Editor’s Page

Support SHEAR/Be a Friend

It is hard, in this upcoming subscription renewal season, not to sound like a public radio shill during a National Public Radio semi-annual beg-a-thon: It is thanks to readers like you that we can make these programs available. But it is true enough. The JER, the conferences, the fellowships, and the other programs and initiatives that SHEAR organizes and supports are made possible in part through the generosity of readers like you. You can become a Friend of SHEAR: a Nicholas Biddle Friend for $150–299, a Thomas Skidmore Friend for $300–499, or a Sojourner Truth Friend for $500 or more. Just send a check, made out to SHEAR, to Amy Baxter-Bellamy, Executive Coordinator of SHEAR, 3355 Woodland Walk, Philadelphia, PA 19104-4531. This single payment will cover your subscription, your membership in SHEAR, and your Friend of SHEAR tax-deductible donation. Friends will be acknowledged in the Winter issue of the JER. We will promise, however, NOT to send you coffee mugs, T-shirts, beach towels, or other unwanted junk to clutter your apartment or house—this will leave more room for bookshelves, something all SHEARites could no doubt really use.

SHEAR/HSP/LCP Fellows

The Historical Society of Pennsylvania and the Library Company of Philadelphia announce the SHEAR fellows for 2010–2011. We will welcome back to Philadelphia Kate Carte-Engel (Texas A & M University), whose current project is “International Protestantism in the Era of the American Revolution.” And in Philadelphia already is Megan Walsh (Temple University), whose dissertation is on “A Nation in Sight: Literature, Visual Technology, and Print Culture in the Early Republic.” Our thanks to Jim Green of the Library Company, the fellowship committee, and the HSP and LCP for their support of the fellowship program.

Call for Papers, SHEAR 2011, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania “What’s New and Exciting in Early Republic Scholarship?”

The 33^rd annual meeting of the Society for Historians of the Early Republic will convene “at home” in Philadelphia on July 14–17, 2011. The Program Committee invites proposals for session and papers exploring all aspects of the history and culture of the early American republic together with its northern and southern borderlands and international connections, c. 1776–1860. Proposals that reflect the application of new methodologies or perspectives, or that explore new approaches to teaching and to public history, are welcome. We are especially interested in exploring aspects of scholarship that cross traditional boundaries or examining novel questions, sources, or interpretive solutions. We welcome participants from outside the traditional boundaries of the field.

The Program Committee will consider proposals for individual papers and for full sessions; panels with two papers and two commentators are preferred. We also welcome workshops with precirculated papers, or sessions in which panelists assess the state of debate on a topic. Each individual paper proposal should include a one-page abstract and a short C.V. Each workshop or full-panel proposal should include a brief abstract of the session, together with a one-page abstract of each paper and a short C.V. for each participant, including the chair and commentator(s). Please specify any special requirements, such as audiovisual equipment, outlets, or facilities to accommodate disability. Any scholar interested in acting as a session chair or commentator should submit a short C.V. Please note that all program participants will be required to register for the conference.

The deadline for submissions is December 1, 2010. Please send submissions to the Program Committee Chair:

• John L. Larson

  Department of History, Purdue University

  672 Oval Drive

  West Lafayette, IN 47907 USA

  larsonj@purdue.edu

• Program Committee for 2011

  John L. Larson, Purdue University, Chair

  James J. Buss, Oklahoma City University

  Kate Carte-Engel, Texas A & M University

  François Furstenberg, University of Montreal

  Michelle Gillespie, Wake Forest University

  Ruth Herndon, Bowling Green State University