Minutes of the Annual Business Meeting of the Dreiser Society

American Literature Association
San Francisco, May 28, 2004

1. The first order of business was the election of officers.  Steve Brennan was elected Vice President and Roark Mulligan was elected to fill a vacant Director at Large position.

2. Secretary-Treasurer Donna Packer-Kinlaw pointed out the need to co-ordinate the collection of dues with the publication cycle of Dreiser Studies, which has changed from spring-fall to summer-winter.  She offered to draft a new policy and distribute it to the membership by email for their approval.  She reported that the Society has 79 members, with 22 having paid their dues for this year.  The current balance in the Society’s bank account is $1,200.00.  Newlin reported that the costs of Dreiser Studies had gone up in recent issues with the expanded contents and new format.   While the UNC-Wilmington English Department is generously providing additional support ($1,000 to the journal this past year), future help remains uncertain. 

3. Newlin pointed out that the bylaws do not adequately define the duties of Dreiser Studies editors, especially when it comes to appointing other personnel and members of the editorial board.  An amendment to the bylaw spelling out the editors’ duties was approved.  

4. Newlin said he would like to add a list of past officers to the Society’s website but could not remember exactly who served and when.  He will query the membership by email. 

5. Discussion turned to an inquiry from University Press of America about publishing the annual proceedings of the Society’s sessions at ALA.  The members agreed with Newlin that such a publication would undermine Dreiser Studies and that a collection of essays from the journal’s past issues would be preferable.  UPA would print only enough copies to meet the demand, but they would require assurance of selling at least 50 copies at approximately $20.00 each.  The members agreed that this was a reasonable demand and approved the project.  Larry Hussman and Roark Mulligan volunteered to join Keith Newlin and Steve Brennan on the committee to choose the essays. 

6. The final topic was the Dreiser bibliography.  As Newlin explained, Roger Smith, the new bibliographer for Dreiser Studies, is interested in updating Pizer, Rusch, and Dowell’s Theodore Dreiser: A Primary and Secondary Bibliography, either in print or online.  While the Society appointed a committee two years ago for regularly updating the bibliography on the Dreiser website at Penn, problems with the website have delayed the project.  Though Pizer, Rusch, and Dowell were not present, the consensus of members was that Smith would be welcome to proceed with his plans.  Tom Riggio indicated that Penn would have no problem with having segments of the bibliography under different authors.