Our annual conference, held alternately in the United States and Canada, is open to scholars and graduate students from North America and beyond.

In 2024, please join us in Spokane, Washington! Details below.

Traditionally the conference features two plenary speakers and up to twenty sessions of three to four papers each, a reception and a business lunch.

Past plenary speakers have included Stephen Greenblatt, Valerie Traub, Fran Dolan, Barbara Lewalski, David Scott Kastan, and Alexander Leggatt.

2024 Annual Meeting: Rethinking Inquiry

  • Introduction

    In this post-pandemic, climate-disaster moment, what are academic conferences for? What can scholars do in rooms together that we can’t do online?

    In 2024 in Spokane the PNRS will once more convene our tight-knit yet welcoming regional community of scholars and teachers of the Renaissance to consider such questions.

    We will extend our mission of advancing knowledge about the early modern past and presents, while also seeking to facilitate new ways of exchanging ideas beyond the traditional paper and panel formats.

    We invite proposals centered around the theme of rethinking, broadly or narrowly construed: rethinking settled orthodoxies about the past, but perhaps also rethinking methods of inquiry, of research, of mentorship, of teaching, of authorship, of writing, of publishing, and of exchange.

  • Call for Papers

    Conferences have always been about presenting work in progress, and ours is no exception. But in 2024 we seek to draw back the methodological curtains around our work in this period and welcome a focus on the methods as much as the results of your research.

    Presentations can focus on any facet of researching and teaching Renaissance texts and culture: such as working with archives, databases, software platforms, editing systems, assignments, classroom activities, and annotations.

    We welcome proposals for papers, panels or roundtables, as well as workshops, lightning talks, digital posters, salon discussions, and other formats for in-person exchange.

  • When and Where

    • October 17th to 19th, 2024 at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington.

    • Hotel and registration details forthcoming in spring 2024.

  • People

    Plenary Speakers

    • Dr. Tiffany Werth, University of California-Davis

    • Dr. Katherine Schaap Williams, University of Toronto

    Conference Co-Chairs

    • Heather Easterling Richie, Gonzaga University

    • Katey Roden, Gonzaga University

    • Michael Ullyot, University of Calgary