Minutes of the IADA General Assembly – Bologna, 12 October 2017

Call to order

The present members are called to order. All members are provided with the following documents: the General Assembly (GA) agenda, the financial statement of IADA, the minutes of the GA in Nancy (France) in 2015, and the list of candidates for the board election. The President asks whether further topics should be added to the current GA agenda. No further changes are called for. The present members accept the GA agenda unanimously.

Approval of minutes

The President asks the members to read through the minutes of the GA in Nancy (France) from 2015. The minutes are approved unanimously.

Membership

The changes made in the previous GA regarding the payment of the fees and the benefits brought together a good crowd of scholars interested in dialogue studies since in Bologna there were 135 participants and the total amount of IADA members reached 150 members. The President reintroduces the idea of a Best student paper Award and Răzvan Săftoiu suggests that it should be named “Sorin Stati Award” and should be awarded at the next conference.

The President quickly presents the membership fees (tier A countries: EUR 100, tier B and C countries: EUR 80, student members: EUR 60 for all countries, tier A retired faculty/non-affiliated members: 80 EUR, tier B and C countries retired faculty/non-affiliated members: 60 EUR), presents the benefits of membership (3 issues a year of Language and Dialogue, an indexed journal edited by Edda Weigand and published by Benjamins, a 30% discount for all the books in the series Dialogue Studies edited by Edda Weigand and published by Benjamins) and asks the members to spread the word about the association and its activities.

Website

The President opens up the IADA website on the video projector and walks the present members through the different sections of the site. Special attention is paid to the updated section dedicated to the Honorary board, IADA newsletter, the access to the IADA online publications including the IADA conference proceedings, videos, and the access to the Language and Dialogue through the John Benjamins electronic platform (www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals).

There are discussions about the improvement of IADA visibility in the social media and Sergei Kladko suggests that he could coordinate such an activity by managing a Facebook page for IADA.

Finances

The members read through the financial statement of IADA accounting for the period of Dec 2012 to Aug 2017. The current balance reads EUR 1222,30 but no payment from the organisers of the conference in Bologna had been received by the time of the GA.

Selected positions on the statement are briefly discussed: costs for website app, webmaster, payments to previous IADA events as well as payments to Benjamins for the journal Language and Dialogue. Andrea Valente suggests that there should be an electronic message about the membership renewal to be received one month before expiry date.

The President alludes to the fact that there should be no more payments to IADA event organizers in the future due to the limited financial means of IADA. The President also explains that EUR 50 from the membership fee is paid to Benjamins for the journal subscription.

Publications

The members are reminded about the three types of IADA publications available to them: the online proceedings on the IADA website, the Language and Dialogue journal, and the Dialogue Studies (DS) book series via the JB website.

The organizers of the Bologna conference 2017 give an overview of the publications planned with reference to the conference. Letizia Caronia states that upon a peer-review process, the best papers will be selected for publication in one of the following outlets:

1) Online proceedings

2) Regular issues of Language and Dialogue in 2018 and 2019

3) A special issue of Language and Dialogue in 2019

5) An edited volume in the series Dialogue Studies.

Outreach activities

To increase the membership, the President suggests to offer a discounted membership fee of EUR 80 for members of the Language and Social Interaction group, a subdivision of the International Communication Association with about 200 members. The main aim is to increase IADA’s visibility in the research community with a view to attracting new members. It is pointed out that the LSI offer is not subject to any special terms from either side. A present IADA member, who is also chair of LSI, encourages this move, pointing to the common research interests of both associations.

Amendments to the bylaws

The President presents the main amendments and members are invited to express their points of view. The main amendments regard art. 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 and 11 in the current bylaws. The President clarifies that IADA membership should run 12 months after payment since there is no deadline to membership payment and this is mainly done before conferences which are organized on various dates.

Future activities

The President announces IADA’s future conference: in 2018, Huey-Rong Chen will organize an IADA conference on “Being and Becoming” at Taipei University in Taiwan, from 25-28 September. The deadline for abstract submission is March 19, 2018.

Elections

The President calls for the election of the IADA board members. Since there are 9 candidates for 9 positions in the board, the President asks the audience if they agree to vote by public acclamation. The audience agrees to the proposal. The President announces the newly voted board:

François Cooren – President
Ronald Arnett
Letizia Caronia
Marilena Fatigante
Marion Grein – Treasurer
Alain Létourneau
Zohar Livnat – Vice-President
Chaim Noy
Răzvan Săftoiu – Secretary

Announcements

The President announces that the new IADA board meets after the GA for the election of the executive board.

Adjournment

The GA is adjourned.

 

Respectfully submitted

Brașov, 26 October 2017

Răzvan Săftoiu (IADA Secretary)