SBL Meetings and Events

2020 Annual Meeting

Virtual Meeting

Meeting Begins: 11/29/2020
Meeting Ends: 12/11/2020

Call for Papers Opens: 1/7/2020
Call for Papers Closes: 3/11/2020

Policies

Please note these major policies.

Deadlines

Program unit chairs should enter calls for papers by Friday, January 3.
All proposals are due by the date indicated on the main Annual Meeting webpage.
All session details are due Wednesday, April 8, including all participant, discussion, and presider information and scheduling requests.
Program unit chairs should review and decide upon all proposals by Wednesday, April 8.
All session information, including audio-visual and scheduling requests, should be entered by Wednesday, April 8 so that initial room assignments are as accurate as possible. We can accommodate AV requests and changes at no charge through June 30. If a presenter requests A/V or changes prior requests after June 30, he or she will be charged a $100 fee per request. After September 30, all new A/V requests will be directed to SBL’s A/V vendor for direct payment.

Participation Details

Only current full and student, not public, SBL members may propose papers.
Full members of SBL are limited to participate in no more than two regular program sessions as a presenter, panelist, or respondent. Presiding at a session does not count towards this total. Appearances on Affiliate programs do not count towards this total. SBL Committee and business sessions do not count towards this total.
Student members of SBL may participate in two sessions as presenter, panelist, or respondent but are limited to only one paper presentation. Presiding at a session does not count towards this total. Appearances on Affiliate programs do not count towards this total. SBL Committee and business sessions do not count towards this total.
By submitting a paper proposal or accepting a role in any affiliate organization or program unit session at the Annual or International Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, you agree to participate in an open academic discussion guided by a common standard of scholarly discourse that engages your subject through critical inquiry and investigation.
Paper proposal policies apply at the time of proposal. If a student member submits proposals under her/his student membership but changes her/his membership type to full membership at a later date, for example, policies related to student members will apply to those proposals.

Proposals

General

Proposals must be submitted through the online system.
It is recommended that you compose your abstract prior to entering the proposal submission process. The process may time out, and your information be lost, if too much time elapses between the start of the process and the time you submit the proposal. Compose your abstract on a local computer and then copy and paste the abstract into the appropriate field in the submission form.
Proposers (full and student members) who have not presented at the Annual Meeting must submit the paper to-be-read to the program unit chair(s) during the call for papers period (by Wednesday, March 11).
Proposals require presentation title and an abstract of approximately 500 words. Enter only your abstract in the abstract box. Do not put your paper title or your name in your abstract.
Papers are most often allotted 20-25 minutes in a session, with 5-10 minutes for discussion.
If you have a question about a particular program unit, email the chair listed in the call for papers for that unit.
All presentations must be new presentations of the scholar's own original work. In absentia presentations are not accepted.
Papers cannot be repeated in other sessions or at other SBL Annual or International Meetings. An exception to this stipulation involves presentation at an SBL Award (e.g., Achtemeier, Diamond, Freedman, DeGruyter) session in the same year.
Proposers are obligated to notify program unit chairs of any change to their participation as soon as possible.
SBL Membership must be current at time of the Annual Meeting. If your membership expires before your proposal is accepted, your proposal will be withdrawn. SBL Membership will be checked by June 1 and non-current members will be removed from the program at that time.

Style

Enter only your abstract in the abstract box. Do not include your paper title or your name in the abstract field.
Enter your paper title and abstract using the SBL Handbook of Style as a guide.
Do not put quotation marks around your paper title.
Do not use all uppercase letters (all caps) for your paper title.

Registration and Membership Requirements

SBL Program

SBL Membership is required at the time of a proposal for the SBL program.
SBL Membership will be checked by June 1 and non-current members will be removed from the program at that time.
Participants must maintain current SBL Membership through their participation in the Annual Meeting.
Both SBL and AAR permit the participation of the other organization’s members in its sessions without requiring that the individual hold membership in the other organization. The person is required to register for the meeting as a member of one of the organizations.

Affiliate Organization Programs

Affiliate organization membership is required to participate.
If a member of an Affiliate organization intends to participate in an SBL session, the member is required to have current SBL membership.

Registration for Meeting

Please disregard the typical 1 June deadline for participants to register. An updated timeline will be communicated to all participants during the summer.

Waivers of Registration and/or Membership Requirements

Program unit chairs may request membership and/or registration waivers for nonmembers who work outside of the field of biblical studies and related disciplines. The criteria for these requests is detailed in the Annual Meeting Program Unit Chair Handbook.
Past members of SBL, prior attendees of SBL meetings, and those who work in biblical studies or related disciplines are not eligible for waivers.

Changes to the Program

only until November 1

Changes to the program between the printing of the Program Book and November 1 will not alter the schedule of sessions, including the order of presenters within sessions and times at which they are scheduled to present. (Changes such as cancellations may be noted, but the schedule represented in the Program Book will remain unaltered.)
Changes will not be made after November 1.
In rare cases, room changes must be made after November 1. Such changes will be publicized as widely as possible.

Recording Policy

Anyone who wishes to audiotape, videotape, or otherwise record a session in part or whole must obtain permission of participants. The SBL is not responsible for unauthorized recording but does reserve the right to revoke registration of anyone who records sessions without appropriate permissions.

Best Practices for Social Media Use at the Annual Meetings

Attendees are encouraged to live-tweet at the Annual Meeting using the official Annual Meeting hashtag (#sblaar20).
Program unit chairs are invited to create hash tags for the unit to be published in the Annual Meeting Program Book.
Presenters may request that the presentation not be broadcast across social media. Similar to a presenter's requests not to be filmed or recorded, attendees are asked to respect the presenters' wishes.
Attribution is key. List the speaker's name and presentation title; refer to a social media handle, if known.
Clearly define where the idea originated. Note direct quotes within quotation marks. Make it clear when you are summarizing an argument and when you respond with your own opinion or interpretation of it. Note when the presentation is over.
Be respectful, even if you disagree.
Keep the dialogue going—bring responses from social media into the meeting session (e.g., ask questions posed to the author from the Twittersphere) and remember to use the meeting hashtag (#sblaar20) so you can see who is responding to the same session you are.

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2020 Annual Meeting