Hello, American Studies and Austin community!It is our very great pleasure to introduce you to AMS :: ATX, a blog dedicated to representing the many activities and interests of the department of American Studies at The University of Texas at Austin. This is a place where you can find department and Austin-area news and events, student and faculty research updates, informal rants and recommendations, as well as opportunities for presenting, publishing, and funding this thing called the academic life.Together with the department's Twitter feed, this blog exists to serve the AMS community in Austin by acting as a hub for up-to-date information on events and opportunities at UT and beyond. It is also a space for students and faculty to talk about their work in a more casual way than the lecture hall, seminar table, research paper, and academic conference usually allow.What this means is simple: we want to hear from you! Stumble across a fascinating bit of American culture in your research? Hosting an event on or off campus? Attending a conference or other academic event? Tell us about it so we can share our experience and get the word out about the wide-ranging and wonderful things we do as American Studies scholars.