Moss reelected president of American Society of Papyrologists

In January, Professor Jennifer Sheridan Moss was elected to a second term (2015-2017) as the President of the American Society of Papyrologists (ASP), which was founded in 1961 to promote the study of Greek and Latin papyri. As the field of papyrology has grown and extended its scope, so has the Society, which now represents the interests of classicists, historians, egyptologists, and scholars of Arabic papyri.

Although the ASP is a small organization that represents a small academic field, it is very active and is seen by many as a model academic society. The ASP sponsors a journal, Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists and a monograph series, American Studies in Papyrology. They sponsor annual paper sessions at the meetings of the Society for Classical Studies and the Society for Biblical Literature. As a field, papyrology digitized long before it was popular, and the Society's members and member institutions have been awarded many millions of dollars in grants by every major funding source in the humanities. Papyrologists are now venturing more into collaborations with scientists that promise to be models for such cross-disciplinary work.

Since papyrology is taught at a limited number of North American universities, the ASP sponsors Summer Institutes which bring together the top scholars in the world to teach the field to graduate students. The ASP has established an endowment to fund the Institutes, which is now nearing $1 million. Students who are accepted to an Institute are fully funded.

Over the years, Professor Sheridan Moss has held a number of positions in the ASP. She was secretary-treasurer for six years, served as a trustee, and was a member of the investment committee. As president, she has a number of responsibilities. She responds to inquiries from the media (papyrology can be a hot topic!), negotiates with publishers, names and participates in nominating committees (for example, they are currently searching for a new editor for their monograph series), and fundraises and writes grants for the society's activities. Under her leadership, the Summer Institute endowment has gone up by six figures.

The most exciting new development for the ASP is the first-ever North American Papyrology Seminar, which will be held this May 2015 in Ann Arbor. While the seminar will feature papers, there will be more time for discussion than is usually provided at traditional academic conferences. This way, scholars will be able to present works in progress and get useful feedback from the whole audience. They plan to sponsor a Seminar every three years, with universities acting as co-sponsors. This year's meeting is co-sponsored by the University of Michigan.