LAUSR

2021 conference virtually. Featuring prerecorded oral and poster presentations along with live panels and discussion sessions for symposia held during the January meeting, the 2021 SHA virtual conference changed the way participants “conferenced.” The virtual format allowed participants to view all of the presentations and posters of interest, to engage in meaningful dialogue and dive deeper into discussions with presenters than a typical 15 min. Q&A period can accommodate, and facilitated more international participation, especially for students who could not afford the travel costs associated with traditional inperson attendance. The 2021 SHA virtual conference provided new opportunities, including some that were unexpected. The post-conference call for underwater papers for the 2021 ACUA Proceedings yielded too few submittals to justify the cost of publishing the usual stand-alone bound volume. Instead of canceling the Proceedings, Annalies Corbin, the ACUA editor, contacted Kathryn Sampeck, editor of SHA’s Historical Archaeology journal, to inquire whether the ACUA Proceedings papers could be published as a special section in an upcoming issue of the journal. Kathryn welcomed the ACUA underwater papers with open arms and provided the authors with an exciting opportunity to share their research with the wider SHA membership. We at ACUA are grateful for everyone’s efforts to accommodate the ACUA Underwater Archaeology Proceedings under such unprecedented circumstances. For more than 60 years, the Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology (ACUA)—beginning with its initial formation as the Council on Underwater Archaeology in 1959—has served as an international advisory body providing guidance on issues related to maritime, nautical, and underwater archaeology. Research related to these topics is presented at the Society for Historical Archaeology’s (SHA) annual conference on historical and underwater archaeology. The ACUA publishes the Underwater Archaeology Proceedings, featuring papers focusing on this discipline that were presented at the SHA conference. For decades, the ACUA Proceedings has served as a reliable venue for disseminating the latest information on underwater archaeological methods and theory, and best management practices, and provides a valuable opportunity for students to publish their original research. In 2020, the global COVID-19 pandemic forced the SHA Board to make a tough decision about the January 2021 conference: pivot to an entirely virtual format or cancel the annual conference altogether, as other scientific and professional societies opted. Faced with this dilemma, the board ultimately decided to stay the course and hold the January