Have you heard of the The Lord Ruthven Assembly? The group’s been around since 1988. It is “a scholarly organization dedicated to the serious pursuit of scholarship on and research of the vampire/revenant figure in a variety of disciplines.” (Melton 1999, 431).
As you may have guessed, its name is taken from Lord Ruthven, the vampire antagonist in John Polidori’s “The Vampyre” (1819).
Every year, it holds meetings during the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts and hands out the Lord Ruthven Award in recognition for “a deserving work in vampire fiction or scholarship” (“The Lord Ruthven Assembly” n.d.)—but also awardsfiction, too.
A Wikipedia entry for the group’s awards was recently created by Mika Loponen. This year’s winners were Maria Lindgren Leavenworth and Malin Isaksson’s Fanged Fan Fiction: Variations on Twilight, True Blood and The Vampire Diaries (non-fiction) and Joe Hill’s NOS4A2 (fiction). To see a list of other Lord Ruthven Award winners, click here.
The Lord Ruthven Assembly has a Facebook group, which is admined by Dale K. Hanes—and now, someone else, too:
If you’re interested in hobnobbing with experts in the field, discussing vampires and keeping up to date with the LRA’s going-ons, come join us. We’d love to see you there.
References
“The Lord Ruthven Assembly.” n.d. The Lord Ruthven Assembly. Accessed April 6, 2014. http://home.earthlink.net/~lt._dahlquist/lordruthven.htm.
“Lord Ruthven Award.” 2014. Wikipedia. Last modified April 5, 2014 at 13:03. Accessed April 6, 2014. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Ruthven_Award.
Melton, J. Gordon. 1999. The Vampire Book: The Encyclopedia of the Undead. 2nd ed. Detroit: Visible Ink Press. 431–2.
The Vampirologist 
Way to go Anthony! I think this is an ideal role that is tailored to your skills, background and experience. You will do wonderfully. 🙂
Thank you for your kind words, Erin. Onward and upward! 😀