Ceci est un thème de conférence
(This is a conference theme)
(This is a play off The Treachery of Images)

For over 40 years, NASSS has held an annual conference, and except for the very first conference in 1980, it has had a conference theme. It’s not in the bylaws or constitution that NASSS must have a conference theme, but it does appear in the curated, helpful, and unofficial policies and procedures manual. Over those 40+ years, the President-Elect worked with the conference planning committee to determine the conference theme. As we’ve come to expect, in proper sociological representational fashion, for 40+ years NASSS has been engaging in a lot of parentheses, forward slashes, and colons: (Re)producing / (re)making: And (re)envisioning. Playing the serious business of language games, the NASSS conference can be viewed as a site for heterotopias bursting with neologisms. Varying paradigms, theoretical frameworks, methodological designs and tools, the NASSS conference is open for sociological business. Oops, a neoliberal idiom. It’s okay to have a little chuckle--comfort for the sociology of sport soul engaged in critical work.

Taking stock, has NASSS lived up to its purpose? We quote at length:

Constitution of the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport
ARTICLE II. PURPOSE
Section 1:
The North American Society for the Sociology of Sport is organized exclusively for educational purposes to promote, stimulate, and encourage the sociological study of play, games, and sport, to support and cooperate with local, national and international organizations having the same purposes, and to organize and arrange meetings and issue publications concerning the purpose of the Society.
Section 2:
The Society shall recognize and represent all sociological paradigms for the study of play, games, and sport and will promote scholarly activity and exchange among these alternatives paradigms and perspectives.

What does it take to stretch and strive for this mission: to create the roux that serves up a conference climate where all members and would-be members feel included, and truly feel empowered to transform their selves, sessions, the sociology of sport, and ambitiously, society?

A radically open conference theme, swinging to the tune of scholarship, service, and structure.
● Scholarship--broadly but clearly centered on the sociology of play, games, and sport, including the body and physical cultural studies, inclusive of all paradigms and perspectives. Limited guardrails on the path to curiosity and creation.
● Service--to NASSS, each other, and community; service to our collective mission and its flourishment; service to our committees, members, and operations (e.g., this conference, SSJ, take a student to lunch, +1 initiative); and service to address the needs of others and the needs of NASSS.
● Structure--our recent critical turn throughout the sociology of sport often results in breaking down existing structures, without a complementary restructuring to scaffold our revisioning. Can your sessions, your involvement in NASSS, modify or re(envision) new structures that foster our mission and the sociology of sport? Such is one impetus for a radically open conference theme, along with a new session option.

Here’s the assignment. It’s time to look inward at NASSS, our scholarship, service, and structure, while simultaneously doing public sociology of sport. These subthemes and the local connection to New Orleans will be integrated throughout the conference and planning for NASSS as a whole. For now, go for it! Create the session you would like to see. Present or perform like you want. Lean into improvisation like the great African American jazz birthed from the unique culture of New Orleans. Submit that idea that’s been simmering throughout you like some good ol’ N’awlins gumbo and know that we are all there to serve one another.

“Laissez les bons temps!” encouraged the conference planning committee.
“Oui, cher,” they replied, understanding the assignment.