Call for Papers: Annual Conference: Corpses: Search and Identification in post-Genocide and Mass Violence Contexts
Corpses: Search and Identification in post-Genocide and Mass Violence Contexts 2nd Annual & International Conference of the Research Programme CORPSES OF MASS VIOLENCE AND GENOCIDE Conference to be held at the University of Manchester, UK on 9 – 11 September 2013
Following a first conference in Paris in September 2012 focusing on the treatment of corpses in the phase of destruction (see here), this second conference of the research programme «Corpses of mass violence and genocide» aims to explore another severe manipulation of bodies after the killings: addressing their search and identification.
The beginning of the 21st Century has already experienced many occurrences of this phenomenon, be it the opening of mass graves from the Spanish Civil War, the identification of corpses by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, the return of human remains from the Gulag and even the localisation of sites of Jewish massacres from the Holocaust in Eastern Europe. Whether bodies have been destroyed through industrial processes, mutilated, buried individually or collectively or even reburied in secondary or tertiary sites, the search and identification of these victims’ remains are undertaken in various circumstances and raise a range of questions.
The organisers are therefore calling for papers dealing with the search and recovery of bodies in the context of mass crimes. The conference will focus in particular on the twentieth century. Studies may deal with any geographical area and should focus on the methods and processes for identification, as well as the motivations and interests behind these pursuits, taking an instrumental perspective which promises to open up new avenues of research.
A wide range of themes and approaches are expected to be dealt with, and the conference organisers would particularly welcome papers dealing with the following aspects:
1. On actors: who exhume and identify victims of genocide? How is their legitimacy built?
2. On techniques: how do exhumations occur? Exhumations can be complicated, time consuming and expensive. Technologies and research should therefore be considered as well as issues of innovation, knowledge transfer and standardisation
3. On motivations: what do those exhumations and displacement of human remains tell us about NGOs, international organisations and societies themselves that endeavor the return of corpses?
4. Forensic approaches: constraints on identification and forensic archaeology
5. The symbolic and legal status of identified corpses: their value and implications, including gender issues
6. Anthropological or religious approaches to human remains: bones, ashes, hair, bodily fluids
Proposals must be no longer than 6000 characters, accompanied by a detailed biography and should be sent either in French or in English by 15 March 2013 to the following email: l.radford@corpsesofmassviolence.eu.
Notification of the acceptance of proposals will be sent around 15 April 2013. Final papers should be sent no later than 1 September to be included in the publication resulting from the conference. Funds are available to cover some of the transport and accommodation costs for delegates delivering papers. The conference will be conducted in English, with translations available.
Call for Papers: THE FUTURE OF THE PAST: REPRESENTING THE HOLOCAUST, GENOCIDE, AND MASS TRAUMA IN THE 21ST CENTURY
The inaugural cross-institutional and inter-disciplinary conference convened by Deakin University and the Jewish Holocaust Centre, to be held in Melbourne, Australia, will be held on 6-8 July, 2014 in Deakin University and the Jewish Holocaust Centre, Melbourne.
‘Questions about the ethics of representation are gaining urgency at a time when ever more diverse forms of Holocaust representation are emerging worldwide…’
—Libby Saxton, Haunted Images: Film, Ethics, Testimony and the Holocaust
The proliferation of depictions of the Holocaust and other traumatic events in popular culture and elsewhere demands continued attention to the means by which complex human experiences are communicated to and negotiated by contemporary audiences. From Anne Rothe’s Popular Trauma Culture to Alvin H. Rosenfeld’s The End of the Holocaust, recent scholarship has engaged with the ethics of different representational strategies—strategies that become progressively diverse with expanding technological innovations. Yet many questions remain unanswered. This conference aims to expose and explore key issues relating to the Holocaust, genocide and mass trauma, contributing to ongoing debates over historical and cultural representation. Paper proposals might address, but are not limited to, the following topics:
● The limitations and possibilities of digital media in depicting traumatic pasts
● New research in Holocaust and genocide film, literature, art, and testimony
● The future of remembering traumatic events in monuments and museums
● Mediating gender, sexual violence, and trauma
● The politics of identification and reception in representations of perpetrators
● The appropriation of the Holocaust as a metaphor for contemporary traumas
● Mediating trauma in the now via mobile screens and instant uploads
● Pedagogical uses of genocide representations in and out of the classroom
Please submit a 200 word abstract and short biographical statement for paper proposals to Adam Brown abrown@deakin.edu.au and Danielle Christmas dchris20@uic.eduby 31 October 2013. Panel proposals will also be accepted, which should include a brief 200 word outline of the panel as a whole followed by individual abstracts and bios. ‘Lightning sessions’ (of 5 minute presentations with discussion) will be available for students who do not wish to present a full paper.
Please identify this preference and submit a 100-150 word abstract consisting of a short summary of research, a specific case-study, or a methodological problem. A number of travel/accommodation bursaries will be available–please see the conference website for details.
A selection of papers from the conference will be published as a special issue of a peer-reviewed journal. Full details of the conference are available at:
Call for Papers: Memory and Culture
The 7th Cultural Studies Symposium on Memory and Culture jointly organized by the Turkish Cultural Studies Association and Bilkent University, Department of Political Science and Department of Architecture, will be held on September 5-7, 2013 in Ankara, Turkey.
The International Cultural Studies Symposia that are organized every two years have been contributing to cultural studies and bringing together researchers who work in this area.
The 7th Cultural Studies Symposium on Memory and Culture jointly organized by the Turkish Cultural Studies Association and Bilkent University, Department of Political Science and Department of Architecture, will be held on September 5-7, 2013 in Ankara, Turkey. The International Cultural Studies Symposia that are organized every two years have been contributing to cultural studies and bringing together researchers who work in this area. Since the first meeting in Kemer, Antalya (2001), the Symposia have been organized, jointly, in Van with Yuzuncu Yil University (2003), in Istanbul with Koç University (2005), in Şile with Isik University (2007), in Zonguldak with Karaelmas University (2009), in İstanbul with Kadir Has University (2011).
The purpose of this symposium is to question existing paradigms in topics that bring together the concepts of “memory” and “culture”; it aims to present critical and analytical approaches and to explore new theoretical and methodological paradigms in cultural studies. It adopts an inter- and multi-disciplinary perspective that includes such disciplines as sociology, anthropology, psychology, political science, urban studies, architecture, design, and literature; it also takes a gender perspective. Submissions, both domestic and international, are invited on the following sub-themes. The conference is open to a variety of themes beyond the suggested ones as long as they deal with memory and culture.
Memory is about the retreat to consciousness of experiences, accompanied by awareness that it has happened somewhere sometime. Culture is its concrete form; the term goes beyond its everyday connotation with art, civilization and development; it is used in the anthropological sense referring to a “way of life.”
The relationship between memory and identity is an important one. The way the individual remembers his/her own or family’s past determines to a significant degree what s/he is. This is “discovering” oneself in a particular way.
The relationship between memory and space is also important. We remember everything with its location in space. But this can happen only in relation to social frameworks, as M. Halbwachs puts it. Social frameworks can be broadly classified as the family, religious / ethnic groups and social classes. They are the instruments used to reconstruct an image of the past which is in accord with the dominant ideas of the society in a particular epoch. Therefore, memory is selective.
Memory is also a question of social and political power. What we remember depends upon the context and the group(s) that we are part of. Accordingly, the depth and contour of our collective memory reflect also the competitive positions of power groups. Political power usually has the tendency of reconstructing collective memory to reproduce its legitimacy.
Today the interest in the past and consequently in the collective memory has intensified. In the processes of globalization, ethnic groups’ claims of recognition in post-modern societies have brought the need for ethnic groups to construct their past and hence their collective memory. The collective memory written during the construction of the nation state as a political project is today questioned and challenged; and the past, which is forgotten or rendered forgotten, is today brought to public attention, creating awareness about new collective identities. This once again turns collective memory into a political project, this time of ethnic groups.
As migration movements increase in our globalizing world, migrants tend to construct their identities in their new societies using their constructed collective memory, thus ending up keeping their identities based on their places of origin, i.e., not forgetting who they originally are.
The fact that cities have become important means of accumulation of capital in the neoliberal economy has sharpened the competition among cities to attract investment and tourism; and in the endeavor to create unique identities for the cities, the concepts of cultural heritage and nostalgia have gained much popularity. Thus, cities turn into sites of consumption as their pasts are constructed in particular ways to create special city images and identities. Moreover, the increased environmental problems render important the collective memory constructed about the issues of nature and disaster.
In the framework given above, the sub-titles about Memory and Culture can be as the following, which can be differentiated according to personal, group and social memory:
Identity and memory (Family and memory; Biographical and autobiographical studies; Migration, diaspora and memory);
Space and memory (Memory and culture in architecture; City, urbanization and memory; Gecekondu (squatter housing), village, city, neighborhood, nature in collective memory);
Politics, political power and memory (Memory and culture in modernity / modernization/ modernism; Construction of memory as a political project; Nationalism and memory; Ethnic identity and memory; Minorities and memory; Political trauma and memory);
Memory and culture in everyday life (Traditions, memory and culture; Rituals, memory and culture; Bodily practices, memory and culture; Recreation, memory and culture; Disasters and memory; Nostalgia and memory);
Social institutions / Cultural products and memory (Art / Literature, memory and culture; Language, memory and culture; Religion, memory and culture; Media and memory; Internet and virtual memory);
Proposals to be submitted for the Symposium may be in the form of (a) individual paper presentations, (b) pre-organized panels consisting of 3 to 4 individual presentations, (c) poster sessions, and (d) exhibitions. Abstracts of individual papers should be submitted not to exceed 200 words, written in Times Roman 12-point font, single spaced. Also expected are five keywords, as well as a short CV and contact address. Proposals for panels should include individual abstracts as well as an abstract for the overall panel, and CVs of Chairs and Discussants. Proposals for poster sessions and exhibitions should also include CVs and contact addresses.
Please send your proposals to semp2013@kulturad.org not later than 15 December 2012. The results will be announced by 31 January 2013. You may refer to the same e-mail address for inquiries.
Abstracts will be published; and full papers will be distributed during the symposium as CDs. Selected articles will be published by a respectable publisher following the symposium.
Early registration fee (until March 1, 2013) is 100 TL for members of the association and 150 TL for non-members; and after this date, it is 150 TL for members and 200 TL for non-members.
MEMORIA Y NARRACIÓN. Influencias transnacionales y contextos locales
VI Simposio Internacional- Justicia, Memoria, Narración y Cultura y III Simposio Internacional La memoria novelada
11-13 de noviembre, 2013.
Sala Menéndez Pidal (0E18)
Centro de Ciencias Sociales y Humanas,CSIC
C/ Albasanz 26-28.Madrid
Organizan: Justicia: Memoria, Narración y cultura (JUSMENACU, CCHS) Grupo de Investigación La memoria novelada Departamento de Español, Universidad de Aarhus (Dinamarca)
Con el patrocinio del Consejo de Investigación para la Cultura y la Comunicación de Dinamarca
http://www.cchs.csic.es/es/content/justicia-memoria-narraci%C3%B3n-y-cultura
Nationalisms in Spain: Project Outline and Call for Proposals
Research project on ‘The Dynamics of Nationalist Evolution in Contemporary Spain’ based at the University of Liverpool and funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (UK)
A first workshop on ‘Nationalisms in Spain’ will be held in late September 2014 and proposals for papers are welcome, deadline 4 October 2013.
Call for proposals Researchers interested in contributing to the project are asked to send a proposal to Richard Gillespie (richard.gillespie@liverpool.ac.uk) by 4 October 2013.
This should consist of
* a paragraph on your research profile
* a 200 – word provisional abstract of your proposed paper
* an indication of how you see the paper contributing to aims of the workshop and fitting within the framework outlined.
We are particularly keen to encourage papers that involve comparison between the Basque and Catalan cases, but individual case studies will also be considered for the workshop. Final decisions on the proposals will be made by late October 2013, based not only on consideration of individual contents but also issues of balance between papers and overall coverage of the research questions.
Call for Papers: Sound, Memory and the Senses
Call for Papers: Sound, Memory and the Senses, University of Melbourne will be held on 24-25 July 2014 in Melbourne.
The past 20 years has witnessed a turn towards the sensuous, particularly
the aural, as a viable space for critical exploration in History and other
Humanities disciplines. This has been informed by a heightened awareness of
the role that the senses play in shaping modern identity and understanding
of place; and increasingly, how the senses are central to the memory of
past experiences and their representation. The result has been a broadening
of our historical imagination which has previously taken the visual for
granted and ignored the other senses.
We propose a two day conference to debate some of the ongoing issues in
relation to the senses and chart the diversity of the field in Australia.
We encourage engagement with a rich array of sources and methods which
explore the possibilities and limits for the Senses as object of study.
Some of the topics might include:
– The Sound of War
– Sensory Urbanism
– Heritage and locative media
– The politics of the senses: eavesdropping, surveillance
– Smell and the historical environment
– Technology and the Senses
When: 24-25 July 2014
Where: University of Melbourne
Please submit a 200 word synopsis to Paula Hamilton@uts.edu.au by 31st
October 2013.
Dr Paula Hamilton
Call for Papers and Call for Panel Proposals
The Centre for Culture and Cultural Studies (CCCS)
The Balkan Network for Culture and Culture Studies (BNCCS)
Annual Conference 2013: «Cultural Memory»
September 5-6, 2013, Skopje, Republic of Macedonia
The deadline for proposals is February 1st, 2013
The Centre for Culture and Cultural Studies (CCCS) and The Balkan Network for Culture and Culture Studies (BNCCS) will organize the first of many to follow, annually-held conferences, under the overarching theme «Cultural Memory».
The interest in the past, and consequently, the interest in collective and individual memory, is quite pertinent to our overall present-day research interests. Finding a way to articulate and express individual and collective identities, which find themselves under the undeniable pressure of globalization, transition and consumer processes, is becoming increasingly important. On the one hand, in today’s contemporary, post-modern societies, the various ethnic groups call for recognition, which in turn demonstrates a need for the construction of their pasts, and thus, their cultural memories. On the other hand, if national, regional, religious and/or local cultural identities present today were portrayed as more or less stable entities, today they may be observed as nothing more than events, changes or conflicts usually associated with secularization, industrialization, globalization, migration, or many other political, economic, cultural and/or religious. From this stance, culture is seen as shaped under the influence of processes that stand in constant mutual tension. In other words, it is located in a state of constant negotiation with the newly present conditions, values, ideas and beliefs, set in circumstances whence the previously dominant segments are no longer present. In such processes, the term memory occupies a central role.
The objective of this first conference is twofold: namely, to contribute to the study of cultural memory by unlocking narratives about the past (and their canonization), and offer relevant critical observations on the manifestations of cultural memory that are not essentially ‘narratives’. This approach provides a kind of multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary access to cultural memory taken from various perspectives.
In this context, we are faced the following questions: how do we recall, remember and forget? What stories are ‘permitted’ and which are ‘forbidden’? How does the past determine the present and shape the future? How do the various discourses of the past determine the social and personal identities? How are our deepest emotions, desires and fantasies articulated in the present through the discursive space of memory? What are the relations between memory and monuments, archives and museums? How can we understand the dual nature of monuments: as tools of ideologically driven memory (fixed memory) and/or as constant sources of creative construction and opening up of memory? Does technological development influence the process of remembering the past? What are the implications of a digitalization of memory? What kind of history is created by the massive use of digital technologies (i.e., online archives that are encoding/decoding their users’ memories in virtual space)? How do the systems used for production affect the ways that use, protect and work with memory? In what ways is cultural tourism associated with memory? How does it reflect the local and global histories in terms of which narratives are being produced and consumed?
On that note, individual and collective memory within the processes of creating identities provides for the contemporary researcher indispensable links to the myriad present-day realities that are at the same time quite problematic. This duality manifests itself in the creative and conceptual forms of expression. Hence, the aim of the conference is to bring closer the various aspects applied in studying cultural memory. The conference aims at fostering a critical dialogue beyond the boundaries set by various disciplines, thus papers from various disciplines and fields are most welcomed, including art history, literature, anthropology, architecture, philosophy, political science, sociology, cultural geography, cultural studies, media and film studies, ethnology and folklore, economics, history, heritage studies, museum studies, landscape studies, leisure studies, tourism studies, transport studies and urban/spatial planning.
Possible topics could include, but are not limited to, the following areas:
Cultural Memory and Identity: family memory; biographical and autobiographical memory; the ‘homå’; immigration; the migrant; borders; nationalism; ethnicity; history and changing historical narratives; tradition; violence; trauma and terror; forgiveness; memories of transitions: important personal and national events.
Cultural Memory and Politics: the use of propaganda; the use of cultural memory; the politics of cultural memory; authority; resistance; creating cultural memory; collective remembering and forgetting.
Cultural Memory and Space/Place: architecture; geography (cartography); the city and urbanization; the use of nature in the collective memory; transformed places; monuments, archives, museums.
Cultural Memory and Social Institutions/Cultural Products: myth; religion; art/literature presentation; language; clashing memories, popular culture.
Cultural Memory and Everyday Life: rituals; bodily practices; nostalgia.
Mediated Memories: cultural representations; mass media/digitalized memories; virtual memories.
Cultural Memory and Tourism: ‘imagined routes’ (mythic highways and meta-narratives); crossing boundaries; war itineraries; violence and displacement; consumerism.
Papers, creative projects, and other non-traditional presentations exploring the aforementioned topics are also welcomed.
The Conference will be held on September 5-6, 2013 in Skopje, Republic of Macedonia.
Please submit your proposals to conference@cultcenter.net by February 1st, 2013.
Submissions should include a 250-300 word abstract, keywords and a brief bio, as well as a contact address.
The paper proposals should be prepared filling in a paper form.
Please feel free to contact Loreta Georgievska-Jakovleva (lgeorgievska@yahoo.com) or Mishel Pavlovski (mpavlovski@iml.ukim.edu.mk) with any interim questions.
Notifications of acceptance would come no later than February 15th, 2013.
Abstracts will be published and made available with the conference materials. Full papers will be published in the peer-rewieved journal «Култура/Culture».
We are seeking proposals for panels within the scope of the Conference
Panels are organized by internationally recognized experts aiming to bring together researchers on focused topics for an interactive discussion among the panel members and the participants. Panels are an important component of Annual Conference 2013. Panel members are researchers who have done well-known or controversial work related to the theme of the panel. Researchers interested in organizing a special session are invited to submit a formal proposal to conference@cultcenter.net by February 1st, 2013.
Before submitting a panel proposal, the organizer of a panel is expected to contact all the proposed panel members and get their agreement to serve as a panel member. A list of questions to be discussed in the panel should be made available to all the panel members well ahead of time for them to prepare their response. Each panel typically allows a certain amount of time for each panel member to present their response before an open discussion is opened.
The panel proposals should be prepared filling in a panel form.
Fees:
Early registration (till April 1st, 2013): € 40 (for members of The Balkan Network for Culture and Cultural Studies – € 20)
Late registration (till August 15th, 2013): € 60 (for members of The Balkan Network for Culture and Cultural Studies – € 40)
On-site registration (or after August 15th, 2013): € 80 (for members of The Balkan Network for Culture and Cultural Studies – € 60)
The registration fee includes the conference materials, the publication of the abstract and the papers, refreshment breaks, a welcome dinner for all participants of the Conference.
The Centre for Culture and Cultural Studies web site: http://www.cultcenter.net/
Conference web site: http://www.cultcenter.net/conf2013.php
Reunión del Proyecto de Investigación «Comunidad y violencia: espacios públicos para la construcción
Viernes, 14 Diciembre 2012
10:15 hrs. Sala José Gaos 3C
Centro de Ciencias Humanas y Sociales, CSIC
C/Albasanz, 26-28
Programa:
-10:15h., «Madrid, la ciudad desplazada», por Julio Díaz Galán (Universidad Europea de Madrid)
-12:30h., «Los límites de la memoria y los límites de la historia. El caso de la represión franquista», por Pedro Piedras Monroy (Escritor y Traductor)
Organiza: Proyecto de Investigación «Comunidad y violencia: espacios públicos para la construcción de memoria y ciudadanía». Investigador Principal: José M. González García (IFS-CCHS, CSIC)