogenous factors

- The social, political and religious causes and consequences of economic crises

For further information http://copingwithcrisisconference.wordpress.com

We welcome proposals for 20-minute papers or panels of three papers exploring crisis across traditional time periods. Please send a title or abstract to Alex Brown, Andy Burn and Rob Doherty at copingwithcrisis@gmail.com. The deadline for submission of proposals is Friday 22 February 2013.

Southern Forum on Agricultural, Rural, and Environmental History
The sixth Southern Forum on Agricultural, Rural, and Environmental History (SFARE) will be held at Converse College in Spartanburg, SC on April 26-27, 2013. Sponsored by the Department of History and Politics at Converse with support from the Goodall Environmental Studies Center at Wofford College, the Center for the History of Agriculture, Science, and the Environment of the South at Mississippi State University, and Agricultural History, the Forum’s goal is to provide a welcoming and collegial environment for graduate students and established scholars to present new material that pushes the boundaries of agricultural, rural, and environmental history.

Dr. Kathryn Newfont, chair of the Regional Studies Department at Mars Hill College and author of Blue Ridge Commons: Environmental Activism and Forest History in Western North Carolina, will present a keynote address entitled “Exploring the Fruitful Intersection of Oral History and Environmental History.” Other conference activities will include a field trip to a sustainable farming operation and a reading by environmental writer John Lane (author of My Paddle to the Sea).

The organizers intend this event to be a place for scholars of all ranks to try out innovative ideas in an informal, supportive, and constructive setting. Toward that end, we ask that participants plan on attending all sessions to generate quality discussion for all presenters (the sessions will be non-concurrent). Work on all geographic locations and time periods is welcome.
Faculty and graduate students are invited to submit session, roundtable, or single-paper proposals on any topic dealing with rural, agricultural, or environmental history.
Please submit a 100-word paper proposal or a 250-word session proposal, and brief biographical sketch or CV electronically to Melissa Walker, Johnson Professor of History, Converse College, at Melissa.walker@converse.edu. The deadline for submissions is February 15, 2013.

Web Extra Now Online
Looking for the extra images that accompany Warren Elofson's "Grasslands Management in Southern Alberta: The Frontier Legacy," from Agricultural History 86, no. 4 (Fall 2012)? Well look no further.

Call for Award Nominations
The Agricultural History Society seeks nominations for its publication awards through December 31, 2012. To nominate a book, article, or dissertation with a 2012 publication date, please follow the directions below. If you have a question, please email executive secretary Jim Giesen (JGiesen@history.msstate.edu).

Theodore Saloutos Memorial Award for the best book on agricultural history, broadly defined, with a 2012 copyright date. To nominate a book, please send four copies to the Society office (address below) with a brief letter of nomination. (You may email the nomination letter to Jim Giesen.)

Henry A. Wallace Award for the best book on any aspect (broadly interpreted) of agricultural history outside the United States, with a 2012 copyright date. To nominate a book, please send four copies to the Society office (address below) with a letter of nomination. (You may email the nomination letter to Jim Giesen.)

Wayne D. Rasmussen Award for the best 2012 article on agricultural history (broadly defined) not published in Agricultural History. To nominate an article, please e-mail a .pdf copy to Jim Giesen with a letter of nomination. If you must send a hard copy, please send one to Jim Giesen at the Society office (address below).

Gilbert C. Fite Dissertation Award for the best dissertation on agricultural history defended in 2012. To nominate a dissertation, please e-mail a .pdf copy to Jim Giesen with a letter of nomination. If you must send a hard copy, please send four copies to Jim Giesen at the Society office (address below).

Everett E. Edwards Award for the best article submitted to Agricultural History by a graduate student during 2012. All articles submitted to the journal by graduate students are considered by the committee.

All nominations must be received in the Society office by December 31, 2012.
Send electronic nominations to: JGiesen@history.msstate.edu

Send books to:

James C. Giesen
History Department
PO Box H / Allen 214
Mississippi State, MS 39762

Call for 2015 Conference Site Proposals
The Future Sites Committee of the Agricultural History Society invites proposals to host the annual meeting of the organization in 2015. The host of the 2015 conference will have the opportunity to build on the successes of meetings held in Boston, Massachusetts; Ames, Iowa; Reno, Nevada; Little Rock, Arkansas; Winter Park, Florida; Springfield, Illinois; and Manhattan, Kansas. The 2013 and 2014 meetings will be held in Banff, Alberta and Provo, Utah respectively. Those interested in making a bid to host the conference should contact the Future Sites Committee chair, Mark Hersey (mhersey@history.msstate.edu) for guidelines and other helpful information. The deadline for proposals is January 15, 2013.

Proposals to host the conference should consist of the following information:
1. Proposed dates
2. Rationale for hosting the conference
3. Proposed members of local organizing committee
4. Proposed venues (including information on number, capacity, and A/V capabilities of spaces)
5. Food and accommodation arrangements (and where relevant, transportation)
6. Ideas for hosting receptions and field trip excursions
7. Funding / sponsorship plan
8. Indication of institutional support
9. Preliminary budget


Award Winners Announced
During its annual meeting in June, the Society recognized the winners of its book and publication prizes for 2011. See the details on our Awards Page.

Journal and Staff Profiled
Rollins College, host of our journal Agricultural History, has published a profile about the journal and our editorial staff. Read the article here.

2013 Call For Papers
The Call for Papers for the 2013 Annual Meeting of the Agricultural History Society is now available on our annual meetings page. The deadline for submissions is October 1, 2012.

European Rural History Organization CFP
The EURHO Call for Papers for their 2013 conference in Bern, Switzerland is now available here.

Annual Meeting Registration is Now Live!
Register today. Full details on the meeting are on our Annual Meetings page.

Louisiana Historical Association Call for Papers
The Louisiana Historical Association invites proposals for its 55th Annual Meeting to be held in Alexandria, March 21-23, 2013. The meeting will be headquartered at the Best Western Inn and Suites.

We invite sessions on any aspect of Louisiana History, but we strongly encourage proposals in the emerging field of business and industrial history of Louisiana, broadly defined. Topics might range from the colonial fur trade, to 19th- and early 20th-century agriculture, lumber mills, and mining, to 20th- and 21st-century oil & gas, gambling, and film & television. We also solicit proposals on Louisiana and borderlands studies as a secondary field of emphasis, in honor of Alexandria’s reputation as the “crossroads of Louisiana.”

The program committee is open to submissions that take a novel approach to session design as well as traditional scholarly panels. We also encourage the participation of graduate students and public historians. We prefer to receive proposals for complete sessions but will consider individual paper proposals as well. Proposals should be submitted in a single Microsoft Word document and include:

• A cover sheet with the session title as well as the names, affiliations and email address of all participants including the chair and commentator

• A summary of the focus and intent of the session as a whole not to exceed 250 words

• An abstract for each paper or presentation not to exceed 250 words

• A vita for each participant not to exceed 500 words

• All materials should be emailed to the program committee at LHAprog@latech.edu. Please include the name, affiliation and email address of the proposal organizer in the body of your message. Queries may be sent to the program chair, Dr. V. Elaine Thompson, at the same email address.



The submission deadline is Sept. 1, 2012.

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Contact Us

The Society Office
James C. Giesen, Executive Secretary
JGiesen@history.msstate.edu
Alan I Marcus, Treasurer
aimarcus@history.msstate.edu
MSU History Department
PO Box H
Mississippi State, MS 39762

The Editorial Office
Claire Strom, Editor
CStrom@rollins.edu
Agricultural History
1000 Holt Avenue - 2762
Rollins College
Winter Park, FL 32789