.

PRESENT:
Madeleine Adriance, Hans Baer, Eileen Barker, David Bromley, Donald Capps, James Davidson, Stephen Glazier, Bradley Hertel, Ralph Hood, Armand Mauss, Meredith McGuire, Katherine Meyer, Romney Moseley, Thomas Robbins, Richard Schoenherr, William Silverman, Ellen Umansky, and Stuart Wright.

CALL TO ORDER:
President Donald Capps called the meeting to order at 2:11 p.m., November 7, 1991, at the Vista International Hotel, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The agenda which was circulated before the meeting was approved as amended. Two corrections were made in the 1991 - 1992 roster of Council members: Eileen Barker's correct postal code is WC2A 2AE and David Bromley's office telephone number is 804 - 367 - 6286.

The minutes of the November 8, 1990 Council meeting were circulated. One correction on page ten of the minutes was noted. Page 10, fourth paragraph, line 10: "The motion does not pass" should be corrected to read "The motion did not pass." The minutes were approved as corrected.

REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE SECRETARY --- INFORMATION AND EVALUATION ITEMS:
Secretary Davidson distributed a five page written report to the Council. Highlights of this report were discussed. Grateful thanks were offered to people who are completing terms of office: Donald Capps, president; Meredith McGuire, past president; Ellen Umansky and Thomas Robbins, Council members; and Bradley Hertel, 1991 program chair. The 1992 program chair is Nancy Nason-Clark. The new president elect is Ruth Wallace. Margaret Poloma and Donald Miller begin three year terms as members of the Council.

Membership in the Society declined slightly between August 1990 and August 1991. From 1610 members in August 1990 to 1570 in August 1991, a decline of 40 members (2.5 percent). 273 people joined the Society between August 1990 and August 1991. 313 members dropped their memberships in this period. Four mailings were sent out during the 1991 membership campaign to recruit new members.

As an experiment, members were asked to send the executive secretary names of potential members. As an incentive to do this, members were told that the names of nominators would be put into a box and one name would be drawn from the box. Jack Stott won the drawing and he will receive a free airplane ticket. This experimental procedure for getting names produced a list with a higher than average yield of members. Davidson recommends that this procedure be used every two or three years.

Subscriptions to the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion are slightly up this year, from 1236 to 1247. This increase occurred in spite of a $ 10 increase in library subscription fees which went into effect this year.

1991 PROGRAM:
Two innovations were introduced this year in the preparation of the program for the annual meeting. The two program chairs (Bradley Hertel, SSSR, and John Simpson, RRA) communicated with each other and with the executive office via email. This procedure saved considerable time and effort. The format of the preliminary and final program booklets was changed in order to make it easier to produce copy for the printer.

Pre-registration for the Pittsburgh meeting is larger than expected. Effective this morning (Thursday, November 7) preregistration is 321. Compared with 330 last year. The Vista Hotel reports that our room total is 750 for four nights. The Society has filled its reserved block of rooms. When our new accountant was told that the Society gets about 25 percent of its members at the annual meeting he was impressed. He said that, in his experience with other organizations, this is an extraordinarily large attendance.

The Society for the Sociological Study of Mormon Life has two sessions and a business meeting scheduled at the 1991 annual meeting. If all goes well this year the SSSML may want a permanent arrangement for joint meetings in the future.

Evaluation forms have been inserted into the convention kits this year. Davidson will tally the responses and report them to the Council.

1992 HOTEL ARRANGEMENTS:
The Society was scheduled to meet at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C. in 1992. Two weeks ago Davidson discovered that the rooms in the Mayflower Hotel which we intend to use are now being gutted and renovated. When the renovations are complete the rooms will cost about $ 130 per night, not the $ 88 we expected to pay. With the assistance of people at the Mayflower Hotel Davidson investigated alternative hotels in the D.C. area. After consultation with several SSSR officers the choice was made to shift the meeting to the Stouffer's Concourse Hotel in Crystal City for the weekend of November 6-8, 1991. The rate will be only $ 75 for singles. The other option, which was rejected, was the Washington Court Hotel, near Capitol Hill, which was more expensive.

Meredith McGuire noted that because the Concourse Hotel is not close to Washington, D.C. restaurant districts people may not be willing to hurry back to the hotel for evening plenary sessions. She therefore suggests to the 1992 program chair that she may want to leave evenings free, with no scheduled plenaries. This suggestion does not effect the evening of the buffet dinner. Thomas Robbins suggests an alternative: starting plenaries at a later time than has previously been customary. Perhaps 9:00 or 9:30 p.m.

SELECTION OF NEW EXECUTIVE SECRETARY:
Davidson's term as executive secretary was extended through the 1993 annual meeting. But Davidson has just been notified that he will probably be awarded a major research grant in June 1992. Since it is not possible for him to work on the research project and continue as SSSR executive secretary, he will end his term at the end of the 1992 annual meeting. So the Council must begin a search procedure for a new executive secretary earlier than expected. The new executive secretary will follow Davidson around at the 1992 meeting to observe how the work is done and start his or her term at the end of that meeting.

Davidson noted that executive secretaries are not elected competitively because it is necessary to discuss the job with potential executive secretaries in order to make sure that they are interested in the job and that their institution will be able to offer appropriate support. The work of the executive secretary is enjoyable. But the executive secretary must be a detail person who is able to anticipate potential mess ups and cope with them.

The Council then discussed procedures for selecting a new executive secretary. A motion was made and passed that a committee of at least the past president, president, president elect, and executive secretary shall be established to nominate candidates for the executive secretary job. The chair of this committee will be the current SSSR president. This committee will present its candidate (or candidates) to Council members by the start of August 1992. Any negative feedback on candidates will be considered by the committee before it makes a final choice for the job. The committee may offer the Council one major candidate for the job or a ranked list of candidates. It is the intent of the Council that this will be a standing committee which will be used to recruit future executive secretaries.

The final decision about approval of an executive secretary will be made by the Council at its November 1992 regular meeting. The purpose of this motion is to ensure that the Council has the opportunity to comment on candidates before the meeting in November 1992.

Donald Capps noted that it is necessary to make special arrangements for selecting an executive secretary this year because of the unexpected resignation of James Davidson. In other years the time table for selecting an executive secretary will not be as abbreviated.

REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE SECRETARY -- ACTION ITEMS: SITE OF THE 1994 MEETING:
Locations in the western region were examined. Davidson discovered that Las Vegas hotels did not respond to his inquiries. They are not interested in small weekend conventions.

Four possible locations were found: the Doubletree Antlers Hotel in Colorado Springs; the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Albuquerque; the Hyatt Regency in Irvine, California; and the Executive Tower Inn in Denver. The Council discussed the pros and cons of each site. Motion: That the Council's first choice for the 1994 meeting is the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Albuquerque and its second choice is an alternative hotel in Albuquerque. The motion passed.

SITE OF THE 1995 MEETING:
Several suggestions were made to amend the "SSSR Site Selection Plan for Future Meetings, approved October 1988".

* That the southeast region be moved into the first column with other regions which may be repeated two out of every three years.

* Add Montreal to Great Lakes region.

* Add Nashville, New Orleans, and Memphis to the list of cities in the southeast region.

A motion was made and passed to instruct the executive secretary to look for a meeting site in the Great Lakes region in 1995 and in the Southeast region, as it has been redefined, for 1996.

There was considerable sentiment among Council members in favor of New Orleans as a meeting site, provided that the gubernatorial election in November 1991 produces an acceptable result.

INCLUSIVE LANGUAGE:
Moved that the following statement be put on the first page of the preliminary program and at the beginning of the final program: "SSSR and RRA expect all participants to use inclusive, rather than exclusive, language in their presentations. All presenters are urged to avoid language reflecting racial, sexual, ethnic, or religious bias." Motion passed.

DISTINGUISHED ARTICLE AWARD:
Ralph Hood, chair of the committee on the distinguished article award, reported for that committee. The other members of the committee are Janet Jacobs and David Hackett.

The winner of the 1991 article award for articles published in 1989 - 1990 is Stjepan G. Mestrovic, "Reappraising Durkheim's Elementary Forms of Religious Life in the context of Schopenhauer's philosophy", Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion , 1989. The four finalists are: Dwight B. Billings, "Religion as opposition",American Journal of Socioloqy, 1990; Lee A. Kirkpatrick, "A psychometric analysis of the Allport-Ross and Feagin measures of intrinsic-extrinsic religious orientation," Research in the Social Scientific Study of Religion, 1989; Kenneth I. Pargament, "God help me", Ibid., 1990; Lesley Steven's, "Different voice/different voices", Review of Religious Research, 1989.

Because this is the first year in which the article award is presented the committee reported to the Council in some detail about its experience in doing its work.

Letters were sent to editors of the following journals for nominations of articles: American Journal of Sociology, American Sociological Review, International Journal for the Psychology of Religion, Journal for Psychology and Christianity, Journal for Psychology and Theology, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Journal of Religion and Health, Researching the Social Scientific Study of Religion, Review of Religious Research, Social Forces, Sociological Analysis. Nominations were also solicited from SSSR members. In 1991 this procedure produced 27 nominated articles. In future years, as the award becomes better known, it is likely that a larger number of articles will be nominated. Hood made copies of the nominated articles and sent them to committee members for their ratings. It was expensive to prepare all of these copies, but Hood was able to absorb the cost through his college.

The selection criteria used by the committee are:

1. Award to any journal article. Excludes books, book chapters, and monographs unless part of a journal series.

2. A theoretical article (meets at least one of the following criteria):
a) must substantially advance existing theory
b) propose novel or critical advancements in appropriate criteria for judging existing theory
c) be a meaningful criticism of existing theory
d) be itself a new and meaningful theory

3. A research article (meets at least one of the following criteria):
a) must be a critical test of existing theory
b) a valuable piece of empirical work whether theory based or not
c) a valuable piece of descriptive work within any legitimate framework
d) the construction of a new and useful measure
e) a major empirical corrective to previously established findings

4. Articles authored or co-authored by award committee members are ineligible for nomination.

5. Nominations for any year's award (e.g., 1991) can include any articles published in the previous two years (e.g., 1989 and 1990).

Finalist articles for 1991 could be considered again for the 1992 award.

The committee offers the following suggestions, for consideration by the Council and/or by future articles award committees:

* At least one member of the committee should be a non-sociologist.

* In 1991 the five winners got plaques. In the future the Society may wish to present a certificate instead of a plaque.

* The plaque goes only to the senior author of multiple authored articles.

* The committee is in favor of putting an author meets critic session on the program of the annual meeting for the author(s)of the winning article.

* If an awardee is not able to afford travel to the annual meeting to get his or her award the Society might want to subsidize his or her travel. (In subsequent discussion, Meredith McGuire commented that she thinks that this is not a good idea.)

* Because the cost of copying articles is burdensome, and would become an even heavier burden if more than 27 articles are nominated, it is recommended that the supplying of three copies of an article be made part of the nomination process.

* The committee urges future committees to begin their work as soon after January 1 as possible.

Editors of the following journals should also be invited to nominate articles: Religious Studies, Social Compass, and Religion and the Social Order.

A motion was made to revise the membership of the article award committee: The article award committee should have at least one member who is not a sociologist, at least one sociologist, and at least one person on the committee from the committee of the previous year. The president of the Society shall appoint members. The three year term for committee members which was set in the motion, approved in November 1990, is eliminated. The motion passed.

A motion was made to establish a procedure for selecting the committee for the annual book award. It was moved that the same procedure which is used to select the committee for the annual article award be used to select the committee for the annual book award. That is: The president of the Society appoints people each year. One member is a sociologist, one member a non-sociologist, and preferably one member who served in the previous year. The motion passed.

PUBLICITY COMMITTEE:
Stuart Wright, committee chair, presented a written report to the Council. After several years of experience, Wright's name is now listed on the source-rolodexes of some reporters. He gets calls from reporters requesting information.

Last year an attempt was made to set up a procedure through which authors of articles in the JSSR would be asked to prepare press releases about their articles and send them to Wright. This effort did not succeed. Wright concludes that authors are not able to write press releases. Instead, Wright will prepare press releases for selected journal articles.

It was suggested that the 1992 program chair be asked to send copies of abstracts of papers directly to Wright so he can share these abstracts with reporters who attend the meeting.

The meeting was recessed from 6:10 to 8:17 for the joint dinner with the RRA Board of Directors.

Present when the meeting resumed at 8:17 p.m.: Madeleine Adriance, Hans Baer, Eileen Barker, David Bromley, Donald Capps, James Davidson, Stephen Glazier, Bradley Hertel, Armand Mauss, Meredith McGuire, Katherine Meyer, Romney Moseley, Thomas Robbins, Richard Schoenherr, William Silverman, Ellen Umansky, and Stuart Wright. Donald Miller was present for part of the meeting.

SCREENING OF PROGRAM PAPERS:
Eileen Barker introduced a motion which is intended to provide guidance to program chairs and presenters concerning the sorts of papers which are appropriate for presentation at SSSR annual meetings. After considerable discussion, a revised motion was offered: Papers submitted to the SSSR for presentation at its annual meeting should be of a scholarly nature and concerned with the systematic study of religion and religious behavior. Papers that present merely ideological apologetics are inappropriate. The revised motion passed.

If a program chair is unable to make a decision about the acceptability of a paper from the abstract he or she may ask the author for a copy of the complete paper or for a discussion of the methodology used.

INTERNATIONAL MEMBERS:
An Ad Hoc Committee on International Members was established at the 1990 Council meeting in order to examine proposals for increasing the participation of people outside the United States and Canada in the Society. Eileen Barker, Richard Schoenherr, and William Silverman (Chair) are members of the committee.

The committee offered four major proposal for consideration by the Council. Major proposals are proposals which will involve a great deal of work and considerable money for implementation. The first major proposal is that the Council should establish SSSR travel grants for international scholars who would not otherwise be able to attend the annual meeting. Armand Mauss and Madeleine Adriance commented that we must use careful judgment in order to give grants only to people who actually need them. Meredith McGuire commented that we should realize that we also enrich ourselves by bringing people over. Perhaps grants could be set up as a percentage of actual air fare. Eileen Barker commented that sometimes people from soft currency countries are able to get air fare on their national airline, where the government is able to pay in the local currency. In such situations international scholars are more concerned with paying for accommodations than air travel. In Great Britain it is sometimes possible to provide accommodations in homes or to arrange for room sharing.

Eileen Barker moved that a committee be set up for the 1991 - 1992 program year to provide grants to international scholars for annual meeting travel or accommodations. The sum of $ 1,500 is appropriated for the committee to spend. The committee will use its discretion in giving grants and will report on its experiences to the Council in 1992. The president will appoint members of the committee, which shall include the 1992 program chair. The motion passed.

Barker anticipates considerable interest in international contacts among social scientists in Eastern Europe.

The second major proposal is that subsidized memberships for international scholars from developing countries and Eastern Europe be made available. Questions were asked about how much it costs to provide basic, no frills membership in the Society. James Davidson estimated that these basic costs are about $ 18 per member. It was suggested that the Society could offer an "international subscription rate" which covers the basic cost of providing membership to international scholars. The University of Chicago Press uses a similar subscription procedure with its journal Current Anthropoloqy. Some members of the Council suggested computing the marginal cost of an additional international subscriber.

A motion was offered: That the ad hoc committee should prepare an estimate of the basic costs of providing membership to international scholars and provide these estimates to the Council at its 1992 meeting. Then the Council will be able to make a decision about providing reduced rate memberships to international scholars. Basic costs may be defined as the cost of printing the Journal, mailing the Journal, and sending other mailings to members. NOT including the cost of operating the business office or the executive secretary's office. The motion passed.

The third major proposal is that arrangements be made to offer joint memberships between the Society and the CISR. Richard Schoenherr moved that this proposal be rejected. The motion passed.

The fourth major proposal is that the Society should publish a directory of people who are doing research on the social scientific study of religion around the world. This directory would include information on current research interests and recent publications as well as name, address, telephone number, and fax number. The purpose of this directory is to serve as an "International Who's Who of the Social Scientific Study of Religion" and to facilitate cooperation between people around the world with common research interests.

A similar proposal has emerged from the Councils of the Association for the Sociology of Religion and the Religious Research Association. Their proposal is for a joint membership directory to include ASR, RRA, and SSSR members and perhaps also CISR members and members of other international associations. It did not favor inclusion of information on research interests.

A motion was made and passed that the president will appoint a person to serve as liaison with other societies. This liaison person will consult with relevant others in ASR, RRA, and other societies about the feasibility of preparing a joint directory. The scope of the directory --- membership list only or also include research interests --- will also be explored. The liaison person will report to the Council in 1992.

James Davidson noted that a joint directory probably ought to represent people in Latin America and Japan as well as those in North America and Europe. It should also include people in different disciplines.

The ad hoc committee also presented seven administrative actions to the Council for its consideration. Administrative actions are proposals which only require fairly routine action by the executive secretary for implementation. They do not involve the expenditure of much money.

A motion was made and passed to accept four of the administrative actions and table three of them. The four administrative actions which were accepted are:

(1) Some international members have trouble paying their dues with checks written on non-USA banks. The committee recommends that a procedure which was proposed to Anna Davidson by Bank One for processing checks from outside the United States be tried for a year on a small scale.

Bank One will credit our account with the dollar amount of a non-USA check at the exchange rate applicable on the day the check is presented. If the check is not paid by the foreign bank the SSSR will be charged for the amount of the bounced check. If this procedure works, the committee recommends that it be made standard operating procedure and publicized.

(2) Encourage annual meeting program chairs to put international scholars on the program.

(3) Some international scholars have an easier time of getting funding from their universities for travel to our annual meeting if they get a letter which invites them to participate in the meeting. Invitation letters may be written by the executive secretary or by the program chair. These letters will only invite the international scholar to send in a proposal for a paper at the meeting. The letter can not guarantee acceptance of the proposal. The committee recommends that we put a notice in the SSSR Newsletter that if a special invitation to present a paper would be helpful, such a letter can be sent.

(6) Encourage members to donate books and files of journals to overseas libraries

The three administrative actions which were tabled are:

(4) Appoint a wheeler-dealer to arrange lecture tours for international scholars, in cooperation with annual meeting program chairs.

James Davidson noted that doing this is hard work. We must also be careful in our choice of lecturers. What happens if one of the lecturers who we have informally sponsored turns out to be a dud? Or a no-show? It was suggested that it might be desirable to mention the possibility of arranging lecture tours to the 1992 program chair.

(5) Add to the list of criteria for selection of annual meeting sites: Places with low cost air fares from outside the United States and places with convenient air route accessibility for travelers from outside the United States, get extra points.

The problem with this proposal is that, if it where to be applied strictly, the Society would be limited to meeting in large, primary cities with expensive hotels. Such as New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Such a policy would greatly limit choice of cities for the annual meeting.

(7) Provide free copies of the JSSR to selected libraries outside the United States and Western Europe.

SELECTION OF NEW EDITOR FOR THE JSSR:
A committee of Donald Capps, Armand Mauss, and Hart Nelsen solicited proposals from potential editors. The new editor will start editorial responsibilities with the March 1993 issue. Initially four people indicated interest. Two actual proposals were received, from David Bromley and Chaim Waxman. The committee recommends to the Council that David Bromley be appointed as editor. The Council approved this recommendation.

It was noted that Bromley will continue his work as supervising editor of the Reliqion and the Social Order JAI series. Actual editorial work on these annual volumes is done by editors of the specific volumes.

SSSR HISTORY PROPOSAL:
Armand Mauss proposed that the Council should start an effort to prepare a history of the Society in preparation for the 50th anniversary in 1999. A first stage would be to assemble archival materials from the files of members and to interview those founding members of the Society who are still alive. A second stage would be to commission a historian to write a history in which this information would be used.

Much discussion of this proposal ensued. Among the people who could be interviewed are Charles Glock, James Dittes, Samuel Klausner, and David Moberg. Mauss estimates the cost of commissioning a history at least $ 15,000 a year plus fringe benefits-- the level of a twelve month research assistantship at a research university. Considerable uneasiness was expressed by Council members regarding spending lots of Society money on this project.

A motion was made to include the items listed in Mauss's proposal as "immediate goals" : The president will appoint a chair (or coordinator) of the SSSR history project. This person will initiate exploratory activities as listed below. The history project chair will report to the Council in 1992 about possible future activities concerning SSSR history. The motion passed.

The immediate goals from Mauss's proposal are:

l) Identification of as many as possible of the founders of SSSR, especially those who served as officers, editors, and Council members during the "founding" period of SSSR.

2) Solicitation of written reminiscences about the earliest SSSR years from each of these "founders". They would each be furnished with a standard list of questions and be encouraged to respond to those, as well as to add any other reminiscences that they feel would be appropriate.

3) An ad hoc committee would read these reminiscences and then formulate a series of additional questions needing more elaboration or probing in depth.

4) SSSR members known for their commitment to the Society would then be asked to take tape-recorders and visit with each of the "founders" to discuss in particular the questions defined in (3). Each such "volunteer" interviewer would be asked to make only one or two such visits. The contents of these taped interviews could then be transcribed.

REPORT OF THE TREASURER AND THE 1991 - 1992 BUDGET:
Richard Schoenherr, treasurer, reported that the transition of the business office from Washington,D.C. to West Lafayette is almost entirely completed. The Society operated within its budget last year. Schoenherr distributed a proposed budget. To that budget must be added the $ 1,500 which was appropriated for the new committee on assistance to international scholars. Total expected income in the budget is $130,178 with total expected expenditures of $122,850 and a proposed surplus of $7,328. Schoenherr moved that this budget be accepted. The motion passed.

REPORT OF THE 1991 PROGRAM COMMITTEE CHAIR:
Bradley Hertel commented that the program is his report. He found that it is desirable for the new program chair to talk with the former program chair at the annual meeting at which his or her term of office begins. Hertel noted that there was a great deal of cooperation between the SSSR and the RRA program chairs this year. There was no attitude of competitiveness this year betweeN sessions that are "mine" versus sessions that are "yours".

Meredith McGuire suggested that a handbook should be written for program chairs. Paying particular attention to listing the matters that need to be dealt with and to necessary deadlines. McGuire suggested that this effort could be started by asking the last three program chairs to list items. These lists will be collated by the executive secretary. Davidson agreed to request brief statements from past program chairs.

STUDENT PAPER AWARD:
This year, unlike last year, several good papers were submitted. Committee members are Stan Gaede (chair), Bradley Hertel, and Ellen Umansky. The winner is Stephen J. Brewer, University of Connecticut, "Parental-Adolescent Relations Among Fundamentalist Christians."

NOMINATIONS COMMITTEE:
Meredith McGuire reported on several operational problems faced by the nominations committee as it does its work. She recommends that the Council think of ways to provide members of the Society with additional opportunities to participate in committee work and other activities in order to bring them to the attention of the nominations committee. At present the only ways that this may be accomplished are working as program chair or working on the Journal.

In recent elections separate seats on the Council have been set aside for sociologists and non-sociologists. The nominations committee has found it difficult to locate people who are not sociologists. Perhaps it would be a good idea to ask members to indicate their academic discipline on their membership renewal forms.

SUGGESTIONS ABOUT PROGRAM FORMAT AT THE ANNUAL MEETING:
Madeleine Adriance objected to the proliferation of short sessions at the annual meeting. Presenting four papers and a discussant 75 or even 90 minutes does not leave enough time for general discussion. Adriance favors assigning four papers and a discussan to one hour and 50 minute sessions. If 90 minute sessions must be used, assign three papers and a discussant or four papers with no discussant to these sessions. Other ways to allow more time for discussion at sessions: meet for more than three days, accept fewer papers, eliminate discussants, or set rigid deadlines for consideration of papers for acceptance.

James Davidson said that he will make the program chairs aware of this problem when he meets with them on Sunday morning. Let them try to handle this informally for 1992.

Thomas Robbins noted that there is a trend for fewer people to send their papers to discussant in advance.

REPORT OF THE JSSR EDITOR:
Armand Mauss distributed a six page report to the Council. Highlights of this report were discussed. The December 1991 issue is larger than usual. A subsidy from the Lilly Endowment paid for extra pages for a symposium.

Mauss reported on his concern with the procedures used to locate editors for the JSSR. The job of editor is demanding. It requires support from the candidate's university as well as willingness to accept the job. It is difficult to get candidates for the job. Mauss favors putting an item on the agenda of the 1992 Council meeting for discussion of the editor selection process. Let us devise ways to look harder for editors and seek them out.

REPORT OF THE BOOK REVIEW EDITORS:
Hans Baer reported that the backlog of unpublished book reviews has been reduced. The editors have managed to assemble a list of reviewers who are anthropologists and to expand the number of anthropological books that are reviewed.

Questions were raised about the disposition of books which are not reviewed in the Journal. At present some of these books are given to the library at the editor's home institution. This is done in gratitude for the support offered by that university to the editors. Books which are not appropriate for the library are sent to Harve Horowitz for display at the annual meeting. The Council may want to make changes in this procedure. Should these books be sent to libraries in non-hard currency countries? Perhaps the executive secretary and book review editors could select books worth sending to such libraries.

MONOGRAPH SERIES:
Katherine Meyer reported that a contract has been signed with Yale University Press for publication of a translation of Georg Simmel's writings on the sociology of religion. The Society will pay $ 6,000 to Yale University Press. This is repayable from royalties. When the book goes out of print the copyright will shift to the Society. The copyright page lists the SSSR and its monograph series as co-publishers. Publication is expected soon after June 1992.

Three complete manuscripts were submitted this year. One of them was reviewed and rejected. The other two were not relevant to our concerns. Five partial submissions, without a full manuscript, were submitted this year. Two of them have promise for the future. Meyer has contacted some authors and invited them to keep the SSSR monograph series in mind as one place to submit book length manuscripts.

RESEARCH AWARDS:
Eileen Barker, committee chair, reported that research awards totaling $ 8,000 were presented this year. The recipients are: Alan Black ($ 1000), David Hackett (1350),Mary Johnson (750), Phillip Lucas (1300), Beverly McCallister(200), Nancy Nason-Clark (900), Raymond Paloutzian (500), James Spickard (1000), and William Swatos (1000). The other members of the committee are Bryan Wilson and James Beckford.

DISTINGUISHED BOOK AWARD:
Given to The Black Church in the African American Experience by C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya, Duke University Press, 1990. Committee members for the 1991 award are: James D. Hunter (Chair), Stan Gaede, Kevin Christiano, and Stephen Ainlay.

Other books that were nominated for the award include: David Martin, Tongues of Fire (Blackwell, 1990); George Thomas,Revivalism and Cultural Change (Chicago, 1989); David Hackett,The Rude Hand of Innovation (Oxford, 1991); Nancy Ammerman,Baptist Battles (Rutgers, 1991); Margaret Paloma, The Assemblies of God at the Crossroads (University of Tennessee Press, 1989); Melinda B. Wagner, God's Schools (Rutgers, 1990); Reginald Bibby, Mosaic Madness (Stoddard, 1990); and Joseph Fichter, The Pastoral Provisions(Sheed and Ward, 1989).

AAAS REPORT:
The one session which the Society proposed for the 1991 AAAS meeting was not accepted for that program.

OTHER BUSINESS:
A proposal was made at the 1990 annual business meeting that two separate student paper awards should be made: one for graduate students and one for undergraduates. The Council discussed this proposal and showed no enthusiasm for it.

The meeting was adjourned at about 11:00 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,
William Silverman, Secretary

The following reports and proposals were distributed to Council members before the meeting or were circulated at the meeting.

Minutes of the November 8, 1990 Council meeting by William Silverman. 12 pages.

Agenda of the November 7, 1991 Council meeting. 1 page.

Roster of officers, staff, and committees, 1990 - 1991. 2 pages.

Roster of officers, staff, and committees, 1991 - 1992. 2 pages.

Annual report of the executive secretary. 5 pages.

Memo on site selection for 1994, by James Davidson. 4 pages.

SSSR site selection plan for future meetings, approved October, 1988. 1 page.

Report of the committee on the distinguished article award, by Ralph Hood. 2 pages.

Publicity Committee Report for l991, by Stuart Wright. 5 pages.

Motion on criteria for papers, by Eileen Barker. 1 page.

Report of the ad hoc committee on international members, by William Silverman. 4 pages.

Mailing costs to members in countries other than the U.S.A., by James Davidson. 1 page.

Proposal for SSSR history project, by Armand L. Mauss. 2 pages.

Treasurer's Report, by Richard A. Schoenherr. 5 pages.(Includes proposed budget.)

Annual report on the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, by Armand L. Mauss. 6 pages.

Report of JSSR book review editors, by Hans Baer and Gordon Shepherd. 1 page.

Financial report on the monograph series. 1 page.

Report of the SSSR representative to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, by Hart Nelsen. 1 page.