The original submission deadline of March 1, 2026 has been extended, and Submittable will now close on March 8, 2026. We encourage you to not wait until the last minute.

Please submit your papers or panel proposals here:https://asa.submittable.com/submit.

Complete information about the meeting, including the Call for Proposals, is available here: ASA 84th Annual Meeting.

We are pleased to again offer travel funding for persons without access to institutional travel funds who have papers and panel presentations accepted for the meeting. In addition, as in past years, all full-time students with papers and panel presentations accepted for the meeting will receive travel support. For more details, see: Travel Grants for ASA Annual Meeting.

We look forward to the opportunity to review your submissions for the conference.

Shelby Moser  (University of Utah)
2026 Program Chair

If you are at the meeting, don't miss this great panel of speakers!

There are also a number of ASA members presenting on the main program. For information about these presentations - including abstracts, times, and locations - please go to the APA Central Division Meeting page.  You can locate these sessions by going to the "Program" tab and typing "aesthetics" in the Subcategory box under the "Filter by Paper" option. 

Congratulations to everyone who is on the Central Division program!

The American Society for Aesthetics and the British Society of Aesthetics are pleased to announce that A.W. Eaton will be the Richard Wollheim Lecturer at the BSA Annual Conference at Oxford University, St Anne's College, September 11-13, 2026.

A.W. Eaton is Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Associate Dean in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois Chicago. She received her PhD in both philosophy and art history from The University of Chicago. She has published on topics such as the relationship between aesthetic and ethical value, pornography, erotic art, fatness, feminist aesthetics, aesthetics and race, and artistic representations of rape. She is currently developing a pragmatic account of pictures and working on various topics related to aesthetic injustice. Professor Eaton has been a Laurence Rockefeller Fellow at Princeton's Center for Human Values; Senior Research Fellow at Lichtenberg Kolleg, University of Göttingen; and the Brady Distinguished Visiting Associate Professor at Northwestern University.

For more information about Professor Wollheim, click here.

The Richard Wollheim Lecture is jointly sponsored by the American Society for Aesthetics and the British Society of Aesthetics. The ASA nominates a lecturer to speak at the BSA annual conference in even years and the BSA nominates a lecturer to speak at the ASA annual meeting in odd years.

This two-day event will be held at Auburn University in Auburn, Alabama on April 17-18, 2026.

Invited speakers from the University of Warwick include: Diarmuid Costello, Eileen John, and Eliza Starbuck Little. 

Call for Abstracts (click here)

Abstracts will be accepted until February 25, 2026.

Questions? Contact Keren Gorodeisky at kzg0003@auburn.edu.

Please see the "On Seeking a Community of Taste" webpage for the most up-to-date information about the workshop.

The 84th ASA Annual Meeting: Salt Lake City, UT (November 18-21)

Submissions of papers and panel proposals are now being accepted on the Submittable site for the 84th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Aesthetics. Submittable will close on March 1, 2026. We encourage you to submit early!

Please submit papers or panel proposals here: ASA84 Submission Portal.

Information about the meeting, including the Call for Papers/Proposals and the submission link, is available on the meeting webpage, which will be updated as more details become available: ASA84 Annual Meeting.

We look forward to the opportunity to review your submissions for the meeting, and we hope to see you in Salt Lake City in the fall!

Shelby Moser (Chair) and the 2026 Program Committee

The 2026 Rocky Mountain Division Meeting: Santa Fe, NM (July 10-12)

Submissions of papers and panel proposals are now being accepted for the 2026 Rocky Mountain Division Meeting of the American Society for Aesthetics. The submission deadline is March 15, 2026. We encourage you to submit early!

Please see the Rocky Mountain Division 2026 Call for Abstracts for submission details: RMASA2026 CFA.

Information about the meeting, including the Call for Abstracts, is available on the meeting webpage, which will be updated as more details become available: RMASA2026 Meeting.

We look forward to the opportunity to review your submissions for the meeting, and we hope to see you in Santa Fe in the summer!

Bethany Henning, President
Jamie Dow, Vice-President
Matthew Williams-Wyant, Secretary
Emmie Malone, Past-President
          -2026 Rocky Mountain Division Officers

Congratulations, also, to this year's Danto Honorable Mention recipient, James Young (University of Victoria), for his paper “The Myth of the Aesthetic.”

For more information about the Arthur Danto/American Society for Aesthetics prize, which is awarded in even-numbered years in conjunction with the American Philosophical Association, see:

https://www.apaonline.org/page/danto and https://aesthetics-online.org/page/DantoPrize.

2026 Eastern Division APA

Nick Riggle will be presenting his prize-winning work, with commentary by ASA members, at the 2026 Eastern Division Meeting of the APA in the following session:

Thursday, January 8: 11:00 a.m. - 12:50 p.m. 

6N. APA Committee Session: Arthur Danto/American Society for
Aesthetics Prize Symposium

Arranged by the APA Committee on Lectures, Publications, and
Research; co-sponsored by American Society for Aesthetics

Chair: Jochen Bojanowski (University of Illinois)

Speaker: Nick Riggle (University of San Diego)
“Aesthetic Value and the Practice of Aesthetic Valuing”

Commentators: Robbie Kubala (The University of Texas at Austin)
Kenneth Walden (Dartmouth College)

*****

Thank you to David Friedell (Union College) who has organized this year's ASA Special Session for the Eastern Division APA.  If you are at the meeting, don't miss this author-meets-critics panel!

Wednesday, January 7: 4:00 - 5:50 p.m.

G3C. American Society for Aesthetics

Topic: Author Meets Critics: Robert Gooding-Williams, Democracy
and Beauty

Chair: David J. Friedell (Union College)

Author: Robert Gooding-Williams (Yale University)

Speakers: Elvira Basevich (University of California, Davis)
J. Reid Miller (Haverford College)
Philip Yaure (Virginia Tech)

Table of Contents

ASA members have free access to all content via the Oxford site. Log into your account on the ASA web site. Look for the red Members button (upper-right) and the Oxford drop-down menu.  Print copies to regular ASA members will be mailed soon.

JAAC Annual Report for 2025

Jonathan Gilmore and Sandra Shapshay, Co-Editors
The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

Antony Aumann is Professor of Philosophy at Northern Michigan University. He has published articles on aesthetics in venues such as the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Journal of Aesthetic Education, Synthese, and Journal of the American Philosophical Association. His 2019 monograph was titled Art and Selfhood (Lexington Books). Aumann is a former president of the Rocky Mountain Division of ASA and co-organizer of the 2024 Existential Aesthetics Conference. He is also currently co-organizing the Eastern Division Meeting of the ASA. His goals as trustee are to create more opportunities for underfunded members of the profession, including graduate students, and to increase engagement with aestheticians outside the discipline of philosophy.

Shelby Moser is an Associate Professor (Lecturer) in the Division of Games at the University of Utah. Her research focuses on games and aesthetics. Her publications include “The Heaviness of Play in Heavy Metal Music” (forthcoming) and "Videogame Ontology: Constitutive Rules, and Algorithms" (2018). She earned her PhD from the University of Kent, Canterbury (2018). Shelby’s been an active member of the American Society for Aesthetics (ASA) since 2016. She'll serve as the annual meeting chair (2026), has served as co-editor of the ASA Newsletter (2017–2022), reviewed for the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, co-chaired the Pacific Division meetings (2019, 2020), and has participated in two ad hoc committees. With Tony Chackal, she received ASA support to organize a conference on the philosophy of street art (Fall 2025). She's also presented papers and joined panels at numerous Annual and Divisional meetings.

Elisabeth Schellekens is Chair Professor of Aesthetics at the Philosophy Department of Uppsala University, where she is currently Department Head. She received her PhD from Kings College London, holding appointments in London, Manchester and Durham before moving to Uppsala in 2014. Schellekens has published on conceptual art, aesthetic understanding, objectivism and subjectivism, Kant, intelligible beauty, and more. She currently leads the interdisciplinary research program, “Aesthetic Cognitivism and the Prospects of Criticism” (Templeton). Formerly Co-Editor of The British Journal of Aesthetics, she served 11 years on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism. A regular participant at ASA meetings since 2002, Schellekens delivered the Richard Wollheim Memorial Lecture in 2023. Having overseen a period of considerable growth of the Aesthetics division at Uppsala, Schellekens has nurtured an environment in many respects unique in the subject. She has led numerous externally funded research projects and built a teaching syllabus which offers over a dozen Aesthetics courses every year. As trustee, she would put her experience of strengthening Aesthetics environments at the service of the ASA, and aim to build collaborations between the Society, its members and European grant infrastructure. Her primary goals include improving the visibility of Aesthetics within academic philosophy and the wider community.

Thanks to all the nominees who stood for election and to all the ASA members who voted.

Michalle Gal, Brandon Polite, and Sonia Sedivy will complete their terms as trustees on January 31, 2026. In December 2026, the members of ASA will elect three new trustees. 

Click here to read about recent society news, catch up on the latest CFP's, and learn about upcoming dates and deadlines. 

The current edition of the newsletter is available to anyone who visits the ASA's website. 

To access the full archive of previous editions, you must have a current membership in the society.  You can join the ASA, or renew an expired membership, with ease by accessing the menu options on the top right of the society's main page at https://aesthetics-online.org/.

Thank you for a great year and best wishes for 2026!!

Julia Minarik and Mary Beth Willard

ASA Newsletter Co-editors

The nominees are:

Antony Aumann

Garry Hagberg

Shelby Moser

Panos Paris

Elisabeth Schellekens

Nicholas Wiltsher 

Bios for the nominees can be found by clicking HERE.

Only current ASA members are eligible to vote. The ASA website will only let members who have logged in vote in this election. 

• Log into the ASA website.
• Hover over the red "Members" menu in the top right.
• Select "Trustee elections" in the drop-down menu.
  

You will only be permitted by the site to vote once. Please vote carefully, as it will not be possible to change your vote later. Voting will close on December 31, 2025.

Please email Renee Conroy at secretary-treasurer@aesthetics-online.org if you encounter any difficulties.

Please see below for meeting details, and contact the divisional leaders if you have any questions.

The ASA Eastern Division is pleased that the 2026 Meeting will be held at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Philadelphia Center City on April 10-11, 2026. 

Antony Aumann  (Northern Michigan University) and Henry Pratt  (Marist University) are the 2026 Division program co-chairs.

 The division is accepting paper submissions until December 1, 2025. 

Please send all inquiries to the conference email address: easa2026@gmail.com. 

 For EASA meeting information and to access the CFP, CLICK HERE.

Please see below for meeting details, and contact the divisional leaders if you have any questions.

The ASA Pacific Division is pleased that the 2026 Meeting will be held at the Graduate by Hilton Berkeley Hotel on March 6-7, 2026. 

Eliya Cohen  (University of Utah) is the 2026 Pacific Division program chair.

 The division is accepting paper submissions until November 15, 2025 . 

Please send all inquiries to the conference email address: asapacific2026@gmail.com . 

 For PASA meeting information and to access the CFP, CLICK HERE.

***

The ASA Eastern Division is pleased that the 2026 Meeting will be held at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Philadelphia Center City on April 10-11, 2026. 

Antony Aumann  (Northern Michigan University) and Henry Pratt  (Marist University) are the 2026 Division program co-chairs.

 The division is accepting paper submissions until November 15, 2025. 

Please send all inquiries to the conference email address: easa2026@gmail.com. 

 For EASA meeting information and to access the CFP, CLICK HERE.

DivCom Co-Chairs

Eliya Cohen (University of Utah) will be the 2026 program chair.

 The division is accepting paper submissions until November 15, 2025 . 

Please send all inquiries to the conference email address: asapacific2026@gmail.com. 

 For up-to-date details about the meeting and to access the CFP, CLICK HERE.

Table of Contents

ASA members have free access to all content via the Oxford site. Log into your account on the ASA web site. Look for the red Members button (upper-right) and the Oxford drop-down menu.  Print copies to regular ASA members have been mailed and should be arriving soon.

JAAC Annual Report for 2025

Jonathan Gilmore and Sandra Shapshay, Co-Editors
The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

Click here to read about recent society news, catch up on the latest CFP's, and learn about upcoming dates and deadlines. 

The current edition of the newsletter is available to anyone who visits the ASA's website, as are a number of recent issues. Please see ASA Newsletter Current and Recent Issues.

To access the full archive of previous editions, you must have a current membership in the society. You can join the ASA, or renew an expired membership, with ease by accessing the menu options on the top right of the society's main page at https://aesthetics-online.org/.

Julia Minarik and Mary Beth Willard

ASA Newsletter Co-editors

The submission deadline is November 1, 2025.

***

The Pacific Division is also pleased to announce that Antonia Peacocke (Stanford University) will be giving the 2026 Peter Kivy Address.

Dr. Peacocke's main research lies in philosophy of mind, epistemology, philosophy of action, metaphysics, and aesthetics (especially philosophy of literature). She is particularly interested in topics that cross-cut these areas of philosophy.  Her current research projects focus on content plurality in mental action, the nature of aesthetic value, and phenomenal learning in literature.

For the most current information about the meeting, please visit the Pacific Division 2026 webpage.

We hope to see you in Berkeley in the spring!

Eliya Cohen (University of Utah), PASA 2026 Program Chair

We hope to see many of you in Baltimore at the 83rd Annual Meeting next month!

As fall arrives and the new academic year begins, the ASA looks forward to hosting its Annual Meeting, which will commence for the 83^rd time in Baltimore, Maryland at the Lord Baltimore Hotel October 22-25, 2025.

This yearly gathering is always a special occasion for the society and its members. It is a regular opportunity for those who love the arts, philosophy, and the many aesthetic sides of life to enjoy being in community. It is also an occasion for attendees to present new work, revisit well-known ideas, discuss the future of the society, and forge long-lasting relationships. The ASA’s Annual Meeting, thereby, helps sustain the vibrance of the sub-discipline of philosophy described broadly as “aesthetics,” in accordance with our organizational mission.

In addition to its regular program of papers and panels, this year’s meeting features several special events, including three receptions, a Welcoming Luncheon, the Feminist Caucus Committee Lunch, and a catered business meeting open to all registrants. This year, the ASA also highlights two honored speakers: Murray Smith (University of Kent) and Michael Lamason (Executive Director and a founder of the Black Cherry Puppet Theater). Smith will give the Richard Wollheim Lecture on Thursday, October 23, while Lamason will share his expertise in puppetry at the Arthur C. Danto Memorial Lecture on Friday, October 24. For more information about these events and to see the most updated version of the meeting program, please visit the ASA 83rd Annual Meeting webpage.

At the Annual Meeting, we also honor several prize recipients who, in addition to receiving monetary recognition, will present their award-winning work on the main program. Many congratulations to Joseph Kassman-Tod (California State University Fullerton), this year’s recipient of the John Fisher Memorial Prize for his paper entitled “Towards Ideas: A Kantian Aesthetic Virtue.” Congratulations, too, to Juan Carlos Gonzalez (Colorado College) and Mary Gregg (Yonsei University, SUNY Korea) for being the 2025 winners of the Irene H. Chayes New Voices Award. And kudos to Jacob Blitz for being awarded this year's Outstanding Student Paper Prize. Remember to keep your eyes open for the sessions in which their papers will be presented!

As with the four divisional meetings hosted by the ASA each year, the Annual Meeting is organized by dedicated volunteers from the society who curate the program and work together for twelve months preceding the event to ensure the meeting is a success. Special appreciation for the 83^rd Annual Meeting is due to this year’s co-chairs, Adriana Clavel-Vázquez (Tilburg University) and Jonathan Weinberg (University of Arizona), who have assembled a program with 54 original papers, 7 panels, and 2 Author-meets-Critics sessions that represents the wide range of interests and philosophical approaches characteristic of contemporary aesthetics. Additional thanks is owed to their program committee members – Sondra Bacharach, Sergio Gallegos, Shen-yi Liao, Sheila Lintott, Derek Matravers, Shelby Moser, Jeremy Page, and Angela Sun – who helped review an extremely competitive pool of worthy paper and panel submissions this past spring.

At the time of this publication, the organizers are still looking to fill several chair slots. If you see a “TBA” opportunity listed on the current ASA 83rd Annual Meeting program in a session that interests you, please contact the meeting co-chairs at 83rdannualmeeting@gmail.com to express your desire to serve in this important role.

This exciting opportunity to convene as a society is less than two months away, so we remind readers to register for the meeting as soon as possible if you are participating on the program as a presenter, commentator, or chair. The ASA’s guaranteed room rate at the Lord Baltimore hotel will be available only until September 27, 2025 or the room block has sold out (whichever comes first). In the next few weeks, please ensure your membership in the society is up to date, then log in as a member to register for the meeting and any special events you would like to attend. You will receive the hotel booking code in a confirmation email you will be sent after you have registered for the meeting.

The National Office is also pleased to make two new announcements about future Annual Meetings. In 2026, the 84^th Annual Meeting will be held November 18-21 in Salt Lake City, Utah at the Hilton Salt Lake City Center hotel. We are delighted to welcome Shelby Moser (University of Utah) as the program chair for this event and thank her in advance for volunteering to organize next year’s meeting.

We are also happy to announce that in 2027 the 85^th Annual Meeting will commence at the Omni Providence hotel in Providence, Rhode Island October 20-23. Many thanks to those society members who, in recent months, have helped the National Office select and secure this lovely location.

If you are interested in volunteering to help organize or participate on the program committee of the 2027 Annual Meeting, please contact the National Office at secretary-treasurer@aesthetics-online.org to let us know you would like to contribute your talents to this event.

We wish everyone a productive start to fall and look forward to seeing many of you in Baltimore in October.

Respectfully submitted,

Renee M. Conroy

Executive Director and Secretary-Treasurer

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

● Submissions are accepted via email to SWGraduateAesthetics@gmail.com. Please provide your preferred name and current student affiliation in the body of the email.

● Submissions should be an abstract of no more than 1,000 words. This abstract should be representative of the full paper to be submitted upon acceptance.

● Abstracts are to be prepared for anonymous review (meaning your name should not appear within the abstract).

● Co-authored papers are not eligible for submission.

This conference will be held at the University of Arizona in Tucson, Arizona on November 22-23, 2025. 

(Please note that this is a change from the originally advertised dates of November 21-22, 2025.)

SWGAC is co-organized by ASA graduate student members Kyle Kirby, Ella LaRose, and Lenin Vazquez-Toledo, with faculty advising by Hannah Kim and Jonathan Weinberg.

Questions? Contact SWGraduateAesthetics@gmail.com.

For full details and up-to-date information, visit the conference website:

Southwestern Graduate Aesthetics Conference.

The American Society for Aesthetics is pleased to help fund this graduate student philosophy conference.

***

The 2026 Eastern Division meeting will again commence at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Philadelphia Center City on April 10-11, 2026.

This year, the Katharine Everett Gilbert Memorial Lecture will be given by Elisabeth Camp (Rutgers University). The program will also include the Beardsley Lecture, given by C. Thi Nguyen (University of Utah), sponsored by the Department of Philosophy at Temple University.

For updated information about the meeting, please visit the Eastern Division 2026 webpage.

We hope to see you in Philadelphia in the spring!

Antony Aumann (Northern Michigan University) and Henry Pratt (Marist University), EASA 2026 Co-Chairs

***

For more details about special speakers and events at the meeting, please see the preliminary program available on the meeting webpage.

At this time, we are still actively filling commentator and chair slots, so please contact us at ASA83rdannualmeeting@gmail.com if you are interested in fulfilling one of these important roles. 

"TBA" slots remain available.

We also encourage you to register for the meeting now while the early bird rates are still available.  After September 24, registration rates will increase as indicated on the meeting webpage.

When you register, you will receive the ASA's booking code for the Lord Baltimore Hotel.  Rooms will remain available in the block for the guaranteed rate of $199/night until September 20 or they are sold out (whichever comes first).

We look forward to seeing you in Baltimore in the fall!

Adriana Clavel Vazquez (Tillburg University)

Jonathan Weinberg (University of Arizona)

83rd Annual Meeting Co-Chairs

Table of Contents

ASA members have free access to all content via the Oxford site. Log into your account on the ASA web site. Look for the red Members button (upper-right) and the Oxford drop-down menu.  Print copies to regular ASA members have been mailed and should be arriving soon.

JAAC Annual Report for 2024

Jonathan Gilmore and Sandra Shapshay, Co-Editors
The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

At this time, we are actively filling commentator and chair slots, so please contact us at ASA83rdannualmeeting@gmail.com if you are interested in fulfilling one of these important roles. All "TBA" slots remain available.

We hope to see you in Baltimore in the fall!

Adriana Clavel Vazquez (Tillburg University)

Jonathan Weinberg (University of Arizona)

83rd Annual Meeting Co-Chairs

Be sure to SAVE THE DATES: October 20, 2027-October 23, 2027.

All information about the meeting - including the CFP, organizers' contact information, and details about special events and registration - will be posted on the 85th Annual Meeting webpage as they become available. We hope to see you in Providence in 2027!

Outstanding Monograph Prize: Kathleen Higgins for Aesthetics in Grief and Mourning: Philosophical Reflections on Coping with Loss (University of Chicago Press, 2024) 

Selma Jeanne Cohen Research Prize: Kate Mattingly for Shaping Dance Canons: Criticism, Aesthetics, and Equity (University of Florida Press, 2023)

Honorable Mentions for the 2025 SJC award: Serouj Aprahamian and Megan Nicely

Somaesthetics Research Prize: Stefano Marino for "Pragmatist Aesthetics, Ethics of Taste, and Feminism" in Somapower: Somaesthetics Reads Politics (Brill, 2024)

New Voices (for 83rd annual meeting): Juan Carlos Gonzalez and Mary Gregg

Many thanks to everyone who has applied to be considered for an award from the ASA in the past year, as well as to every person who has served on a review committee. 

To learn more about awards offered in 2026, please CLICK HERE to access the ASA's grants and prizes page.