Participation and presentation format guidelines, deadlines, styling, etc.

1) A concise abstract of your paper, refined from the original abstract submitted in response to the CFP, should be submitted not later than 2 October 2009 for inclusion in the symposium program booklet. This abstract should not exceed 150 words. Additionally, a brief bio not longer than 75 words should be included, specifying the presenter’s university affiliation and title. Titles of papers may be revised up to this date; further changes to the title or abstract made after this point cannot be reflected in the symposium’s official program or symposium booklet.

2) Advanced-stage drafts of papers must be posted on the symposium’s secure server not later than Friday 30 October 2009 (exactly three weeks in advance of the symposium). The server is expected to be fully functional and accessible to all authorized users at least a week in advance of the posting deadline. User names, passwords and other relevant information about how to access the Counter Nature(s) secure server will be sent to all researchers presenting at the symposium in early October.

3) Paper drafts should be submitted in pdf format. These advanced-stage drafts will be accessible only to other active participants at the symposium who have been granted login privileges to the symposium’s secure server. While all active participants are encouraged to read papers submitted by their colleagues in advance of the symposium (within reasonable limits/expectations), only one participant will be designated to formulate a response for each submitted paper during the session in which it is delivered (typically this will be a fellow presenter from the same presentation panel/workshop); so in addition to contributing his/her own paper, each presenter will be asked to read and respond to one paper submitted in advance by a fellow presenter in his/her workshop.

4) Each workshop presentation during the symposium should actually be a 12-15 minute summary of the fuller paper posted on the secure server three weeks earlier; this summary presentation is to be followed by roughly a 7-10 minute critique from the paper’s designated respondent, and up to 10 additional minutes of Q & A with the audience, as moderated by the workshop chair. This means each paper will be allotted a total of 35 minutes of presentation and discussion time during workshop sessions.

5) A structurally complete (if not fully revised) advanced draft of the paper is to be posted, as noted above, three weeks in advance of the symposium on a secure server. This posted draft is not expected to be the final version of the paper, but it should be much more complete than an outline or early/rough draft. Presenters should aim for a draft that is not less than two-thirds the length of the paper as they expect to submit it in its final, revised form for the Counter Nature(s) volume (for more information on final length guidelines for published papers please see under point 6 directly below).

6) Publication is a planned outcome of the Counter Nature(s) project for those who elect to submit their contributions for publication following the symposium. Presenters are invited to resubmit their revised papers roughly three months after the symposium (not later than the end of February 2010). Revised papers submitted will be peer reviewed by independent reviewers in the author’s field. These final versions of the papers should not be less than 6000 words in length, nor more than 9000 words in length, including end notes, list of works cited, abstract and list of keywords; they should be posted on the Counter Nature(s) secure server in both Microsoft Word and pdf formats.
Selections will be made for the Counter Nature(s) volume on the recommendations of the peer reviewers. The volume as submitted to the publisher in 2010 will include between 15 and 20 contributions, including the keynote speakers’ articles. This means that somewhere between one-half and two-thirds the number of papers delivered at the symposium should appear in the finished volume.
Please refer to the style sheet sent to each of you by Steven Hartman in late June 2009 for all pertinent information concerning the styling of papers. All participants who expect to revise and submit their papers for the Counter Nature(s) volume are strongly advised to style their papers according to these guidelines at the time they submit advanced drafts to the symposium’s secure server in late October.