AFRICA-RELATED CONFERENCES

 

 

1ST INTERNATIONALCONFERENCE ON AFRICAN CULTURE AND DEVELOPMENT, KUMASI-GHANA, APRIL 21-26, 2008.

This conference is designed to draw attention to the missing link in the
futile attempts to develop the African continent - culture. This is
clearly illustrated in the 1995 report of the World Commission on
Culture and Development: "Development divorced from its human or
cultural context is growth without a soul. Economic development in its
full flowering is a part of a people's culture". The purpose of this
conference is to provide a platform for the generation, interaction and
refinement of ideas. As an advocacy body, the ICACD Secretariat aims to push for the conclusions drawn at ICACD 2008 and subsequent programmes into the framework of policy-making on the African continent. For more
information, see http://www.icacd.ccoghana.org/


FROM AFRICA TO THE BALKANS, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY,
APRIL 24-25, 2008.


The Italian Academy at Columbia University will host an international
conference on April 24 and 25, 2008, aiming at initiating a new, integrated approach to the history of fascist Italy's expansionism, in relation to Mediterranean and African studies. Pannels include: Theories and Practices of Violence; Social Behavior and Cultural Hybridization; Material Culture; The Built Environment: Formulations of Modern Spaces. We invite proposals from the fields of history, art and architectural history, anthropology, sociology, political science, cultural studies and the museum studies. Organizers: Jennie Hirsh, assistant professor of Modern and Contemporary Art, Maryland Institute College of Art; and Lidia Santarelli, assistant professor/faculty fellow of European and Mediterranean Studies, New York University. Contact e-mail: fromafricatothebalkans@gmail.com

THE AMERICAN COMPARATIVE LITERATURE ASSOCIATION ANNUAL MEETING, APRIL 24-27, 2008 IN LONG BEACH, CALIFORNIA. SEMINAR: NOMADISM, HUMAN RIGHTS, AND THE REFUGEE NARRATIVE

An invitation for paper proposals for a seminar of 8-12 presenters at
the ACLA, the plan being to turn the the proceedings of the conference
into a publication. Refugee narratives embrace a range of
storytellingfrom those which recount the lives of internally displaced
populations and people fleeing the nation to those that relate the
predicament of people rendered stateless when territories are
transferred as regimes collapse. As the trope of flight defines these
narratives of displacement, migrancy, and temporary shelters, the
paradigm of the nation-state along with its attendant category of
citizenship come to a crisis, and the human rights claims of the
homeless are foregrounded. For questions about the panel, please contact
the seminar organizer: Basuli Deb (Basuli.Deb_at_quinnipiac.edu). For
submitting paper proposals and for more information on the conference,
please visit the official conference website at
http://www.acla.org/acla2008/.

ASSOCIATION FOR THE STUDY OF THE MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA ANNUAL CONFERENCE, APRIL 24-26, 2008, WASHINGTON, DC

The Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa Annual
Conference--a new, inter-disciplinary academic association that promotes
the highest standards of research and teaching in the fields of Middle
Eastern studies, African studies and their related disciplines--invites
scholars to attend our annual conference set for April 24-26, 2008 at
the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, D.C. The conference is
entitled: The Evolution of Islamic Politics, Philosophy, and Culture in
the Middle East and Africa: From Traditional Limits to Modern Extremes.
It will feature a variety of panels that deal with this subject and a
keynote speech from ASMEAs Chairman, Professor Bernard Lewis of
Princeton University. Professor Lewis will speak to conference attendees
about the future of the Middle East. To register or obtain more
information on ASMEAs conference, please visit: www.asmeascholars.org.

CONFERENCE ON RELIGION & RELIGIOUS IDENTITIES IN AFRICA AND THE AFRICAN DIASPORA. KALAMAZOO, MICHIGAN, MAY 22-25, 2008. DEADLINE: APRIL 15, 2008.

Religious beliefs and identities have among other things shaped the
nature of human experience in Africa and the African Diaspora. It is
also a known fact that religious beliefs and identities have influenced
human behavior in both religious and non-religious ways in different
societies. These influences have included positive and negative
consequences in the ordering of society in Africa and the African
Diaspora. Conference participants are encouraged to submit abstracts
(300 words at most) on any aspect of the broad themes identified above.
The deadline for submitting paper proposals is April 15, 2008. All
abstracts should include title, the author's name, institutional
affiliation, address, telephone number, and e-mail address. Please
submit all abstracts by e-mail to: Onaiwu W. Ogbomo, Western Michigan
University
, onaiwu.ogbomo@wmich.edu. For more information, visit
http://www.wmich.edu/blackamericanastudies/conferences.htm.

WRITING AFRICAN HISTORIES, UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD, JUNE 9, 2008.

Following successful events in 2006 and 2007, postgraduate students in
Imperial and International history at the University of Sheffield are
holding their annual conference on the theme of Writing African
Histories. Professor Frederick Cooper (New York University) will give
the keynote address. Visit the website at
http://www.imperialhistory.group.shef.ac.uk

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON POLITICAL ECONOMIES OF DISPLACEMENT IN POST-2000 ZIMBABWE. WITS UNIVERSITY CAMPUS, JOHANNESBURG, 9-11 JUNE 2008.

This conference, to be held at Wits Campus in Johannesburg from 9-11
June 2008, emerges from an ongoing collaborative research project
initiated in late 2006 by the Nordic Africa Institute entitled Political
Economies of Displacement in Post-2000 Zimbabwe. The project links
researchers located within and outside Zimbabwe who share an active
interest in mapping the complex dynamics of change related to the
crises, uncertainties and multiple displacements of contemporary
Zimbabwe and their effects on neighbouring states and diasporas further
afield. The Conference seeks especially (but not only) empirically
grounded contributions from researchers from different disciplines,
whose work on post-2000 Zimbabwe (yet with linkages to other times and
places), helps to address some of these issues. For further queries,
please contact: Amanda Hammar (amanda.hammar@nai.uu.se) or Tania Berger
(tania.berger@nai.uu.se) at the Nordic Africa Institute, and Loren
Landau (Loren.Landau@wits.ac.za) at the Forced Migration Studies
Programme at Wits University.

EMERGING PERSPECTIVES ON CHILDREN IN MIGRATORY CIRCUMSTANCES, DREXEL UNIVERSITY, JUNE 20-21, 2008.

The Working Group on Childhood and Migration (see
http://globalchild.rutgers.edu/) will hold our first conference June 20,
21 of 2008 at Drexel University in downtown Philadelphia. The conference
them is Emerging Perspectives on Children in Migratory Circumstances.
At this inaugural conference, we welcome researchers and policy
advocates from all disciplines and all areas of the world whose work
focuses on the ways that increased migration affects children and the
cultural, legal, educational, medical, and psychological perception of
childhood.

AEGIS CORTONA SUMMER SCHOOL IN AFRICAN STUDIES: BORDERS AND BORDER-CROSSINGS IN AFRICA, CORTONA, TUSCANY, 16-22 JUNE 2008.

This is to announce that a summer school designed for advanced Ph.D.
students in African Studies (social sciences and humanities) aiming to
take part in the Third AEGIS European Conference of African Studies
(ECAS 3, Leipzig, July 2009) will be held in Italy. The 2008 summer
school will focus on Borders and Border-Crossings in Africa. It will be
sponsored by AEGIS-Naples in collaboration with the AEGIS Centres of
Bayreuth, Edinburgh, and Leiden. The aim of the summer school is: a) to
bring together advanced Ph.D. students and teaching staff from AEGIS
Centres in order to exchange field and research experience; b) to
improve the students ability to prepare and present their research in
an international context; c) to promote graduate training within AEGIS
and stimulate African-European inter-university cooperation. Both
students and senior researchers are expected to present papers on their
current research. The emphasis will be on field methodology and
comparative research results, both in writing and the oral presentation.
Applicants will be selected on the basis of their research outline and
their ability to engage with wider issues in African Studies today.
Priority will be given to students and researchers with recent field
experience and fresh research results. Application by research students
coming from African Universities is encouraged; subsidies for the
participation of a limited number of successful applicants are being
sought for. For more information, see www.aegis-eu.org

THE LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT STUDIES IN SUB-SAHARA AFRICA 2008 CONFERENCE, ACCRA, GHANA JULY 7-9, 2008.

For more information, please see
http://www.crossculturalcentre.homestead.com/LMSSSA2008.html

AFRICAN STUDIES ASSOCIATION OF THE UK BIENNIAL CONFERENCE, UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL LANCASHIRE, PRESTON, 11-13 SEPTEMBER 2008.

The conference aims to bring together Africanists from all over the
world and from various disciplines to discuss the past and current
developments in Africa and African Studies. For more information, visit
the ASAUK websites: www.asauk.net.

EMPIRE, SLAVE TRADE AND SLAVERY: REBUILDING CIVIL SOCIETY IN SIERRA LEONE. PAST AND PRESENT. WISE - WILBERFORCE INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF SLAVERY AND EMANCIPATION, UNIVERSITY OF HULL, SEPTEMBER 26-28, 2008

In 1808, two hundred years ago, Sierra Leone became a British Crown
colony. The bicentennial presents the opportunity to re-examine the
history of Sierra Leone. The conference will bring together academics
from different disciplines, museum professionals, archivists, policy
makers concerned with contemporary issues, and individuals interested in
human rights and the reconstruction of modern day Sierra Leone. This
conference will mark the bicentenary of the establishment of Sierra
Leone
as a British Crown colony in 1808. All participants will be
required to pay a registration fee and to arrange their own
accommodation and travel. Information on local hotel accommodation can
be arranged through the Hull Conference Bureau; details to be supplied
upon registration. An edited collection of papers presented at the
conference will be published. Contact Info: Jane Ellison, Conference
Manager, WISE (Wilberforce Institute for the study of Slavery and
Emancipation), University of Hull, Oriel Chambers 27 High Street, Hull,
HU1 1NE
, T: 01482 305182. F: 01482 305184. Email: j.ellison@hull.ac.uk.
Visit the website at http://www.hull.ac.uk/wise

AFRICAN ATHENA: BLACK ATHENA 20 YEARS ON, UNIVERSITY OF WARICK, COVENTRY, UK, NOVEMBER 6-8, 2008. DEADLINE: MARCH 31, 2008.

African Athena was Bernals original title for Black Athena, his
infamous work that has confronted the modern academy with some of the
most challenging questions it has faced over the last twenty years. This
interdisciplinary conference seeks neither to demonize nor to lionize
Bernals book, but to open dialogue on the issues it has posed: can a
myth of Afrocentrism ever be a useful narrative in contemporary culture?
This is a call for papers from scholars of African Studies, Black
British Studies, African American Studies, of South Asia, of the Middle
East
, of classicists, philologists, anthropologists, sociologists, and
any intellectual beyond these borders. Send proposals of up to 500 words
for papers by March 31, 2008 to Dr. Daniel Orrells, Department of
Classics, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL. Email:
D.Orrells@warwick.ac.uk.

MODERN LANGUAGE ASSOCIATION CONVENTION, 27-30 DECEMBER 2008 SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA, "NARRATING CONFLICT IN POST-INDEPENDENCE AFRICAN LITERATURE.

The sectarian conflicts and civil wars which recur across the African
continent are a common, though under-explored concern of
post-independence African literature. Authors experiment with form,
language, content, and other rhetorical strategies in order to
adequately represent the complex and multivalent nature of these
conflicts. Their efforts consequently broaden our understanding of armed
struggle in Africa and the texts they engender. We invite proposals for
a panel organized in conjunction with the Society for the Study of
Narrative Literature which concern the narration of conflict in
post-independence African literature, particularly comparative analyses
and those focusing on texts which have not yet received notable critical
attention.

"HIERARCHY AND POWER IN THE HISTORY OF CIVILIZATIONS", RUSSIAN STATE UNIVERSITY, MOSCOW, RUSSIA, JUNE 16-19, 2009.

Center for Civilizational and Regional Studies of the Institute for
African Studies under the Russian Academy of Sciences in co-operation
with the School of History, Political Science and Law of the Russian
State University for the Humanities is organizing in Moscow on June
16-19, 2009 the Fifth International Conference "HIERARCHY AND POWER IN
THE HISTORY OF CIVILIZATIONS". The aim of the Conference, like that of
the four previous ones, is to bring together the researchers doing the
respective problematics in the whole variety of its contexts, within the
framework of different academic schools and traditions from the
positions of a wide range of disciplines: social anthropology,
archaeology, history, political science, sociology, philosophy,
psychology, etc. The working languages of the Conference are Russian and
English. The Organizing Committee will be glad to consider any panel
proposals (within 500 words in any of the Conference working languages)
which will be received by February 1, 2008. All the correspondence
should be sent for the Conference Secretaries, Dr. Oleg I. Kavykin and
Ms. Anastasia A. Banschikova, preferably by e-mail
(conf2009@conf2009.ru), or either by fax (+ 7 495 202 0786), or by
ordinary mail (Center for Civilizational and Regional Studies, Institute
for African Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, 30/1 Spiridonovka St.,
123001 Moscow, Russia). The telephone number is: + 7 495 291 4119.