AMSA News


AMSA Holds its 16th Annual Conference
Masculinities and Institutions:
Mapping the Connections
At Wake Forest University
Winston-Salem, North Carolina
April 4th-6th, 2008

Ninety-seven scholars and practitioners participated in the 2008 AMSA Conference on Men and Masculinities, Masculinities and Institutions: Mapping the Connections, April 4th through 6th at Wake Forest University.  The conference featured two keynote addresses, pre-conference men’s studies workshops, and presentations by over 50 scholars, practitioners and activists. AMSA’s conference continues to be the largest annual men's studies conference in the United States, drawing an international group of participants representing a broad range of academic disciplines and interests.  An open and affirming event featuring scholarship and respectful dialogue on the critical study of men and masculinities, anyone with an interest in this emerging field of study is welcome to participate. More on this and past conferenes including conference programs. AMSA 2008 in Photos -- as they are submitted

2009 AMSA Conference Location -- Concordia and McGill Universities in Montreal

The theme of the 17th Annual Conference scheduled for April 3-5, 2009 is "Beyond Borders: Masculinities and Margins." Events will be held at McGill University and Concordia University. A group of Canadian scholars has spearheaded AMSA's first conference in Canada.

Watch for more details.

AMSA Awards Its 2008 Loren Frankel Scholarship to Chien-Chen Kung

The American Men's Studies Association presented the 2008 Loren Frankel Scholarship to Chien-Chen Kung at the annual banquet of its 2008 Annual Conference at Wake Forest University on April 4th. Kung is a doctoral student in the Educational Leadership and Policy Department at the University at Buffalo, the State University of New York. He is in the Social and Philosophical Foundations Program with a concentration in the Sociology of Education.

The Frankel Scholarship is awarded to the student submitting the most promising paper for presentation at the annual conference. Chien-Chen Kung's paper was titled: "Masculinities and leisure: The middle age men's car culture of American white working class."

Kung grew up in a fishing family in a rural town in Taiwan and has been a certificated art teacher for two years (1996; 1999) in an elementary school of a working-class area of Taipei County, Taiwan.

AMSA is committed to supporting new scholars and students, and limited scholarship money is available for full-time students through The Loren Frankel Scholarship Fund.

The 2007 15th Annual Conference on Men and
1Masculinities —Engaging Boys and Men: How Are We Doing?
in Kansas City was the Largest in History.

Over 100 registrants presented papers and plenary sessions addressing a broad range of personal and professional perspectives on the critical study of men and masculinities at the March 30 - April 1, 2007 gathering. The Kansas City, Missouri Holiday Inn on the Plaza and the campus of the University of Missouri - Kansas City provided the setting for AMSA's 15th annual event. For the first time, two preconference workshops on Friday, March 30, included Sam Femiano and Stu Johnston on clinical interventions involving boys and men and Robert Heasley and Mark Justad on teaching men's studies.
Download the 2007 Conference Program.
A Photo Album from the 2007 Conference.

Member Notes and other AMSA News

Our membership office has relocated from Albuquerque, NM to Northampton, MA. After years of duty above and beyond the call of duty, AMSA Office Manager, Conference Manager and Board Member Dave Robinson has relinquished his organizational duties. Dave also designed, launched, and updated the AMSA web pages until last year. Our thanks go out to Dave--see you in KC, friend, where you can actually go to sessions and take it easy for a change. Sam Femiano, AMSA Treasurer, is handling the membership office duties once again out of his home in Northampton. Bob Minor and Mark Justad now share web maestro duties, using the term loosely.

 

Sam Femiano and a committee of three others are overseeing the Loren Frankel Student Scholarship Fund, an endowment used to support student participation in AMSA. The fund is nearing its goal of $10,000 thanks to the generosity of AMSA members and other friends of Loren and his family.


AMSA Board Member Whitney Harris is finalizing plans for an effort to raise endowment funds for the Clyde Franklin III Lectureship to be given each year at the annual AMSA conference. The goal for this endowment is $20,000 and it is being established in honor of Professor Franklin and his contributions to the field of Men's Studies and work on non-majority men and masculinities.

 

AMSA Past President and current Board Member Steve Boyd, received the 2007 Building the Dream Award, given during the sixth annual Winston-Salem State University & Wake Forest University joint Martin Luther King Jr. celebration on January 15, 2007. The Building the Dream Award was established to honor one professor or administrator and one student from either WSSU or WFU who exemplifies the ideals that King embodied and ultimately died for. Steve is
Professor and Chair of the Department of Religion at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, NC.


AMSA Board Member Bob Minor has published his eighth book, When Religion Is an Addiction (St. Louis: HumanityWorks!, 2007). In addition his current series of practical booklets, "The Fairness Project Series" now includes five different topics. For more information visit The Fairness Project.

 

Board Member Lewis Bosler recently presented at the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education on graduation and retention rates and is teaching “Clinical Skills for Working with Male Clients” at Antioch University in Keene, NH this fall.  He will present at NASPA this fall on “Men’s Initiatives on College Campuses” and “From the Battlefield to the Classroom”.  He is working with NASPA administrators to start a program to assist returning veterans in their transition to college campuses.

News Page Editor's Call

AMSA members are invited to send items of interest to other members (e.g., research projects, publications, recommended readings, and any activities or achievements you'd like your colleagues to know about) for inclusion in this News column. Send copy to Mark Justad along with an active E-mail address. Minimal copyediting and formatting will be done to submissions, so send clean copy only.



--AMSA is an inclusive organization dedicated to promoting the critical study of men and masculinities--

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