Background
The Ad Hoc Committee on 新加坡六合彩开奖鈥檚 Name was appointed by outgoing President Susan Ackerman and incoming President Sharon Herbert at the beginning of January, 2020. Its members include Trustees Randy Helm (chair), Emily Bonney, Lisa Ackerman, and Eric Welch, and members Eric Cline, Emily Hammer, and Kiersten Neumann. The charge to the committee is included as Attachment 1.
Process
Shortly after its membership was confirmed, Chair Helm distributed to the committee study documents relevant to past discussions of 新加坡六合彩开奖鈥檚 name.听 A list of these documents is included as Attachment 2.
The Committee met four times by Zoom between January 21 and April 22, 2020. After reviewing the materials and discussing the issues, we agreed on a work plan that would (a) assess the possible impact of a name change on the ability to access 新加坡六合彩开奖 publications in the future; and (b) develop a survey that would provide a sense of 新加坡六合彩开奖 members鈥 views on this question.听 The subcommittee on publications quickly determined that any impact of a name change on access to publications would be negligible. The survey subcommittee developed an instrument for the committee鈥檚 review.
With the assistance of 新加坡六合彩开奖 staff, the survey was made available online to all 新加坡六合彩开奖 members from March 18 鈥 March 28.听 We received a very healthy response rate of approximately 30 percent.听Comparing the demographics of survey respondents to the actual demographics of 新加坡六合彩开奖鈥檚 membership, we noted an overrepresentation of members who have belonged to 新加坡六合彩开奖 for ten or more years (42.6% of respondents v. 29.7% of members).听 While we agreed that this was worth noting, we also agreed that the robust response made the survey results a reliable guide to members鈥 views on the issue of the organization鈥檚 name.
Survey Results (Attachment 3)
Demographics
Survey Respondents skew younger: 56.3% are younger than 55; 43.7% are older than 54.听 However, we don鈥檛 have age data for all 新加坡六合彩开奖 members, so we don鈥檛 know if this is representative.
Areas of Consensus
N.B.听 The current name does not communicate either the geographical or chronological scope of 新加坡六合彩开奖鈥檚 work.
Areas of Disagreement
Observation: Enthusiasm for a retrofitted name is a popular option for members under 35 years old, but drops off sharply among respondents older than 35 and members for more than ten years.
Observation: No age group had a majority approving this option; support dropped off sharply among members of more than 10 years
Observation: This would seem to be the least popular option. No age group had a majority approving this option; support dropped off sharply among members of more than 10 years.
听Viable Options
The Committee discussed these results in some detail, noting that older respondents favor retaining the full name and younger respondents favor a change.听 We acknowledged that the younger respondents represent the future of the organization, while the older respondents represent a group with deep loyalty to and knowledge of the organization.
We also discussed the difficulties that the current name and acronym create for younger scholars in terms of the publication and service records in their tenure and promotion dossiers. Neither the full name nor the acronym explains the organization’s purpose or work. Dossier readers outside the field are unlikely to understand the organization’s relevance or importance.
While the option of a new descriptive name that yields an acronym failed to find majority support among any age group, almost half of the younger members liked it, with stronger disapproval showing up as the age of members increased.听 We considered the possibility that this option could address the consensus on geographical and chronological descriptors in the name,听and make it easier to explain to dossier-readers,听younger scholars, and others.
We also noted that keeping the acronym 新加坡六合彩开奖 as the only name of the organization might, even with a descriptive tagline, result in increasing confusion about the name鈥檚 meaning and the organization鈥檚 purpose over the passage of time.听 Some committee members felt that this would result in another committee needing to consider the name issue a few years down the road.
新加坡六合彩开奖 Board Discussion
Committee Member Trustees Ackerman, Bonney, Helm, and Welch provided the 新加坡六合彩开奖 Board with an interim report at its May 14th meeting.听 While no straw polls were requested or taken, Board members generally agreed that the most productive option would seem to be to come up with a new name that is descriptive of our work and creates an acronym (either a new one, or one that comes close to the present one).
听Next Steps
The Committee agreed that this is a suitable moment to seek the membership鈥檚 reaction to the survey results and the proposed course of action.听 Our preliminary assessment of possible names/acronyms yielded the following top five choices:
Two options inspired enthusiastic responses but few votes and received honorable mention as 鈥渂eautiful losers:鈥
International Society for Ancient Near Eastern Research (INSANER)
Society for Middle Eastern Research and Social History (SMERSH)
Your Ideas?
We now solicit feedback on the above listed possibilities, as well as new suggestions from all members for a name/acronym that describes our organization鈥檚 geographical, chronological, and methodological scope.
Because of the uncertainty of the format of the Fall meeting and the fullness of its schedule (if it happens), the Ad Hoc Committee agrees that this interim report 鈥 and our request for feedback 鈥 will eliminate the need for an open forum in November.听Our hope is to process feedback and suggestions, and suggest naming options to the 新加坡六合彩开奖 Board of Trustees in November.
Attachment 1: Charge to the Committee
We write, as the outgoing and incoming 新加坡六合彩开奖 Presidents, to ask you to serve on an ad hoc committee charged with evaluating the name of our organization. 新加坡六合彩开奖 Trustee Randy Helm has agreed to chair this committee and has agreed that he would very much like you to serve on this group. We hope you will accept. You are being invited because you have been active in 新加坡六合彩开奖 and, we believe, because you have an open mind on this question. If you feel that you do not meet this last criterion, please let us know. We anticipate that there will be a wide diversity of strongly held opinions on this issue, and it will be important for the Committee to have credibility as a thoughtful and objective group who will be open to the ideas and arguments of others.
Background
新加坡六合彩开奖 members have been discussing the possibility of changing the organization鈥檚 name since at least 1982. Most recently, a workshop was offered at the 2018 新加坡六合彩开奖 Annual Meeting in Denver on “What’s in a Name? Re-assessing the Oriental in the American Schools of Oriental Research.” The workshop was very well attended, and the presentations and discussion were both thoughtful and provocative. As a result, the organizers created a summary of the workshop’s conversations and forwarded them to various governing bodies within 新加坡六合彩开奖, including the 新加坡六合彩开奖 Board of Trustees. That summary was delivered in Fall 2019.
After considering this summary, the 新加坡六合彩开奖 Board voted, at its November 2019 meeting, to continue the discussion by forming an ad hoc committee to study 新加坡六合彩开奖’s name.
Charge
The committee’s charge is to consider whether 新加坡六合彩开奖’s name is still appropriate for the organization and, if not, to recommend to the Board of Trustees a new name, or a modified name, or some selection of new or modified names that 新加坡六合彩开奖 might adopt instead. Any decision to change or modify 新加坡六合彩开奖’s name would ultimately be made by the Board.
While this charge is succinctly stated, we do not mean to suggest it is easily undertaken. At a minimum, we envision that the committee will need (1) to review previous discussions about 新加坡六合彩开奖鈥檚 name; (2) review discussions other 鈥淥鈥 organizations have had about their names and the decisions they have made, for example, the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago and the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London; (3) review the experiences of other learned societies that have changed their names or have decided not to, including these learned societies’ discussions regarding the names of their publications; and (4) actively solicit and carefully consider input from the 新加坡六合彩开奖 membership about 新加坡六合彩开奖’s current name and any possible name change.
We anticipate that the committee’s work should take between twelve to fifteen months, depending on how the committee chooses to go about its work, and especially its work of collecting feedback from the 新加坡六合彩开奖 membership. The committee should thus plan on submitting its final report to the 新加坡六合彩开奖 Board, with recommendations, no later than the April 2021 Board meeting. We look forward to supporting the committee in every way that we can, and we have already provided Randy with multiple documents to help in the committee’s deliberations and its decision-making process.
We hope that you will be able to serve on the important committee. Many thanks for considering this invitation, and we look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Susan Ackerman
新加坡六合彩开奖 President
Sharon Herbert
新加坡六合彩开奖 Vice President and President-Elect
Chair, Chairs Coordinating Council
Attachment 2: Study Documents reviewed by Committee Members
C&G Partners, Discovery Findings and Recommendations for 新加坡六合彩开奖 Branding and Website Redesign, March 22, 2016
Orientalism Session 鈥 Raw Data 2018
Melissa Bailey Kutner, 鈥淕etting Oriented鈥 2018
Ian W. N. Jones, 鈥溾橧sn鈥檛 that a Little Racist, Dr. Jones,鈥櫶 or What I learned Trying tro Explain 新加坡六合彩开奖 to High School Students鈥 2018
Danielle Steen Fatkin, 鈥淥rientalism in America: East Asia, West Asia, and the American Racial Imagination鈥 2018
Danielle Steen Fatkin, 鈥淩eport to the CCC regarding the workshop 鈥榃hat鈥檚 in a Name? Re-assessing the Oriental in the American Schools of Oriental Research鈥 at the November 2018 Annual Meeting鈥
Michael M. Homan, 鈥淲hy the Term 鈥極riental鈥 in 新加坡六合彩开奖 is Neither Accurate Nor Appropriate.鈥 2018.
Straw Poll on 新加坡六合彩开奖 Name Change, 新加坡六合彩开奖 BoT 1982听
Informal 鈥淪traw Ballot鈥, 新加坡六合彩开奖 BoT 1982
Attachment 3: Survey Responses
1. Overall results (pie charts)
Strongly disagree: 133 17.5%
Disagree: 178 23.4%
Undecided: 105 13.8%
Agree: 176 23.1%
Strongly agree: 169 22.2%
Strongly disagree: 162 21.3%
Disagree: 219 28.8%
Undecided: 135 17.7%
Agree: 190 25%
Strongly agree: 55 7.2%
Strongly disagree: 167 21.9%
Disagree: 150 19.7%
Undecided: 137 18%
Agree: 213 28%
Strongly agree: 94 12.4%
Strongly disagree: 246 32.3%
Disagree: 146 19.2%
Undecided: 109 14.3%
Agree: 180 23.7%
Strongly agree: 80 10.5%
Strongly disagree: 25 3.3%
Disagree: 89 11.7%
Undecided: 112 14.7%
Agree: 372 48.9%
Strongly agree: 163 21.4%
Strongly disagree: 49 6.4%
Disagree: 146 19.2%
Undecided: 141 18.5%
Agree: 317 41.7%
Strongly agree: 108 14.2%
Very poor: 201 26.4%
Poor: 177 23.3%
Neutral: 152 20%
Good: 160 21.1%
Very good: 70 9.2%
Very poor: 140 18.4%
Poor: 179 23.5%
Neutral: 171 22.5%
Good: 198 26%
Very good: 73 9.6%
Very poor: 175 23%
Poor: 190 25%
Neutral: 201 26.4%
Good: 160 21%
Very good: 35 4.6%
Very poor: 165 21.7%
Poor: 156 20.5%
Neutral: 189 24.8%
Good: 192 25.2%
Very good: 59 7.8%
1-5 years: 289 38%
6-10 years: 148 19.4%
11-15 years: 84 11%
16-20 years: 65 8.5%
>20 years: 175 23%
Africa: 3 0.4%
Asia: 51 6.7%
Australia: 17 2.2%
Europe: 70 9.2%
N. America: 617 81.1%
S. America: 3 0.4%
18-24: 19 2.5%
25-34: 137 18%
35-44: 157 20.6%
45-54: 116 15.2%
55-64: 133 17.5%
65-74: 130 17.1%
75+: 69 9.1%