2025 American Name Society Annual Meeting
2025 ANS Annual Conference (Online, via Zoom, 22 February 2025)
Call for Papers:
The American Name Society is now inviting proposals for papers for its next annual conference. The one-day event will be held virtually via Zoom, allowing for the attendance of onomastics scholars from around the world. The 2025 ANS conference will not be held in conjunction with the Linguistics Society of America conference.
Abstracts in any area of onomastic research are welcome: personal names, place names, business and institutional names, names theory, names in literature, among others.
Proposals require these elements:
- Title of proposed paper
- 250-word abstract
- Shorter 100-word abstract suitable for inclusion in conference program
- 50-word biography suitable for inclusion in conference program
To submit a proposal, complete the 2025 Author Information Form found here:
http://www.americannamesociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ANS-2025-Author-Info-Sheet.doc
Email completed forms to Dr. Michel Nguessan at: abstracts@americannamesociety.org
For organizational purposes, place “ANS2025” in the subject of your email.
The DEADLINE for receipt of abstracts is July 31, 2024.
All proposals will be subjected to blind review. Notification of proposal acceptances will be sent by September 30, 2024. Authors whose papers have been accepted must be current members of ANS and must register for the annual meeting. Please contact Dr. Michel Nguessan at the above email address if you have any questions or concerns.
We look forward to receiving your submission!
Read the news update here or download a PDF of the call for papers here.
A link to the registration page will be posted later in 2024.
For more information about the ANS Conference, please visit our Conference Page.
ANS Panel at the Linguistic Society of America Conference
The ANS will host a panel at the LSA 2025 conference, which will be held 9 to 12 January 2025 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Names and World-building in Fantasy & Science Fictional Universes
an organized session at the 2025 annual meeting of the
Linguistic Society of America
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
9-12 January 2025
The American Name Society (ANS) is pleased to announce a panel that will be convened at the 2025 annual meeting of the Linguistic Society of America (LSA), which will take place on 9-12 January 2025 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As a long-time sister society of the LSA, the ANS frequently held its annual meeting in conjunction with the annual meeting of the LSA. This panel will celebrate the relationship between the two organizations with three papers on the theme of names and world-building.
The panel is titled “Names and World-building in Fantasy & Science Fictional Universes,” and it features three papers on names and the fantasy genre of literature and Role Playing Games. The panel will be held from 3:30 pm to 5:00 pm in Franklin Hall 1 of the Philadelphia Marriott Downtown. The papers in this session are:
Richard Janda (IU – Bloomington), “Tolkien’s vs. Rowling’s Names: Historical vs. Modern Reality; Elvish vs. Humorous Inventions”
Brandon Simonson (Boston University), “The Linguistic Function of Religious Names in the Creative World of Dungeons & Dragons”
Jean-Louis Vaxelaire (Université de Namur) and Marine Verriest (Université de Namur), “Theirastra and Gérard: Onomastic differences between two tabletop role-playing games (RPG)”
Registration for the 2025 LSA annual meeting is now open:
https://web.cvent.com/event/40d9411e-b965-4659-b9c3-63046eeed3d4/
For more information about the Linguistic Society of America, click here:
The Call for Papers described the session as such:
This session explores names and naming conventions in popular culture, especially personal names and place names that appear in works of literature, music, film, and games. Names convey meaning, but they also serve greater purposes of world-building in popular culture and its reception. Whether the names are of competing houses in A Game of Thrones, the lawless outer rim worlds in the Star Wars universe, or the vault-dwelling protagonists in the Fallout series, each name adds substance and meaning to the world for which it was created. Papers in this session organized by the American Name Society (a long-time sister society of the LSA) address the complex intersection between names and the worlds that they inhabit.
Download a PDF copy of the Call for Papers by clicking here.
For more information about the LSA 2025 conference, visit the LSA conference page here.
ANS Panel at the Modern Language Association Conference
The ANS will host a panel at the MLA 2025 conference, which will be held 9 to 12 January 2025 in New Orleans.
For further information, please contact Dr. Anne W. Anderson (AWAnderson.Editing@gmail.com).
For more information about the 2024 conference, click here.
Past ANS Conferences
For programs from past American Name Society conferences, click here.
Other Onomastic Conferences
For other onomastic conferences, click here.