MAA News – From the Executive Director: 2023 Annual Meeting

Publication Prizewinners with President Maureen Miller

What a joy it was to gather in Washington, DC last week with more than 500 friends and colleagues! This year’s Annual Meeting was remarkable in so many ways: the number of attendees, the breadth of programming, the demographic and professional diversity of the presenters, and the noteworthy field trips to DC-area collections. The gathering included visits to Dumbarton Oaks and the Textile Museum, a textile workshop at The Avenir Center, the inaugural day-long Digital Medieval Studies Institute, and sessions at the National Gallery of Art (“Curating Global Medieval Art”) and the Library of Congress (“Fragmentology”). The closing reception was a jubilant gathering at the National Museum of Asian Art, with curators on hand to answer questions and guide us through the galleries.

The plenaries all engaged, in various ways, with issues of indigeneity and cross-cultural contact, beginning with Kiros A.B. Auld’s Land Acknowledgement that took us beyond platitudes and towards action (click here to learn more about the Indigenous Lands Project). The Land Acknowledgement can be found in the online program. President Maureen Miller’s plenary will be published in the July 2023 issue of Speculum.

Newly-inducted Fellows of the MAA with the Fellows Officers

I want to take this opportunity to thank Program Committee Chairs Jennifer Davis and Laura Morreale for their work organizing and implementing this very complex meeting, along with the Program Committee, the team of volunteers (led by Lilla Kopár, Sam Collins, and the MAA’s own Christopher Cole) and the many DC-area institutions and departments who supported this event. I would also like to thank Maureen Miller for her service as President and welcome incoming President Robin Fleming.

We look forward to seeing you at the University of Notre Dame in 2024 for the 99th Annual Meeting of the Medieval Academy of America!

Lisa Fagin Davis, Executive Director

This entry was posted in MAA Newsletter. Bookmark the permalink.