President’s Message – November 2023

Dear ATDS colleagues,

I’m writing with some updates and sending you a virtual mooncake in honor of the upcoming mid-autumn festival. 🥮

As I said stepping into the role of President at our Austin conference, I’m grateful for Jocelyn’s leadership, and I’m humbled by all the great
people who make this organization possible. I’m eager to build on our initiatives supporting contingent faculty, emerging scholars, and those at the mid-career and senior levels. I’m excited for the direction of our field as represented by our awards, journals, and sessions offering mentorship, centering marginalized people, lifting up innovative and transgressive artistic-political work, interrogating unequal power dynamics, and moving within and beyond the United States. I’m energized by our values–accessibility and equity for queer, trans, and global majority people–and I’ll do my best to represent you and advocate for you.

ATDS shined at ATHE with a slew of co-sponsored sessions, award celebrations, and meetups with friends. If you have ideas for our conference in Atlanta next year, then please contact me, our new Vice President/Focus Group Representative Ginny Anderson, and our fantastic Co-Conference Planners Amy Meyer and Heidi Nees. ATHE is also hosting an online town hall on Wednesday, September 27th at 12pm Eastern time to seek more feedback on the future of the organization. You can register for the town hall at this link.

The ATDS governing body recently voted to change our bylaws (https://www.atds.org/about/) to grant our Conference Planners voting privileges and to turn the Conference Planner position into an elected one. This means we will host a special election for the next Conference Planner very soon, because they will shadow our current Co-Conference Planners this year. In the spring, we will hold an election for a new Digital Media Secretary. I encourage you to consider running for office and becoming a part of our terrific team. I also want to thank Pria Wood, Bess Rowen, and David Bisaha for serving on our Nominations Committee this year.

Please renew your ATDS membership if you haven’t already done so, especially since membership will enable you to vote during the special election and access our upcoming programming. We’re continuing to offer pay-what-you-can membership.

Finally, I’m delighted to announce that, with the support of Theatre Annual’s editors Ann Folino White and Peter Reed and their editorial board, the Journal of American Drama and Theatre’s editors, the ATDS Emerging Scholar Awards Committee, our Editorial Advisory Committee, and our governing body, Theatre Annual will begin inviting the winners of our annual Emerging Scholar Awards to publish their ATHE conference papers in a new special section. We believe that this opportunity will be a wonderful way to support graduate students and expand our field. In addition, please check out the latest CFPs for journals such as Theatre Annual and the Journal of American Drama and Theatre on our CFP page.

We have plans for more year-round online programming to spotlight anti-racist work, publications, and professionalization, so let’s stay connected.

Best wishes,
Donatella
—
Donatella Galella
President, American Theatre and Drama Society
Associate Professor, University of California, Riverside
she/her