Society for the Scientific Study of Religion
Business Meeting Minutes
1982
| October 23, 1982 | Providence, RI |
Business Minutes - Version 1
October 23, 1982
President Marie Augusta Neal opened the meeting with words of welcome. The Minutes for the 1981 meeting were distributed. Moved and seconded to accept the minutes. Motion passed.
Announcements: The Executive Secretary announced that well over 400 people were registered for the meeting, some of whom were unable to find rooms anywhere within the city. New officers were announced: Ralph Hood and Benetta Jules-Rosette to Council, Stan Gaede as Secretary, and David Roozen as Treasurer. Also, it was announced that one member of the Society, William Shepherd, had died during the year.
Executive Secretary's Report. The Executive Secretary, Wade Clark Roof, reported that the Society had enjoyed another good year. He indicated that though membership was down by about 75 members, we were in sound fiscal condition. Even though we had tried to spend the previous year's surplus, we were still coming out with a surplus for the year. Regarding the membership decline, he recommended that the Society establish a Membership Committee to work on the problem.
Roof reported on the Journal, noting that Don Capps at Princeton Theological Seminary was now Editor, and Robert Wuthnow was Book Review Editor. Submissions to the Journal remain quite high, which reflects, he noted, the quality and interdisciplinary character of the publication.
He went on to comment on the program, pointing out that this year's theme was an attractive one. Robert Wuthnow was commended for the program, and David Roozen was recognized for handling media relations quite successfully. Appreciation was also expressed to Stephen Glazier, who handled local arrangements for the 1982 meeting.
He concluded his report observing that the Executive and Business offices were operating well and that he looked forward to another year as Executive Secretary. He noted we would be meeting in Knoxville in 1983 and that plans were under way to meet. possibly in Chicago in 1984.
Treasurer's Report: Ruth Wallace expressed appreciation to the Business Manager and the Executive Secretary for another sound fiscal year. She noted that we had tried the previous year to incur a deficit through some major expenditures (equipment, increased support of research awards, membership directory). yet we reached the end of the year with a small surplus. The reasons for this were the continued high interest rates on our investments and our fortunate stock and bond holdings. She also noted there was an increase in contributions to the Society.
Turning to the budget for the year ahead, she pointed to the following Council-approved actions: (1) to increase the allocation for research awards from $4,000 to $10,000; (2) to increase the Executive Secretary's stipend by
$700 and to provide $2,500 for secretarial support; (3) to set aside $1,000 for a committee to explore possibilities of establishing a Foundation; (4) to increase support from $500 to $1,300 for COSSA. Altogether, the proposed budget for the year ahead totals $96,750 with a proposed income of $78,050 and an anticipated deficit of $17,700. She reminded the meeting that we had tried to do this the year before, but failed, and assured the gathering that we could afford to absorb a deficit if it should occur.
Program for 1983. President Neal introduced next year's Program Chair, Cheryl Gilkes, and commented on the theme for the meeting, "Religion and Justice." Gilkes pointed out that papers on all religious topics were acceptable but religion and justice issues were especially needed. She asked members to contact her with ideas and proposals for the Knoxville meeting. Sister Neal then recognized Don Ploch as the local arrangements person. Ploch observed that the hotel facilities were excellent, that Knoxville had many local attractions of religious interest, and that plans were under way for some one-day excursions into the surrounding area.
Monograph Editor's Report. Jim Wood announced that he had received only a few manuscripts during the year, and asked that members encourage others to submit monographs to the Society for possible publication.
Research Awards. Jeff Hadden reported that the research committee received 17 applications for funding but was able to award only 4. A fifth project was approved, but funding would come partly out of the new year's budget. He encouraged people to reapply in the new year when the research budget would be larger.
President Neal also announced that the Student Paper Award on the program was given to Judith Cook and Dale Wimberly.
Foundation Proposal. Jim Richardson reported that a committee had been appointed by Council to explore possibilities of establishing a foundation which in the future might fund large research projects or perhaps support research leaves for members of the Society. Council approved $1,000 to cover expenses for exploring the legal and practical aspects of such endeavor.
Book Project. President Neal announced that Council had authorized Phillip Hammond to edit a collection of essays on contemporary scientific study of religion, to be published most likely by the Univ. of California Press. Council approved a subvention to help cover costs of publication.
Membership Committee. In keeping with the Executive Secretary's recommendation, Council approved the appointment of William Silverman to head a membership committee. President Neal asked for interested people to contact Silverman about recruiting new members.
Search for Executive Secretary. President Neal announced that this was the fifth and final year of Clark Roof's term as Executive Secretary and that a new person would be named to this job in the coming year. Neal, D'Antonio, and Johnson, the present and past presidents, would serve as the Search Committee. She encouraged members to submit nominations to her.
Program Chair's Report. Robert Wuthnow reported that 380 names were on the program. He noted that he had received cooperation from people in history, political science, and comparative religion. He also called attention to the large number of graduate students participating on the program.
President Neal observed that there had been excellent cooperation among the three societies in putting together the program. She expressed appreciation to Wuthnow for his work.
Discussion from the Floor. Sister Neal asked if there were announcements from those in attendance. She recognized Walter Clark, one of the founding members who helped organize the Society in 1948. Clark observed that in the early years there was a good blend of sociologists and psychologists, but that recently psychologists were not as involved as much. He urged the Society to maintain its interdisciplinary character and to encourage psychologists to remain with it.
Meredith McGuire noted that this was the first time ASR had met jointly with SSSR and RRA and that from ASR's perspective the meetings had been extremely successful.
Sister Neal expressed appreciation to the retiring officers and to Stephen Glazier as local arrangements person. Despite the fact that not all our members were able to find rooms in the hotel, she acknowledged that the hotel had been quite pleasant to work with.
Adjournment. The President entertained a motion to adjourn. Carried. 1:30 p.m.
Business Minutes - Version 2
October 23, 1982
The Business Meeting began at 12:30 p.m. There were possibly 30 or 40 people in attendance. Neal provided a short introduction to the session. She indicated that three or four other SSSR sessions were going on at the same time so that there were a number of conflicts and a small number of people therefore were able to attend the Business Meeting. She indicated that this won't happen in future years. The minutes of the Business Meeting last year were distributed and examined by the membership. Neal asked for a motion to accept the minutes. It was moved and seconded from the floor and the vote was to accept the minutes. CARRIED
Reports and Announcements by Clark Roof
Roof said that he was delighted to have a fantastic registration at this point of some 425 individuals. He indicated that this did not include around 100 APRE individuals. He said that the Providence Journal Newspaper reported that there were 500 individuals attending the religious meetings here in town and indeed Roof indicated that this was probably a pretty accurate figure. He said that the integration of the four societies had been an excellent success this year. He indicated that it was very unfortunate that the hotel was full. However, to the best of his understanding everyone had been accommodated and mostly everyone in Providence itself. He announced the new officers and the new council members. He indicated that the election for council members had produced two new council members - J. Rosette from the University of California and R. Hood from the University of Texas. He indicated that S. Gate would be the new Secretary and that D. Roozen of the University of Hartford would be the new Treasurer. He indicated that these two would replace R. Wallace and R. Crumrine as Treasurer and Secretary respectively. He indicated that on council, E. Brewer and M. McQuire were also being replaced. Roof went on to note that there was one obituary - W. Shephard's tragic death in August. He indicated that Shephard had been working on a book during the past year, a book which was to deal with the first amendment rights of CALT members, that lately his life had been troubled
and in August his tragic death occurred. He noted that we had given Shephard a research grant to help him with his book and that we will continue to support the book. We will make sure that these grant monies go towards the publication of the volume. It is now to be published by the American Academy of Religion.
The Executive Secretary Report
Roof indicated that he was highly pleased and that the Society had had another excellent year. He indicated that last year we had had considerable financial surplus so that during this fiscal year we had attempted to spend that surplus. We bought considerable new equipment, we increased the research award from $3,000 to $6,000 and we added a $500 prize for a student paper. He indicated that we were concerned regarding our tax free status, that in order to be a non-taxable organization the government expects that the group does not continue to show a profit. He indicated that this year we also again have a surplus. However, he was not happy to note that our membership is down 75 members. He said that initially he expected that during this recession library and student memberships would drop off but this has not been true. Library and student memberships and retired person's memberships have kept up but it is the regular members that are dropping. He indicated that this was a common pattern in academic profession societies but that he was concerned that our Society was also experiencing this drop in membership. He indicated therefore that the Council has appointed a membership committee and that William Silverman will act as the chairman of that committee. Roof also noted that Hadden would report later on the research awards.
Since the journal editors were not available Roof went on to report on their activities. He indicated that Capp has said that submissions to the journal are still high and that the journal is doing well. Roof thanked the previous editor, Hammond for his excellent interdisciplinary balance. Roof said that a number of people had commented on the high quality of the journal and its interdisciplinary orientation. He indicated that Capp as new editor will carry this on and also indicated that Wuthnow, the new Book Reports Editor,
will also carry on this tradition.
Roof went on to mention the programme which has been very excellent. The special topic, the inter-relationship of political power and religion has caused a lot of interest and a high number of papers. Roozen also has been extremely successful and has worked very hard in getting the media to cover the meeting, so there is excellent progress in this area.
Roof concluded saying that this summarizes the highlights of this year of our operation. He indicated that the business and executive offices are operating very well and that he is extremely excited about our prospects for the coming years. He said that next year we will be meeting in Knoxville and it appears that this also will be an extremely exciting and hopefully very successful meeting. Roof is also looking forward to this, his fifth and last year as Executive Secretary.
Neal then gave thanks to Roof for the Executive Treasurer's Report and moved on to Wallace's Treasurer's Report.
Treasurer's Report
Ruth Wallace gave thanks especially to Lorraine and to Clark and she indicated that they had been extremely helpful during the three years that she has acted as Treasurer of the Society. She indicated that D. Roozen would be the new Secretary and he was extremely capable. She was sure that the Treasurer's work would be carried on very very well. Wallace indicated that the budget which they were distributing to the membership had been approved by the council. Contrary, she indicated, to our expectations, our projected $19,000 deficit this year has turned into a $400 positive income. However, she did note that on paper our general fund is worth a good deal more than it would actually be if we had to sell our securities as the market is somewhat depressed. She asked why we should have this excess of $400 this year. She noted that the index of the membership which was to be prepared this year is not quite ready and that we set aside $250 for that index. She also went on to indicate that
interest rates are still very high and that therefore we are showing good
income on our investments. Also she mentioned that there was an increase
from $75 last year to $400 in the category of general contributions to the
society. This she said was a very good sign and she was extremely pleased
that members were interested in investing in the Society and in our membership.
She felt that the council was doing its best to reinvest our profits, our
monies in our membership and she felt that the members themselves in observing
this kind of activity also wanted to contribute to the Society.
Wallace indicated that the research awards were very successful and that it was an ongoing project. She noted that monies for research awards were up this year from $4,000 to $10,000. This is for the coming fiscal year. She indicated that there would be an 8% salary increase for the secretaries and the salaried employees in the Society. She noted that Roof, the Executive Secretary, has lost the $2,000 donation of their university for a secretary and also that we are recruiting a new Executive Secretary so the council is increasing Roof's salary $700 and also increasing his monies available from $1,000 to $2,500 for the Executive Secretary's secretary. She also noted $1,000 which the Council is making available to the Foundation Committee. The Society is planning to look into establishing a foundation and this money is earmarked for lawyer fees and for communication to analyze the basis on which such a foundation might be established. She noted also an increase from $500 to $1,300 for COSSA and indicated that in the past we have been subscribers to COSSA but that now if one provides a dollar per Society member then the Society can become an active member of COSSA. For our Society this would mean $1,300 so our contribution this year will be $1,300 to COSSA. She went on to explain that recently COSSA through their lobbying has been able to add $13 million to the NSF funds that are available for scientific research. She indicated that we will be continuing our graduate student award. This adds up to a proposed expense of $96,750, a proposed income of $78,050 and a proposed deficit of $17,700. She did remind the group again that last year we projected a $19,000 deficit and are ending up now with a surplus of $400. So the hope is that next year's deficit will not actually come to pass and that we may come closer to breaking even next year. She asked for questions and
there were no questions on the budget from the floor. Neal then thanked
Wallace for the Treasurer's Report.
Neal mentioned the next year's programme. She said it would deal with religion and social justice and she asked Cheryl Jilks, the Programme Chairman for next year to add any comments that she might have about her programme. Jilks immediately mentioned that there was a new theme that the programme was to be oriented around. However she insisted and emphasized that all contributions were welcome and encouraged whether they dealt with the specific theme or not. She also asked for any kinds of suggestions regarding the specific theme, any symposia that people would want to propose, any suggestions for specific speakers, paper suggestions and so forth. She requested all the members of the Society to contact her if they have any possible suggestions in mind. She said she would look forward to hearing from everyone and hoped that as many people as possible, if not everyone, would have some suggestions that they wished to make. Neal then added that Ploch is the local arrangements person -and that he has some very interesting things in mind for the Knoxville meetings. Ploch then made several announcements. He said that Knoxville was only a day's driving time from much of the East Coast area so that people who do not like to fly could in a long day's drive arrive in Knoxville. He also noted, of course, that there are numerous airlines that do serve Knoxville. He went on to explain that it was very close to the Smokey Mountain Park area and that there were a number of religious groups that were doing considerable amounts of work in this region. He said that the hotel was excellent and he felt that the Society would be very happy in their choice. Neal then added that they were considering a hiking trip to be one of the extra trips, a hiking trip into the mountains, perhaps the day before the meeting starts or the afternoon before the meeting starts and also considering perhaps an overnight hiking trip if people wished to stay or come a day or so earlier. Also a celebration dinner is being considered. The membership will be contacted later on as to whether they would be interested in participating in such a dinner. She indicated that field trips, bus trips and so forth are in the process of being planned. This time period early in November is a very very nice time of year in the
South and that she expected the meeting would be most pleasant. She also
gave thanks to Hammond for his work on the journal as Journal Editor and
welcomed Capps, the new Journal Editor.
Wood, the editor for the monograph series was present and made a very short set of comments. He indicated that at present he doesn't have any manuscripts in hand. He has a whole set of readers, that he is anxious to have them reading manuscripts. But he has no manuscripts so he would like members to submit, as soon as possible, anything that they might have available.
Neal then called Hadden to report on the research awards. Hadden indicated that the monies for the research awards for this present year had been increased from $3,000 to $6,000. He reported that there were some 30 inquiries about the research award. These produced 17 applications and 4 actual awards. There was $1,000 left over that they had earmarked for a project that Roozen is developing. He is summarizing some Hartford Seminary information that has been collected and wants to work it into a little guidebook. This institution also will in part finance the project. Hadden announced the 4 awards that have been given. He said there was special consideration given to Ph.D. students who are presently writing their dissertations and special consideration given to young scholars who have just completed their Ph.D. He added however, that none of the awards went to students working on their dissertations. However one of them did go to a younger scholar. He again indicated that people should please reapply this year, that there would be more money in this fund and that he felt individuals that needed small amounts of money to encourage their research would find this a very satisfactory means. Neal then gave thanks to this standing committee. She indicated that at least year's council meeting we had established this research awards committee which was to be chaired by the vice-president. She indicated also that there is a new committee which we struck this year on an award to scholars that have completed within the last year or so, the best book or the best published set of papers. She indicated that J. Seidler will chair this committee. She also went on to comment that the graduate students who had received the award were J. Cook and
D. Wimberley. She said unfortunately they could not attend the Business
Meeting because they were at this very moment presenting their paper. It
was unfortunate that there had been this conflict in the time scheduling.
Neal then mentioned that the Society is working on a proposal for a foundation and that Richardson has done a great deal of this work and asked him to make comment about this proposal. Richardson indicated that he had been working on a proposed foundation for the Society and asked for any kind of feedback from the membership. He said that last year at the Council Meeting he had been charged to look into the possibility of a foundation or an endowment fund, that could be administered by the society. He had examined this possibility during this year. He said the hope was that this fund could support significantly larger research projects, could support a major research work, and perhaps could support a year's research leave for a member of the association. He indicated that the Council had encouraged his investigation of this matter. He had talked to the research officer at their university, who was in charge of this sort of activity at the university level, and also informally to several attorneys. He indicated that he had no budget this year so that he was not able to request any kind of formal counsel. He noted that he had worked on this committee with J. Fischter and D'Antonio although so much of the work had to be done so late in the year that it was not possible for this group to meet and that he had written up the final report. Richardson said that he still very strongly supports the idea. It seems viable and he certainly hopes that this work can be continued. He noted that the council has authorized an expenditure of $1,000 to get started on this project which will support the organization and the presentation of a really substantial proposal regarding a foundation. J. Hadden will chair the committee, J. Fischter, D'Antonio and Richardson will serve on this committee. Richardson indicated that he assumed that Hadden would welcome anyone else who wanted to serve on the committee. Richardson had made a mockup brochure describing the programme and he distributed it to the people at the meetings. He would like any kind of input regarding this project. He indicated that 4:00 P.M. today would be the first meeting of this committee. Hadden mentioned that
anyone that wanted to contribute monies certainly would be welcome to do
so. The Committee will put it in escrow and keep in available until some
formal kind of agreement has been arranged. Neal thanked them very much.
Neal announced that Hammond was working on a special volume, a book which will update Beyond the Classics. She indicated that he has contacted the University of California Press. The Press is interested and he has solicited chapters to go into this updating of the scientific study of religion.
Neal also indicated that a membership committee had been struck and that Silverman will be the chairman of that committee. He will be attempting to encourage new members for the Society. She went on to note that Clark Roof, the Executive Secretary, has one more year to serve and that she and D'Antonio and will serve on the selection committee. She asked anyone in the membership to send any suggestions they might have regarding the Executive Secretary to her. She gave thanks again to the people who were going out, the officers that are concluding their work this year and to the members of the Council.
Neal made one more announcement that Professor Walter Clark and Mrs. Clark were in attendance in the Business Meeting and that Professor Clark was one of the ones involved in the founding of the Society. It was very satisfying to have him present. She indicated that our plans in 1984 are to hold the annual meeting in Chicago. If for some reason Chicago should not work out, the alternative plan would be Minnesota. However, she assured the membership that the Chicago suggestion was essentially definite and she was most positive that it would be successful. Neal noted then that Wuthnow, the Programme Chairman, was now available and asked him for any report that he might have.
Wuthnow apologized saying that he had had a last minute crisis. He reported that the programme was going very nicely, he had had absolutely excellent cooperation from the membership, there had been many paper submissions and also a number of people outside of the traditionally SSSR disciplines had
been included. A number of people from history, political science and comparative religion had submitted abstracts and had been encouraged to do so. He said there were some 380 names on the total programme which was very satisfying as far as he was concerned. He also noted that this year the Programme Chairman tried to encourage as many graduate students to participate as possible and that we will be continuing that tradition. He then continued to thank the membership very much for acting as chairmen and as discussants in the sessions. He said that in some ways this was an onerous kind of task because people wanted to go listen to papers but that he was very pleased that members responded in a very gracious manner. Neal then thanked Wuthnow deeply for his work on the programme.
Neal asked if there were annoucements and recognized Barbara ????. She is editor of the Religious Council Review, a book review journal. Barbara ???? explained that the reviews consist of about 100 words and that you receive a free book, of course, if you are willing to write up the review. She asked any of the members of the Society that want to review books please to send her their name and to indicate what type of books they would like to review. Also the journal publishes review essays so if individuals are interested in writing essays they also should contact her. If you can read a special foreign language or have any foreign language ability this also would be very important.
A second individual from the sociology of religion from ASR, (I assume he must be the president perhaps of ASR) indicated that this was the first year that ASR had met with SSSR, that ASR was extremely grateful and that from ASR's perspective the meetings had been extremely successful. He did mention that the ASR topic next year was to be Beyond the Classics which is in line with the volume that Hammond is drawing up.
Then Professor Clark said that he had a comment to make. He had been instrumental in starting the SSSR in 1948 and he said at that time they had worked for equal distribution in sociology and in psychology. The two disciplines
were cooperating in the establishment and the development of the Society. He said within the last few years the psychologists seem to be withdrawing and the sociologists seem to be taking over the organization. He did stress that in our study the individual is a very crucial element and that certainly we should continue to study the individual as well as the social group, the social structure, so that he hoped that psychologists also would continue to be major contributors to the Society and that their contributions would continue to be crucial within the Society.
Neal then gave thanks to Glazier, the local arrangements chairman. She said that the hotel had been extremely nice and very pleasant.
Then Neal entertained a motion to adjourn. The motion was made from the floor and seconded and the meeting adjourned at 1:30 P.M. CARRIED
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