Reflections on 20 years of the ACL
Donald E. Walker · 1982
AnnualMeeting represents our 20th anniversary.We did, Of course, change our name to the Association for Computational Linguistics in 1968, but that did not affect the continuity of the organization.The date of this panel, 17 June, misses the real anniversary by four days, but no matter; the occasion still allows us to reflect on where we have been and where we are going.I seem to be sensitive to opportunities for celebrations.In looking through my AMTCL/ACL correspondence over the years, I came across a copy of a memo sent to Bob Simmons and Hood Roberts during our lOth anniversary year, recommending that something in commemoration might be appropriate.I cannot identify anything in the program of that meeting or in my notes about it that suggests they took me seriously then, but that reflects the critical difference between volunteering a recommendation and Just plain volunteerlngl