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Thank you for your interest in co-sponsoring a conference with the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture.
The Institute’s mission is to support, produce, and advance scholarship focused on early American history and culture. An important part of that mission is the sponsorship of conferences. Each is meant to serve as a forum for the rich variety of scholarship on early America. We invite scholars of early American history and culture from any institution to propose topics and organizing themes for one of two yearly conferences:
- the Annual Conference (June), which highlights work from junior as well as senior scholars
- a topically focused conference, usually held in October
The Conference Proposal Process
Once a proposal is chosen by the Conferences Committee, the applicants should formally constitute a Program Committee. The Program Committee determines all content for the sessions as well as plans all logistical details and arranges funding for the majority of the conference. The OIEAHC does not determine the scholarly content of the conference at any point. The OIEAHC’s involvement is limited to promotion, registration and administrative and organizational assistance.
The Conferences Committee reviews proposals with the following considerations in mind:
- That the proposal reflects an ambitious intellectual agenda.
- That the proposal reflects a reasonable commitment of resources necessary for co-sponsorship of a conference.
- That the likely Program Committee be constituted so as to advance the intellectual mission of the proposed program.
- That the Program Committee reflects the diverse composition and interests of the community of early American history and culture scholars.
- That the OIEAHC welcomes proposals from organizations interested in holding conferences in Williamsburg, Virginia – our home base. Ideally, the OIEAHC would like to hold conferences in Williamsburg every other year or every third year, depending on conference proposals.
You can read about the responsibilities of hosting a conference and the conference proposal process on this site. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have questions that are not answered here.