[Linganth] Ext: Re: Virtual option for AAA 2025?

Sun Mar 16 22:31:39 UTC 2025

Thanks Joe and Richard. I absolutely agree that hybrid meetings should be
the norm, for so many reasons.

On Sun, Mar 16, 2025 at 1:28 PM Richard J Senghas <senghas at sonoma.edu>
wrote:

> [Apologies and warning about the length of this response; this topic
> triggered expressions of concerns I’ve been stewing on for some time now.
>  —RJS]
>
> Colleagues,
>
> I strongly believe that asking for reconsideration of this in-person only
> decision for AAA 2025 is warranted for multiple reasons of accessibility
> and safety (age, economic, political, among others).  I would like to see
> the SLA and other units or interest groups (within and extremely to the
> AAA) formally call for a hybrid format as a matter of equity and efficacy
> to further the fundamental purposes of our Annual Meetings: the
> dissemination of research; peer review and collaboration; and democratic
> self-governance as professional disciplinary organizations.
>
> Increasingly, DACA and undocumented individuals (or those who might be
> deemed to simply “look like unauthorized individuals”) are at greater risk
> even for domestic travel, especially with differing levels of compliance or
> capitulation by authorities in the various states, counties, and
> municipalities.
>
> Many of our legally-resident members are non-USA citizens with either
> visas or even Green Cards that are demonstrably no longer being respected.
> Those international scholars with no reasonable reason for refusal of
> admittance at our borders can no longer be confident that they will be
> admitted.  And, alas, it appears that the US Legislative Branch is
> capitulating to the whims and directives of the Executive Branch,
> exacerbating (if not fueling) the concerns and risks considerably.
>
> Many of our areas of research are active foci for federal targeting, not
> just for their funding or publishing of findings, but also for agencies,
> organizations, or individuals who are openly being labeled as “The Enemy
> Within” because their public positions critique or are even in opposition
> to official stances and pronouncements.  Sadly, topics or projects that are
> actually unrelated to these problematically-identified areas that just
> happen to use certain identified terms or phrases deemed anathema could
> cause many others that apparently aren’t intentionally targeted to be swept
> into the maw of this indiscriminate (though very discriminating) movement
> despite whatever context or coreferences would indicate “non-problematic”
> cases (for example, the scrubbing of the historical references on federal
> websites to the atomic-bomb delivering airplane “Enola Gay”).
>
> I believe that concerns about environmental mitigation from reduced
> greenhouse gas emissions due to fewer long-distance travelers need only a
> mention, as they are almost self-evident nowadays.
>
> Excluding so many of our members and colleagues from participating in
> professional advancement and professional self-governance by an in-person
> only policy seems extremely counter-productive.  Yes, there are many both
> tangible and intangible benefits of participating in-person, but I do not
> believe that those should be promoted at the expense of so many other
> benefits and principles.  The both-and solution of a hybrid format for the
> Annual Meetings of the AAA seems to me, while especially appropriate for
> this year, to be warranted for *all* future meetings.
>
> —RJS
> ===========================
> Richard J. Senghas, Ph.D.
> Professor, Anthropology/Human Development
> School of Applied Human and Environmental Studies
> SSU Statewide Senator, Academic Senate, California State University VP
> Stevenson Hall 3804
> Sonoma State University
> 1801 East Cotati Avenue
> Rohnert Park, CA 94928-3609
> senghas at sonoma.edu <http://sonoma.edu/>
> 707-664-2307
>
> [Note: on leave during the summer and the Fall 2024 semester.]
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> On Mar 16, 2025, at 8:17 AM, Zentella, Ana <azentella at ucsd.edu> wrote:
>
> 
> In total agreement,  esp since it is harder for me to travel every yr.
>  Ac Zentella
>
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> ------------------------------
> *From:* Linganth <linganth-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf
> of Joseph Wilson <joseph.wilson at utoronto.ca>
> *Sent:* Sunday, March 16, 2025 7:07:31 AM
> *To:* linganth at listserv.linguistlist.org <
> linganth at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> *Subject:* [Linganth] Virtual option for AAA 2025?
>
>
> Hi all,
>
>
>
> I just posted a comment on the All Members Community channel of the AAA
> message board about AAA 2025:
>
>
>
> [snip]
>
> As I understand it, the AAA conference this year will no longer have a
> virtual option. I'm not an American citizen and am not comfortable
> travelling to the US at the moment with the rhetoric about Canada coming
> from the current administration. There are probably other non-American
> members who feel the same way. I'm not sure what percentage of the AAA
> membership is non-American, but if the only option for AAA 2025 is
> in-person, there are going to be a lot of people who are not willing/able
> to make the trip. In the end, this will have a more detrimental effect on
> the "participation levels and overall engagement" than would holding a
> hybrid conference. Would you reconsider this policy?
>
> [snip]
>
>
>
> If others feel the same way, perhaps the SLA could consider asking AAA to
> reconsider their in-person-only policy for 2025?
>
> I’ve touched base with Bernard Perley, too, to see if CASCA can advocate
> for this option.
>
>
>
> Thx
>
>
>
> Joe
>
>
> * Joseph.wilson at utoronto.ca <%0bJoseph.wilson at utoronto.ca>*
>
> PhD Candidate,
>
> Dept. of Anthropology, University of Toronto
>
> Schwartz Reisman Institute Graduate Fellow
>
>
>
> www.josephwilson.ca
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>
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-- 
Erika Hoffmann-Dilloway, she/her/hers
Professor of Anthropology
Oberlin College
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