Public Address Division
2002 Business Meeting Minutes
NCA Public Address Division
Business Meeting Minutes
Saturday, 23 November 2002
New Orleans, Louisiana
I. Meeting called to order by Karen Rasmussen, Chair, at 12:33 p.m.
II. Minutes from the 2001 business meeting, available to PAD members online at <http://www.pad2002.org>, were approved, with the proviso that anyone who had not yet viewed them online could do so after the meeting and contact PAD officers with corrections.
III. Report from the Legislative Council meeting, by Richard Jensen.A. NCA Leadership: Martha Watson was elected the 2nd V.P. of NCA.
B. Journal Editors: There are three new editors of NCA journals:
1. Michael S. Bowman, Text and Performance Quarterly
2. James Chesebro, Review of Communication
3. Bob Ivie, Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies.
C. Finances: The report on the budget was positive; the organization is wealthy.
D. New NCA Units and Affiliations were approved by the Legislative Council, including:
1. a Communication Lab/Center Directors Section of NCA
2. an affiliation with the Alliance of Rhetorical Societies as a charter member
3. an affiliation with the Partnership for Progress on the Digital Divide.
E. Journal Partnerships
1. NCA entered a partnership agreement with Routledge Journals for the print and electronic publication of NCA journals, to begin in 2004.
2. NCA also made an agreement with EBSCO, Inc. to expand the content of CommSearch and to include NCA journals in abstract and index databases that will be made available to libraries online.
F. Constitution: the constitutional revisions were voted down by the membership, so the legislative council agreed to send the revisions back to the membership in 6 separate parts, divided by issue.
IV. Report from the Vice-Chair, by James Darsey. (Note: the full version of this report was made available to PAD members on the web at <http://www.pad2002.org>. The following is a summary of the oral and written versions of that report, as well as the discussion that followed.)
A. Conference programs: PAD is scheduled for 21 slots in New Orleans, one more than we had in 2000 or 2001. Many submissions and reviews were done on-line this year. We did not accept Vice President Pearson's offer to program even more submissions in poster sessions; the division's executive committee was unanimous in affirming the conclusion of past discussions in the division--that our style of scholarship and political considerations make an agreement to schedule papers in poster sessions unwise.
1. Panels: 18 panel proposals were submitted for consideration, 16 were deemed appropriate and submitted within time limits, and based on reviewers ratings and rankings, 12 were forwarded for inclusion in the program; this constitutes a rejection rate of 25-33%.
2. Papers: 35 papers were submitted, 18 of them identified as student papers. Panels were created from the top-ranked 28 papers submitted; this constitutes a rejection rate of 20%.
3. Co-sponsored programs: PAD is co-sponsor of two additional programs, one with the Political Communication Division and one with Vice-President Pearson's spotlight programs.
4. Reviewers: thanks to Vanessa B. Beasley, Sandra Berkowitz, Diane Blair, James Farrell, William Harlow, William Harpine, David Henry, Lisa Hogan, Stephanie Houston Grey, Susan Huxman, Michael Hyde, James Jasinski, Donna Kowal, Richard Jensen, Larry Lambert, Charles E. Morris, John Murphy, Lester Olson, Shawn Parry-Giles, Janice Schuetz, Craig R. Smith, and Susan Zaeske for serving as reviewers for the division this year.
B. Issues for discussion:
1. Encouraging greater representation of women in the division: the breakdown for participation this year is 76 men and 34 women. (Note: although raised, this issue was not discussed at the meeting.)
2. Identity of "public address" in selecting papers: some reviewers asked what role should be played by a work's character as "public address" scholarship when rating and ranking a submission. (Note: although raised, this issue was not discussed at the meeting.)
3. Paper length
a. Background: The call specifies a 25 page limit; how strictly do we want to enforce that requirement in the future? This year, papers that were slightly over the limit were accepted, but two papers in the 50 page range were returned to the submitters, with an opportunity extended to cut the papers and resubmit; neither took that opportunity.
b. Discussion: On one side was the concern that with a 25 page limit, we'll lose submissions to other divisions that don't have such strict limits. Also, since the papers are eligible for awards, we need to make sure that the writers have the chance to make a good argument; when it comes to judging the quality of a paper, strict correspondence between oral presentation and written presentation is not of primary importance. On the other side was the argument that the short presentation time allowed at the conference requires people to cut their papers anyway, so asking them to cut their papers for submission is not too much of a burden, and getting the paper down to a shorter length will allow the respondents to have a better idea of what will be shared in the room. Also, since reviewers only have a short turn-around time for evaluating these papers, the page limit helps keep that job manageable.
c. Outcome: A motion was forwarded and passed that the page limit be changed to 30 pages of text (more closely approximating page limits for journal submissions), with the allowance that notes can go on past that limit.
4. Debut papers:
a. Background:
i. The Gunderson Award was not given this year because only 3 debut papers were submitted, and based on reviewers' evaluations, none were scheduled for the conference. What can we do to avoid having this happen again?
ii. How do we want to define debut papers? One of the debut papers submitted this year was from a scholar who is scheduled to present on another panel at this conference. Would this count as a debut paper?
b. Discussion: The top two papers in the division were given to graduate students, suggesting that there are plenty of good student papers, even if there are not many debut papers. Of course, it's possible that some students did not mark debut on their papers, even when they were debut papers. As a point of comparison, Southern eliminated its debut panel and began calling it a graduate student panel because it was too difficult to keep track of debut papers. The point was raised that it's just as difficult to determine who is a student as it is to determine what really constitutes a debut paper, as some people never complete their dissertation but stay enrolled as students for many years while holding faculty positions. At the same time, we wouldn't want to eliminate from consideration those who are really still students but have been forced for financial reasons to work as a faculty member at a community college while finishing the dissertation.
c. Outcome: A motion was forwarded, amended, and passed that we do away with debut as a special category and the Gunderson award be given to the top student paper. The individual winning this award must be a student at the time of submission, and the person choosing the award recipient should determine if the person self-identifying as a student is eligible, perhaps by checking that person's enrollment status with NCA. The winner of the PAD top paper award will not be eligible for the Gunderson award, so that the awards are spread around a bit. The Gunderson award should be given retroactively this year to the second highest ranked paper in the division, which happened to be a student paper.
C. Vice-Chair's agenda for the future:
1. Taking more control over our mailing list.
2. Archiving of PAD business, so that we can research things like the PAD/RCT business meeting time conflict and how we dealt with this before.
3. Engaging a discussion of the health of our area, given that public address is taught less and there is less hiring in this area.
V. Report from the NCA Nominating Committee, by Richard Jensen: the two nominees for next year for 2nd Vice President of NCA are Al Gonzalez, from Bowling Green State University, and Dan O'Hair from University of Oklahoma.
VI. Report from the Vice Chair Elect, by Shawn Parry-Giles.
A. Next year's convention will be a hybrid year, where submissions are partially on-line. All-Academic is the program we'll be using this time, not Rapid Review. Vice Chairs will go through a 1.5 hour training session on the program. To submit a paper, an NCA member will need to go to the web first, register the paper with All Academic and get a tracking number, and then send the paper to the division's vice-chair. The information submitted to All Academic is what will appear on the program. You must be accurate with the title and author order because little time will be available for revisions. For panel proposals, all of it will be on-line. The review process will be on-line; evaluators will get hardcopies of papers, but their evaluations will be on-line. If you are not comfortable with this, you should not sign up to be a reviewer. (Shawn then sent around a sign-up sheet to get volunteers to serve as reviewers, respondents, and chairs.) On March 15th at midnight, the divisions will fight for times, so we need to stick closely to our deadlines. We're allotted rooms and we'll get to figure out what times we'll use them. All Academic is up in the exhibit hall now so that NCA members can go check it out if they are interested.
B. The convention theme next year is going to be "Reaching Out/Reaching In." This theme could apply to bringing communities members in from Miami and also the crossings of divisions. Something on the 2000 election would be an example of a thematic panel.
VII.Report from the Nominating Committee, by Lester Olson (standing in for the elected chair of the nominating committee, who was unable to attend the meeting).
A. Thanks to the committee members and to those who agreed to appear on the ballot for this year. The committee sought regional diversity and diversity with respect to new people, especially on the nominating committee.
B. Distribution of ballots. The membership should vote for one candidate in each category, except the nominating committee, where 5 candidates should be chosen. The top vote-getter on the nominating committee will serve as chair of that committee.
VIII. New Business
A. Winans-Wichelns Award: Richard Jensen reported that the winner of the award this year was Stephen J. Hartnett, of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, for his book Democratic Dissent and the Cultural Fictions of Antebellum America (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2002).
B. Resolutions Committee: Kirt Wilson reported that there were no new resolutions this year.
C. Bylaws Committee: Richard Jenson reported that there were no new bylaws to report.
D. Web Page and Newsletter: James Darsey reported that the current web page for the public address division is temporary, on a personal web space and intended for the conference only. There was a discussion about finding a new space for the web page and continuing it, perhaps by splitting up the role of the secretary of PAD and creating the position of division webmaster. NCA does not always keep its web pages up to date, but there is a new person running the NCA web pages who says things will get better, and we could always take the space allotted to us by NCA and do it ourselves. Sue Zaeske indicated that she might be able to find technology support at the University of Wisconsin to design a web page for the division.
E. Awards:
1. Robert G. Gunderson Award for Top Student Paper: Heather Norton, of Fontbonne University, "The Clinton Administration's Depiction of the Modern Militia Movement Through a Rhetoric of Crisis."
2. Wrage-Baskerville Award for Top Contributed Paper in Public Address: David C. Deifell, University of Iowa, "Performing The Idea of University: The Occasion, the Crisis and the Student."
3. Caroll C. Arnold Dissertation Research Award: Lisa Keranen, University of Pittsburgh.
4. Marie Hochmoth Nichols Award for Outstanding Book or Monograph: Davis W. Houck, Rhetoric as Currency: Hoover, Roosevelt, and the Great Depression (Texas A&M University Press, 2001).
F. Announcements:
1. Kathy Turner reported that:
a. Hope College is having a Faculty Development Conference. There's a handout at the back of the room for those who are interested.
b. The SSCA Early Career Research Award is given to someone in the first five years after receipt of terminal degree or appointment at the rank of assistant professor. It hasn't been given in 2 years because of lack of submissions; submissions are being solicited.
2. Mike Hostetler reported that Eastern is having a pre-conference for the first time and there is a call for people to participate by sending a 1,000 word statement to Gerald Hauser.
3. PAD 2004 is scheduled to take place at the University of Maryland.
4. Kurt Ritter is directing the Presidential Rhetoric Conference at Texas A&M University on February 27-March 2, 2003. There's a handout at the back of the room for those who are interested.
5. Matt Martin announced that WSCA Rhetoric and Public Address division needs submissions, reviewers, etc. Submissions should be sent to David Schulz in August.
6. The Hayward conference was announced.
G. Thanks: James Darsey was thanked for his work, especially in setting up the division web page for the conference. Karen Rasmussen was thanked for her service as chair.
H. Election Results
1. Vice-Chair Elect: Amy R. Slagell, Iowa State University
2. Resolutions Committee: Susan M. Zaeske, University of Wisconsin
3. Arnold Award Committee: Mari Boor Tonn, University of Maryland
4. Nichols Award Committee: James A. Aune, Texas A&M University
5. Nominating Committee: Angela G. Ray, University of Memphis (chair); Suzanne M. Daughton, Southern Illinois University; Lisa A. Flores, University of Utah; Charles E. Morris, Vanderbilt University; Nathan Stormer, University of Maine.
IX. Meeting was adjourned at 1:45 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Leah Ceccarelli, Secretary, Public Address Division.
For information about the 2003 Business Meeting, click here.
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