Review of the Fortieth Annual Meeting Chapel Hill, North Carolina

Abstract

Southeastern Geographer Vol. 26, No. 1, May 1986, pp. 73-74 REVIEW OF THE FORTIETH ANNUAL MEETING CHAPEL HILL, NORTH CAROLINA Thomas L. Bell The Fortieth Annual Meeting of the Southeastern Division, Association of American Geographers was held in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, November 24-26, 1985, at the Hotel Europa. Host for the meeting was the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Richard J. Kopec and John W. Florin co-chaired the Local Arrangements Committee. The official registration count was 324. The program for the meeting contained five field trips, three panel discussions, six scheduled meetings, and sixty-five papers that were presented in sixteen sessions. There were six papers in two sessions presented for the student honors competition. At the Sunday evening opening session, members of the Division were welcomed to North Carolina by Samuel R. Williamson, Provost at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A plenary session followed in which five noted scholars at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill spoke from their disciplinary perspective on "The South Across a Half Century, 1945-1995." The speakers included sociologists John D. Kasarda and John Sheldon Reed, political scientist Merle Black, water resources expert David H. Moreau and folklorist Terry Zug. The session concluded with commentary by geographer Stephen S. Birdsall. James S. Fisher, President of the Southeastern Division, presided at the Annual Business Meeting on Tuesday morning. President Fisher announced that Charles S. Aiken had been elected the new President, and Jesse O. McKee the new Treasurer. New State Representatives were William R. Strong, Alabama; Ronald Schultz, Florida; Ronald R. Dilamarter, Kentucky; Gwenda Rice, South Carolina; and Howard Adkins, West Virginia. At the Business Meeting Sam B. Hilliard, Lizabeth Ann PyIe, and Gerald L. Ingalls were elected to the Honors Committee and Sidney R. Jumper, Robert O. Morrill, and Theodore R. Steinke to the Nominating Committee. The Fortieth Annual meeting concluded on Tuesday afternoon with Dr. Bell is Professor of Geography at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville , TN 37996. He served as Vice President and Program Chairman of the Division during 1985. 74Southeastern Geographer the annual Honors Luncheon. Patricia P. Gilmartin, who chaired the Honors Committee, announced that Cynthia A. Miller, University of Georgia won the award for best paper at the Master's level and that William L. Cawthon, University of Georgia won the award for best paper at the doctoral level. She also announced that the 1985-86 Merle C. Prunty Scholarship was awarded to Christine Klaine, a student at Memphis State University and that the amount of the award for student honors had been increased from $50 to $100 and a year's paid membership to the Association of American Geographers. Ronald F. Abler, President of the Association of American Geographers, delivered the luncheon address "Of Rabbits, Levers and Geographers." Continuing concern over the status of geography in the curriculum at all levels of education was reflected in three of the special sessions. The Committee on Geography in Education sponsored a Monday afternoon panel discussion of their report entitled Pre-Collegiate Geography in the Southeast. Gwenda Rice and George F. Hepner led a Tuesday morning discussion on "Fostering International Understanding through World Regional Geography" in which strategies developed at the recent Wingspread Conference on the topic were presented. On Monday evening , Sidney R. Jumper and Truman A. Hartshorn co-chaired a special session on incorporating "Economic Geography in the Business Curriculum ." After considerable efforts had been expended, it was disappointing to learn that a planned visit of several Soviet geographers to the Fortieth Annual meeting through the auspices of the IREX Program had to be cancelled. It is, however, gratifying to realize that the Southeastern Division meeting was specifically selected to showcase a professional meeting of American geographers. ...