Each year SHARP holds an annual conference that brings scholars together for stimulating discussions of an enormously wide range of issues related to the history of authorship, reading and publishing. Panels allow scholars to learn about the newest research in their fields, while keynotes bring the SHARP community together across interests and periods.
SHARP conferences are run locally, making each one unique not only in location but also in thematic content. Questions about individual conferences should be addressed to the organizers identified here or on that conference’s website.
Interested in hosting a future conference? Contact Rachel Noorda, Director of Conferences (conferences@ sharpweb.org)
SHARP 2025, July 7–11
The 2025 SHARP conference, “Value and Community,” will be held at the University of Rochester, New York, organized by the University of Rochester and the Rochester Institute of Technology. The in-person conference will run from July 7-11, 2025. More information will be shared on their SHARP 2025 website.
Travel Grants
Limited travel grants are available for students, independent scholars or other researchers lacking the necessary funding to travel to the conference location. Travel grants are awarded by the organizers of the individual conferences in collaboration with the treasurer.
Past Conferences
- 2024: “Global Book Cultures: Materialities, Collaborations, Access” (Reading, UK)
- 2023: “Affordances and Interfaces: Textual Interaction Past, Present and Future” (online; hosted by the Centre of the Book at the University of Otago)
- 2022: “The Power of the Written Word” (Amsterdam)
- 2021: “Moving Texts: From Discovery to Delivery” (online; hosted by the Chair of Book studies at the University of Münster)
- 2020: “The Power of the Written Word” was postponed due to COVID-19 and was held in 2022. In lieu of an annual conference, SHARP held “SHARP in Focus,” a week of virtual events.
- 2019: “Indigeneity, Nationhood, and Migrations of the Book” (Amherst, Massachusetts)
- 2018: “From First to Last: Texts, Creators, Readers, Agents” (Sydney)
- 2017: “Technologies of the Book” (Victoria, British Columbia)
- 2016: “Les langues du livre / Languages of the Book” (Paris)
- 2015: “The Generation and Regeneration of Books” (Montreal)
- 2014: “Religions of the Book” (Antwerp)
- 2013: “Geographies of the Book” (Philadelphia)
- 2012: “The Battle for Books” (Dublin)
- 2011: “The Book in Art & Science” (Washington, DC)
- 2010: “Book Culture from Below” (Helsinki)
- 2009: “Tradition & Innovation” (Toronto)
- 2008: [program] (Oxford)
- 2007: “Open the Book, Open the Mind” (Minneapolis)
- 2006: “Trading Books–Trading Ideas” (The Hague and Leiden)
- 2005: “Navigating Texts and Contexts” (Halifax, Nova Scotia)
- 2004: [program] (Lyon)
- 2003: [program] (Claremont, California)
- 2002: [program via Wayback Machine] (London)
- 2001: [program] (Richmond and Williamsburg, Virginia)
- 2000: “International Gutenberg Conference” (Mainz)
- 1999: “SHARP 99” (Madison, Wisconsin)
- 1998: “SHARP 98“ (Vancouver)
- 1997: [program] (Cambridge, England)
- 1996: [program] (Worcester, Massachusetts)
- 1995: [program] (Edinburgh)
- 1994: [program] (Washington, DC)
- 1993: [program] (New York City)