The American Literature Association (ALA) is "a coalition of societies devoted to the study of American authors". It has some 110 affiliated societies, mostly concerned with the work of a particular author (e.g. the Emily Dickinson International Society or the

Thoreau Society Founded in 1941, the Thoreau Society is the oldest and largest organization dedicated to an American author. It is based in Concord, Massachusetts, Concord, Massachusetts, United States, at Wheeler-Minot Farmhouse, the house where Henry David Th ...

), some thematic such as the Society of Early Americanists. It was founded in 1989. It holds an annual conference, alternating between east coast and west coast venues, attracting about 850 delegates. Some societies choose to have one of their own main meetings as part of the ALA conference, and many sessions of the conference are sponsored by member societies. There are no plenary sessions at the conference, but seven or eight simultaneous events in each time slot. The ALA has an executive board and a "Council of American Authors Societies", which represents the member organizations. The executive director is

Alfred Bendixen Alfred Bendixen is the founder and Executive Director of the American Literature Association and a lecturer in the Department of Gender and Sexuality Studies at Princeton University. Bendixen gained a Ph.D. at the University of North Carolina in ...

, who has held this post since the association's beginnings in 1989.

References

External links

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American Literature Association
listing at the University of Waterloo's Scholarly Societies Project
Archive of past ALA conferences
including programs for all conferences since 2001 Literary societies Supraorganizations Arts organizations based in New Jersey Arts organizations established in 1989 1989 establishments in the United States {{US-arts-org-stub