Call for Papers, Panels, and Abstracts

Theme: The Functions of Argument and Social Context

Submissions for the Program: Please send electronic versions of completed papers, panel proposals, or extended abstracts to the Conference Program planner: Dennis S. Gouran (g8v@psu.edu).

Deadline for Submissions: Friday, April 3, 2009

Submission Format: Drafts of completed papers are welcome from any of the traditional perspectives on argumentation (logic, rhetoric, dialectic) or from emerging contemporary views in the social sciences and humanities. Papers may address issues that are pedagogical, philosophical, theoretical, interpretive, empirical, or critical. Cross disciplinary perspectives are also welcome.

Panel proposals should provide a title for the panel, names and addresses (including email) of all participants, a specified time limit for each participant, an abstract of each paper, a brief explanation of the nature and importance of the topic and the pertinence of the individual presentations. If respondents are included, their role should be explained. Innovative panel formats will be considered. We discourage panel proposals in which all participants are from the same institution.

Extended abstracts (at least 500 words) should be substantial enough to indicate the scope, direction, and merit of proposed papers. Assessments will be based on the evaluators' understanding of the projected document discussed in the abstract.

Multiple submissions from authors or co-authors are permissible but not encouraged.

Presentation Guidelines: The Alta Conference encourages discussion and audience participation. Thus, each oral presentation (paper or response) should not exceed 15 minutes, nor should the total presentation time for each panel (papers and respondents) exceed one hour.

Conference Proceedings: Papers delivered at the conference will be reviewed for publication in the Conference volume. Only completed papers (including those proposed for panels and in abstracts) forwarded to the Conference Program Planner by July 1 will be considered for inclusion. Papers may not exceed 3,000 words, excluding notes and references. Endnotes should not exceed two double-spaced pages and should be in the same font as the rest of the paper. Papers must follow APA style.

Papers must be submitted in MS Word (doc), WordPerfect (wpd), or Rich Text (rtf) formats. (MS Word is preferred.) Authors who wish to have their papers considered for publication in the volume will need to bring to the conference three hard copies of their paper with final edits completed, 1 disk copy , copyright agreements (doc pdf) signed by each author, and written premissions to publish any copyrighted material.

Conference Director: Dennis Gouran , Department of Communication Arts and Sciences, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802

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