The Program Committee of the American Society for Legal History invites proposals for the 2026 meeting to be held November 12-14 in Banff, Canada. Panels on any facet or period of legal history from anywhere in the world are welcome. We encourage thematic proposals that transcend traditional periodization and geography. The online portal will open in early January 2026. The deadline for Pre-Conference Symposia proposals is Friday, February 27, 2026. The deadline for all other submissions is Tuesday, March 24, 2026.
Panel proposals should include the following: a CV with complete contact information for each person on the panel, including chairs and commentators; 300-word (maximum) abstracts of individual papers; and a 300-word (maximum) description of the panel. Only complete panel proposals will be considered. All conference panel slots will be 90 minutes long.
Scholars looking to build a panel may post their potential paper topics here. We encourage individuals to peruse this spreadsheet to identify other scholars with common interests, beyond their familiar networks. Senior scholars who are willing to chair and/or comment on a panel may register their interest and availability here. All program participants must be current members of the Society by the date of the Annual Meeting. Information on how to build a successful panel can be found here. The Program Committee especially encourages panels that include participants from groups historically underrepresented in the organization, and that include participants who represent a diversity of rank, experience, and institutional affiliation.
Besides traditional panels featuring presentations of work in progress, the Program Committee welcomes other forms of structured presentation, such as a skills/pedagogical workshop (chair, 3-4 presenters) or a roundtable format (chair, 3-5 presenters).
In addition to the above formats, the Program Committee accepts proposals for the following three types of panels:
New Directions: The purpose of these panels will be to identify cutting-edge methodological and topical directions in legal history, to define new subfields, and/or generate dialogue among scholars whose recent books (published since 2023 or forthcoming) have tackled common historiographic questions. These panels may feature three to five authors of new books organized by theme, chronology, or methodology and may also include scholars writing review essays of a field, or others similarly positioned. For a panel featuring new books, the session abstract should include the author, title, publisher, and publication date for each proposed book. Please note that the Program Committee will devote only a very small number of sessions to this type of panel (likely 2-3) that are able to clearly develop broad analytical themes among the included monographs and that illuminate shifts in the “state of field” in a particular area rather than descriptions of the books themselves. The Program Committee will not accept proposals for “Author-Meets-Readers” panels for the 2026 meeting. Book authors are encouraged to apply for: “Making Connections: New Works in Legal History.”
Poster Presentations: This year’s Annual Meeting will dedicate space during the conference for poster presentations on any aspect of legal history in the main conference common area. Participants in the poster presentations will also join in a “lightning round” panel session to introduce their projects. Individuals interested in participating in this session should submit a short description of their project (up to 300 words) as well as a CV. Accepted participants will be asked to submit a poster design to the organizers by early October. Posters will be printed onsite.
Graduate Lightning Round: In this session, 8-10 graduate students briefly introduce their projects and receive feedback and questions from the audience. Interested graduate students should submit their CV and an abstract of their paper. Note that given the large size of the panel, an individual presenter in this session has much less time to present their work than in a traditional panel with 3-4 presenters.
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