The Seminar is now accepting proposals for papers, presentations, and workshops on the maritime history of New England and adjacent areas of New York and Canada from the seventeenth through the early twentieth century. The topic explores how the region remembered its maritime past. Proposals are sought for papers on shipbuilding, fishing and whaling, maritime art and literature, the coastal trade, prize-taking and piracy, shore leave, and charitable associations such as seamen's aid societies. Other subjects might include inland ports and rivers, the global trade, underwater archaeology, maritime ecologies and sustenance, food, speech, work songs, maritime laborers at sea and in shore-side industries, the sea's appeal to rural people and vacationers, and clothing (sailors' slops, for example). The conference is also interested in maritime law, the command structure, and the appeal of maritime life to people of diverse origins such as Cape Verdeans, escaped slaves, and Native Americans. We are also interested in papers on the evolution of maritime heritage, including the histories of maritime museums as well as maritime antiques in New England historical collections. 

The Seminar encourages papers that reflect original research, especially those based on primary or underused resources such as material culture, letters and diaries, vital records, federal and state censuses, naturalization records, as well as newspapers, portraits, prints and photographs, business and banking records, recollections, and autobiographies.

New England at Sea: Maritime Memory and Material Culture will consist of approximately seventeen lectures of twenty minutes each, with related tours and workshops. Professional development points will be available for public school teachers. Selected papers will appear as the 2016 Annual Proceedings of the Dublin Seminar to be published about eighteen months after the conference.