[Air-L] Let's Talk About AoIR

[Sarah Florini]

HI, all.

I just want to echo what has already been said about the conference organizers. You guys are awesome. I appreciate all your work. I'm sure everyone feels the same. I, personally, see this conversation as part of the growing pains of the organization. The change in the submission process just happened to be the thing that sparked it. But, the conversation was probably going to happen sooner or later. If such conversations didn't happen occasionally, AoiR would become calcified and cease to be the reflexive intellectual space we all seem to appreciate. But, I have nothing by love and praise for the conference organizers. 

There have been a lot of good ideas put forth. I think the track idea might be a useful one to think about. We're an interdisciplinary organization, and if we want to have an interdiscipinary conference we need to try and find a way to accommodate the disciplinary needs of members. That way people can "fit" AoIR into what they need to be doing for tenure, promotion, travel funds, etc. A lot of people have said that their home departments don't take AoIR conferences seriously and won't give them funding to come. Those people need a peer refereed full paper that can be published in proceedings to justify their attendance to their departments. I would hate to see AoiR conferences loose those people and their work. So, we should keep those needs in mind. But, we also need to keep in mind the points that have already been made about work in-progress, performances, activist work, etc. It seems like there could be some kind of track system for different kinds of work so that we can be more confident that those different "flavors" of contribution are being evaluated appropriate criteria. 

Also, ditto to what Terri said about being willing to help. As these problems get tackled, I'm always happy to help with what I can. 

Best,
Sarah Florini
A.W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow
Department of Communication Arts
University of Wisconsin-Madison