PUBLICK OCCURRENCES — December 28, 2021
2022 MA History Conference: Send us your Ideas, Suggestions, Proposals
Embracing the New or Unexpected:
The 2022 Mass History Conference
June 6 and 7, 2022
The 2022 Conference will take place on June 6 and 7, 2022. We will meet online as well as in person – we hope outside! All sessions and workshops will be online, on June 7, 2022. Send us suggestions, proposals, and ideas: a keynote speaker, session proposals (1 hour), ideas for workshops, your project that we can roll into a session with someone else, other suggestions, the works! The deadline for proposals is January 19. Please fill out the form below.
Whatever plans we made for the last two years, COVID has upended them. Programs and fundraisers were canceled, school groups disappeared, meetings went to Zoom. What started out as a temporary setback in March 2020 has become the new normal for our cultural and educational institutions, a new challenge that we must meet in order to move forward.
And, Covid upended everything just as we were starting to tackle a whole slew of other realities that demand a broadening of the mission of history in our society and an open and adventurous attitude towards the new: climate change, civic polarization, urgent calls for inclusive history and organizational diversity, and the emergence of exciting participatory communications technologies.
Even as we struggle, these challenges are bringing us opportunities and change us in positive ways. We are developing a new relationship with technology as we seek to communicate safely and effectively with our audiences. We are re-thinking the culture and structure of our organizations, even as staff often works remote. A re-energized emphasis on diversity and equity is making us take a hard look at how we tell our stories, target our audiences, and recruit our staff and boards. Our disaster planning is beginning to incorporate the long-term effects of climate change.
As we long for stability, we need to and are adopting dynamic approaches to public history. Taking comfort in things remaining the same year after year is no longer available. How are you changing, and how has that change made your organization better able to manage change going forward? What are your pleasant surprises? What assumptions have you abandoned along the way (perhaps with great relief)? And finally:
Join us for the 2022 MA History Conference, and share with your colleagues your creative and positive responses to change. How did you learn to Embrace the New and the Unexpected? How do you envision the future for all of us? What do you want Massachusetts public history to look like five or ten years from now?
