Real Estate

AN OPEN LETTER TO ALL MEMBERS
from AMEWS President
March 2007

Dear AMEWS members,

Thank you for the vote of confidence in electing me as president of AMEWS for the coming two years, I look forward to serving as president and supporting the good standing and reputation of our organization and its academic mission. I also look forward to meeting you all as a group- and individuals, getting to know you and sharing in our visions and common concerns. Our AMEWS/MESA meetings in Montreal this year (November 07) promise to be as exciting as were those of the past year in Boston and where I hope to see all of you in the beautiful setting of Montreal. The meetings during the last session were wonderful, both the AMEWS meetings and its three panels which were well attended; for this year we hope to have the same number of panels approved and to have an even stronger audience.

AMEWS has formed an important legacy of great presidents and effective board members since its inception and my thanks goes to all of them. However my special thanks goes to the outgoing president Nancy Gallagher for doing a great job and to her supporting board. Also special thanks go to our incredible treasurer Amaney Jamal whose name has been associated with the smooth running membership for half a decade and also thanks to our hard working secretary Azza Basarudin, both of them remain essential to the successful running of the organization.

AMEWS has come of age, we are 21 years old, which in our tradition of celebrations we will celebrate the event during our meetings in November, and we will also celebrate the success of our journal, the Journal of Middle East Women's Studies, which is already in its third year of publication. Our journal is forging its path in the field and is being reviewed and appreciated by the academe and other concerned communities- it is having an impact and is being quoted often. We have many from among us to thank for this success and hope most of you continue the tradition and expand our contribution through the written word. Please submit your articles and book reviews and please urge your students to do so. We have an exceptionally able team of editors in Sondra Hale and Nancy Gallagher leading the path of the Journal, I would like to warmly acknowledge their contribution and hard work. Indiana University Press provides an excellent home for our journal in its expert, professional handling of the publishing and managing the membership lists.

Also note the great job done by Mary Ann Fay as editor of the AMEWS Online Newsletter another means of having our words heard. I encourage the membership to get more involved in the committees and to send me their suggestions and intentions to join any of our standing committees or propose new ones. In addition to all these signs of growth we also strive to grow in number and hope to expand the membership with more vigorous campaigns to attract educators and scholars - 2007-2008 should be a year of growth and achievements for AMEWS. Our membership is spread all over the globe and our vision, activities and programs should continue to reach out to all with our common interests and views and hopefully this will be reflected in our MESA panels and through our web-page and possible discussions on the web by attracting more overseas memberships.

On the personal front, my own work studies women in the Arabian Gulf and their agency in the development of social history in the region, particularly at this historical juncture of empire building. I hope my contribution will bring in and add to the growing field of Gulf study and women within it. The following website will direct you to the membership forms and subscription to the journal:

http://www.iupress.indiana.edu/catalog.php?cPath=519 1029

Again thanks to all of you and keep up the good work, it is through our joined efforts that we can make a difference,

May Seikaly
March 25, 2007