The three APA meetings encourage philosophers to engage one another in a truly generalist setting: the meeting programs offer papers, symposia, and commentary in areas throughout philosophy and the history of philosophy. The Program Chairs and the Program Committees of all three divisions, supported by the Secretary-Treasurers, aim for philosophical breadth when creating programs. We’re often asked “why isn’t there more x-philosophy, or philosophy-of-x on the program?” The answer is that we rely directly on you and your philosophical communities to help us create expansive meeting programs.
If there’s an area in philosophy you’d like to see more of, here’s the secret: encourage members of your philosophical community to submit colloquium papers (3,000 words) symposium papers (5,000 words), and posters to one or more of the three meetings.
Doing so will, of course, raise the probability of seeing the area you’d like boosted, in the refereed portion of the Divisional Programs (in the refereed colloquia, symposia, and posters). But this is not the main reason why encouraging philosophers in your area to submit papers is likely to increase the presence of that area on the program. The main reason has to do with the relationship between submissions and the makeup of the Program Committees.
The Executive Committees of the three Divisions approve nominations to the Program Committees based in large part on what areas need to be covered in order to referee submissions. For example, the Pacific Division Program Committee has around 30 members, each of whom referees 15—20 papers over a three week period in the fall. Ideally, the areas of expertise of the members of the Program Committee match the areas we find in the submissions. We don’t want some members – say, those who do ethics – refereeing 30 papers while other members are refereeing only 5.
Why do the areas of expertise of the Program Committee members matter when it comes to seeing more of what you’d like on the programs? Because each Program Committee member, in addition to undertaking the time-intensive and essential work of refereeing submissions, also creates invited sessions: Book Symposia, Invited Papers, Invited Symposia. If someone on the Program Committee shares the area that interests you, it is more likely that the invited sessions they organize will be in your area of interest.
So: the more people in x-philosophy or philosophy-of-x submit papers, the more we’ll need representation in x-philosophy or philosophy-of-x on the Program Committees, and the more representation in x-philosophy or philosophy-of-x we have on the Program Committees, the more likely invited sessions on x-philosophy or philosophy-of-x will appear on the program. The Divisional Programs are composed mostly of refereed papers and invited sessions. If members of your philosophical community encourage one another to submit papers to the refereed portion of the program, your area of interest will be boosted not only in the refereed portion of the program, but also in invited sessions.
Becko Copenhaver
Rebecca Copenhaver is Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology at Washington University in St. Louis. She is the Secretary-Treasurer of the Pacific Division of the APA.
