From 21-23 April, hundreds of my colleagues from around the world converged on the Intercontinental on the Plaza in Kansas City, MO, for the American Research Center in Egypt’s annual conference. Without a doubt, Kansas City has never been visited by so many Egyptologists. Prior to the arrival of ARCE, I wrote an article for their e-newsletter describing sites of interest in the KC Metro area as well as highlighting my Egyptology courses at Johnson County Community College: http://www.arce.org/news/2017/03/u205/egyptomania-takes-root-in-kansas-city. Several of my students joined ARCE prior to the conference and joined me for three days of “Egyptological Boot Camp”– four salons rotating a new talk every half hour; two served as official ARCE volunteers– directing traffic and providing general assistance. Perhaps more grueling than the pace was the necessity of choosing only one of the four offerings for each time slot. Many of us highlighted printouts to use as road maps: ARCE_session_schedule_2017__Mar16.
Let’s get this conference started!
Friday morning started early with booksellers and conference registration.
Book stalls a-plenty!
Talks began at 8:30am and continued until the 10:30am coffee/tea break.
Coffee/tea break
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art docent and Egyptology student, Rozanne Klinzing, held “office hours” at ARCE’s information table.
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art docent Rozanne Klinzing at the ARCE Info booth
Friday afternoon was capped off with the General Members’ Meeting followed by a reception at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. I was thrilled that so many Egyptologists were introduced to the Egyptian collection I had been championing locally. Unfortunately, the Nelson-Atkins does not have a catalog of the Egyptian collection available in the gift shop; this is a project that would be of great interest to scholars.
Kirkwood Hall reception
Egyptologists mingling in the Egyptian Galleries
Saturday morning talks began at 8:30am and continued through 11 sessions.
Josef’s Wegner’s talk
Saturday night ended in a Members’ dinner during which the awards for best paper and best poster were awarded.
Best Paper
1. Heba Abdelsalam (Middle Tennessee State University): Implementing Public History Methods in Egyptology: Case Study at Mallawi Museum in Minya
2. Jen Thum (Brown University): Adventures in Living-Rock Stelae
3. Brendan Hainline (University of Chicago): Terminology of the Tomb in the Pyramid Texts as a Criterion for Dating
Best Poster
1. Christian Casey (Brown University): Digital Demotic: New Tools and Methods
Winning poster by Brown student Christian Casey
2. Laurel Hackley (Brown University): The Cowrie Shell as a Protective Eye
3. Martin Uildriks (Brown University): Breaking Down the Walls: Contextualizing the Cities Palette
Sunday had seven sessions, and the conference concluded with Dr. Pierre Tallet’s lecture on Khufu’s harbor, held at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.
Pierre Tallet’s lecture
Next year in Tucson!
