Editorial Statement

Editorial Statement This issue marks the first to be published with the imprint of The University of Calgary Press and under the new editors approved by the Canadian Association for American Studies at its 1991 Annual Meeting. We the editors and editorial staff would like to express our appreciation to the past editors, in particular to Professor Ernest Redekop and Penelope Lister of the University of Western Ontario for their generous support and assistance in attempting to make the transition to a new team and new venue a smooth and effective one. We also wish to thank for their patience and understanding with any unusual delays those authors whose articles, reviews, and essays were already in the process of evaluation, acceptance, and publication when the transition was announced. As editors, we have a strong commitment to the past traditions of the journal and the association as well as to the need for careful change in the content and orientation of the journal. Over the next issues, readers will find that there will be more emphasis, where feasible, on a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach to an understanding of the United States, at the same time that history and literature may remain the core disciplines embodied in the pages of the journal. To that end, the new editorial board draws on expertise in a range of disciplines from the social sciences, humanities and law; there is representation from Canada, the United States, V and Europe. We have also sought to include a diversity of methodologies as well as disciplines-empirical researchers as well as theorists. The editors welcomesubmissions from those disciplines that in the past have been under-represented in our pages:economics, law, anthropology, political science, geography, business administration, fine art, and music, among others-as well as continuing strong contributions from our traditional base in literature, cultural studies, and history. Essays which cross disciplines by applying paradigms from one field to the study of another are also of substantial interest to us. Those submitting materials for consideration to the journal are reminded that all article and review essay submissions, commissioned or unsolicited, are anonymously peer reviewed, although logically the process is less onerous for commissioned review essays. A second change that the editors have initiated already is a reduction in the number of review essays that the journal will publish in each issue. We intend to continue to publish longer review essaysand shorter book reviews; but the emphasis will be on the publication of empirical research and new thinking across the various disciplines relevant to the study of the United States. Our primary objective is to publish the best scholarship in the field of American Studies and to stimulate the study of the United States in Canada and abroad. We look forward to working closelywith all in the field of American studies in the coming years in the pursuit of those common goals. We would be grateful for comments on the journal and, in particular, for letters to the editor that address substantive intellectual issues raised in the articles published in the journal. C.B. S.J.R. vi ...