Panel Title: "Beyond 'Aviation History in the Wider View' – New Approaches to the History of Flight."

Bottom Line: Panel organizers seek participants for a three-paper session on aviation history. The organizers will jointly present one paper, which means there are openings for two additional papers.

Background: We are organizing a panel to follow up on our successful, standing-room-only session at the 2007 SHOT (Society for the History of Technology) Conference in Washington, D.C. For our 2007 panel, titled "'Aviation History in the Wider View’ Revisited...An Assessment of the Field," we used James R. Hansen’s 1989 Technology and Culture article on aviation historiography as a springboard to look back on developments over the past two decades. The abstract for that panel is available online at: http://fiftieth.shotnews.net/?p=111.

For the upcoming SHOT Conference in Lisbon, Portugal (October 11-14, 2008), we intend to follow the organization’s theme: "SHOT@50: Looking Beyond." Just as our own paper provided the contextual foundation for last year's session, we plan this year to present a historiographical discussion regarding innovative and interdisciplinary approaches to aviation history that can potentially move the field beyond its traditional, well-defined boundaries. Our joint paper is tentatively titled "'Aviation History in the Wider View': The Way Ahead..."

We are therefore seeking two other papers on topics and/or from fields that represent new approaches to exploring aviation history. We see these serving as case studies to complement our own theoretical discussion. All submissions will be considered. Scholars with non-western interests and/or from outside the field of history (for instance, anthropologists and sociologists) are encouraged to apply.

Deadline: The finalized session proposal is due at SHOT no later than March 14, 2008. Please provide a formal paper proposal (600 words or less) and a 1-page CV to kinneyj@si.edu no later than March 1st. We will announce selections for the panel no later than March 7th.

Panel Organizers: Jeremy R. Kinney, Ph.D. (Curator, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum) and Alan D. Meyer (Ph.D. Candidate, University of Delaware)

Panel Chair: Roger Launius, Ph.D. Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum