The Forty-Sixth Annual Dickens Society Meeting: Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

The Forty-Sixth Annual Dickens Society MeetingHalifax, Nova Scotia, Canada Diana C. Archibald The forty-sixth annual Dickens Society business meeting was called to order on 8 July 2014 at 9:00 am by President Iain Crawford, who welcomed members and thanked the symposium organizer, Sara Malton, on behalf of the Society. The minutes from the previous year were approved and officers gave reports. Secretary-Treasurer Diana Archibald noted that the 2015 Society’s individual membership numbers (168) are down since 2013 (191), but above what they had been in 2011 (145). She reported that the Executive Committee and Board of Trustees had met to discuss ways we can improve outreach, including increased visibility at regional and international conferences, launching a new website and social media (twitter and facebook), and publicizing the Partlow Prize more widely. Our financial situation is stabilizing, with only a small loss this year, compared to last year’s more significant dip, as occasioned by our move to publishing Dickens Quarterly through Johns Hopkins Press. The Press continues to forecast a rise in subscriptions revenues after a few years of their professional management and projected income from Project Muse. Archibald submitted the preliminary Fiscal Year 2015 financial report (see next section) for discussion. The final report will be audited by the Dickens Society Audit Committee: Iain Crawford, Natalie McKnight, and Rob Jackloski. Editor David Paroissien reported on the state of the Dickens Quarterly, after the first year of our five-year contract with JHUP. A letter campaign to encourage lapsed subscribers to re-subscribe was successful with an 8% renewal of membership. We will continue to try to contact those who have dropped out to determine if this was intentional or due to the transition to a new publisher and process. Paroissien also announced the Executive Committee’s decision to add an associate editor position to be filled by longtime member Trey Philpotts, with Margaret Darby taking over as review [End Page 347] editor. Further, in keeping with standard practice for academic journals, we have also created a formal Editorial Board and invited several prominent Dickensians to serve. Finally, he noted that the institutional subscriptions rate will hold steady for the next two years at $44 but will go up to $75 after that. Martin Regal, Communications Committee chair, reported on the development of our new website <dickenssociety.org> and announced that our twitter account <twitter.com/dickens_society> has been set up and the symposium this year would feature live tweeting from attendee Sean Grass. Volunteers were solicited to assist Communications Committee member James Cutler in our social media efforts: Sara Malton and Lillian Nayder volunteered. Society members are encouraged to send newsworthy items to us for inclusion in our online venues. Next, we heard reports from symposia organizers. Last year’s host, Marie-Amélie Coste, sent an account of the Béziers symposium. Organizer of the 2015 Liquid Dickens symposium in Halifax, Sara Malton welcomed delegates and thanked the administration at Saint Mary’s University for their outstanding support. The 2016 symposium, Adapting Dickens, will be held in Reykjavik, Iceland, to be hosted by Martin Regal’s home institution, the University of Iceland. In 2017 our symposium will return to the U.S. to be held in Boston, Massachusetts, sponsored by Boston University and hosted by Natalie McKnight. This symposium will also be co-sponsored by the Center for Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning, and our theme will be Interdisciplinary Dickens. The following year we expect the meeting to take place in Cardiff, Wales. An election of new trustees followed. A slate was put forward by the nominating committee [Natalie McKnight (chair), Elizabeth Bridgham, Natalie Cole, David Paroissien, Dominic Rainsford], and members voted unanimously to approve them: Trustees (term ending 2018): Leon Litvack (Queen’s University, Belfast, Northern Ireland), Chris Louttit (Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands), Goldie Morgentaler (University of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada), and Leslie Simon (Utah Valley University, Orem, Utah, USA). Since the approval of our new bylaws and extension of officers’ terms for three years, no other elections took place. The members expressed appreciation for the four outgoing trustees: Lauren Goodlad, Jonathan Grossman, Dominic Rainsford, and Daniel Tyler. As a part of our...

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