Friday 20 January 2012

Bulletin 17 January 2012

History Lab Bulletin 17 January 2012
Dear all,
See below for projects and events that may be of interest to History Lab members.
In this issue:
  • Next in History Lab
  • Calls for papers
  • Culture forum
  • Postgraduate Workshop
_________________________________________________
Next in History Lab:
  • Methods Workshop: Managing the Bibliography, Tuesday 17 January 2012, 18:00 – 20:00, Room S261, Senate House, Malet Street, London, WC1E 7HU
    Short presentations by three historians on managing large bibliographies:
    Christopher Nicholson, UCL SSEES
    Sally Osborn, University of Roehampton
    Simon Trafford, Institute of Historical Research Training Officer
    Sally Osborn will be talking about keeping her bibliography in a reference manager which she synchronises across devices. Christopher Nicholson will be advocating a far less technological approach, and Simon Trafford, who runs the School of Advanced Study’s EndNote programme, will introduce Endnote.
    Other forthcoming History Lab Methods Workshops:
    28 February 2012 6pm-8pm, Methods Workshop: Facing a blank page, starting to write
    21 May 2012 6pm-8pm, Methods Workshop: The upgrade (from MPhil to PhD)
    If you would like to take part in one of these events please email a short proposal to the co-ordinator: Guy Beckett at gbecke01@mail.bbk.ac.uk
  • Seminar: Emma Wells (Durham) - *The Fantassie of Idolatrie’* : the ‘Sense’ of Loss in Reformation Saintly Devotion, *c*.1530-1543, Thursday 19 January 2012, 17:30 – 19:30, Holden Room (Room 103), Senate House
  • Meet the historian: Antony Beevor, Wednesday 25 January 2012, 18:00 – 20:00, Russell Room (Room G32) Senate House
    Antony Beevor is the author of The Battle for Spain, Crete - the Battle and the Resistance, Stalingrad, Berlin - the Downfall, and D-Day The Battle for Normandy. His books have been translated into thirty languages and have sold over four million copies. He is a visiting professor at Birkbeck College and the University of Kent and a former chairman of the Society of Authors.
    Meet the Historian’ events are an opportunity to hear at first hand from noted historians how and why they became historians in the first place, their thoughts on research and the discipline generally, and about their latest work. There will be the chance to ask questions and enter into discussion, and to join the speaker for drinks after the talk.
  • Seminar: Chloe Kroeter (King’s College Cambridge) - The Two Sphinxes: Fighting Poverty with Art on the Covers of The New Age, Thursday 2 February 2012, 17:30 – 19:30, Holden Room (Room 103), Senate House
    For more information, see: http://www.history.ac.uk/historylab
  • Calls for papers: AGENCY: History Lab Annual Conference 2012
    Institute of Historical Research, London, 13-14 June 2012
    Who makes history? What is the role of the individual, and how much influence can they have? While historians have long debated the meaning and implication of agency, events such as the Arab Spring, in which traditional structures are overturned by collective and individual action, gives the notion of agency fresh urgency. The study of agency, traditionally understood as the ability of the individual to act independently of political, social and cultural structures, has been dominated by social scientists such as Simmel, Elias, Bourdieu, and more recently, Anthony Giddens. With this in mind, the aim of the History Lab Conference 2012 is to investigate the relationships between agents and structures through the analysis of historical example. History Lab would like to bring together postgraduate students and early- career researchers to explore the significance of agency. Potential speakers are invited to submit proposals for papers, or panels of three speakers, on specific topics exploring agency or on wider methodological and philosophical issues. Papers may cover any historical region or period, exploring agency in topics including, but not limited to, the following areas.
  • Religious lives
  • Popular politics, protest and resistance
  • Crown and estates
  • Court culture
  • Administration and bureaucracy
  • Industry and urbanisation
  • Rural lives
  • The family
  • Social mobility
  • Cultural production
  • Labour, business and industrial relations
  • Policing, surveillance and the law
    Some travel bursaries will be available for research students travelling from the United States. Please email historylab2012@gmail.com for further details. To submit a proposal for the conference, please send your title along with a 250-word abstract, your institutional affiliation, and full contact details to:
    historylab2012@gmail.com by the deadline of Monday, 27th February, 2012.
_________________________________________________
Calls for papers
  • First Annual Postgraduate Renaissance Symposium 'Beyond the Frame: Portraits and Personal Experience in Renaissance Europe, c.1400 – 1650'
    Call for Papers Deadline: 20 January 2012. Conference to take place on Saturday 28 April 2012 at The Courtauld Institute of Art. For more, see: http://www.courtauld.ac.uk/researchforum/events/2012/summer/28apr_RenaissanceSymposium.shtml
  • WSQ (Women's Studies Quarterly)
    Fashion Guest Editors: Eugenia Paulicelli & Betsy Wissinger

    Fashion is an economic and social force, a culture industry, a global

    powerhouse, a political statement. Fashion can simultaneously express

    freedom and constriction, be both democratic and totalitarian; both repress

    and liberate the body and gender roles. Transformation and affect are at

    its heart. Fashion is a universal form of human expression that

    transgresses boundaries of gender/race/class/embodiment/culture/nation.

    Fashion ignites passions, produces colossal waste, demands ruthless

    exclusion, inspires hysterical devotion. Bubbling up and filtering down,

    fashion mixes high and low, sultry and strong, ancient ritual and cutting

    edge technology.


    A thorough study of the history of fashion in its symbolic, creative and

    coercive faces shows how it has been crucial in the construction of

    national identities in fascist regimes or in processes of decolonization,

    such as in India, or in the remapping of the world economy, including

    China, India and Brazil. Fashion is closely tied to industrial,

    technological and economic developments and is at the center of cultural

    activity and change. In today's globalized world, the fashion and textile

    industry are key factors to understand the profound transformations

    occurring in cities, nations and regions the world over.


    Underlying all the recent scholarly attention that has been given to

    fashion is the intent of stripping it of its apparent light and frivolous

    reputation, and replacing it with a serious scholarly investigation that

    seeks to uncover the many complex layers that its surface conceals. The

    study of fashion, costume and dress has involved a series of disciplines,

    and has expanded their boundaries.


    Is fashion a women's issue? Inherently gendered, based on female bodily

    display, taking fashion seriously demands exploring the limits of gender

    and embodiment. Pushing that envelope reveals how fashion can question

    pre-established notions of gender, aesthetics and behavior. How do we

    understand masculinity in relation to dress and fashion? We invite

    exploration of fashion, clothing and adornment through plays of androgyny,

    from dandyism to lesbian chic. Seeing through clothes to the politics of

    power they materialize draws fashion into debates concerning identity,

    selfhood, sustainability, subjectivity, representation, and virtuality. How

    does the fashioned body trouble the boundaries between lived and

    represented, driving toward new phenomenological conceptions? How do the

    globe spanning trends of fashion reshape experiences of self and locale,

    and bring new relations of time and space? How has fashion in the

    blogosphere affected technologies of self, and produced new relations

    between bodies and city-scapes all over the world? How does fashion

    mediate the body? How do these mediations feed through text, film, the

    Internet and beyond?


    Always in flux, never static, fashion's fast pace often defies and disrupts

    the discipline-bound analytics of traditional scholarship. In this special

    issue of WSQ we seek scholarship that pushes the boundaries between dyadic

    conceptions of art and commerce, technology and the body, nature and

    culture, aesthetics and politics, reality and representation.


    We invite a rethinking of the traditional organization of disciplines

    within the social sciences and the humanities to include the impact of

    fashion within their contexts and welcome academic papers from a wide range

    of approaches, including theory, empirical research, literature, art,

    history, design, media and film studies, cultural studies, performance

    studies, women's and gender studies, psychology, sociology, semiotics, and

    anthropology, as well as creative prose, poetry, artwork, memoir and

    biography. Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:


    Fashion cities in literature, cinema, the arts

    Fashion and digital technology

    Sustainability and ecofashion: how can we make sustainability a fashionable choice?

    Fashion shows, models, and the work of producing fashion

    Fashion Capitals

    Fashion and philosophy

    Fashion, policy, and gentrification

    Fashion tourism

    Fashion and religion

    Fashion and feminism

    Fashion and masculinity

    Cross-dressing

    Drag Queens

    The closet

    The street

    The runway

    Stars

    Shopping

    Fast Fashion

    Luxury Brands

    Fashion designers/Fashion Design

    Fashion and museums

    New York Garment District, Yesterday, today and tomorrow

    Fashion and Migration

    Fashion and sweatshops

    Fashion East/West

    Blogs and their effect on fashion

    Clothing as a second skin

    Anti-fashion

    Transgression/transgender/ transformation/ transcendence

    Department Stores

    Fashion Photography

    Fashion Films


    If submitting academic work, please send articles by March 15, 2012 to the

    guest editors, Eugenia Paulicelli and Betsy Wissinger at

    WSQFashionIssue@gmail.com. Please send complete articles, not abstracts.
    Submission should not exceed 20 double spaced, 12 point font pages and

    should comply with the formatting guidelines at

    http://www.feministpress.org/wsq/submission-guidelines.

    Poetry submissions should be sent to WSQ's poetry editor, Kathleen Ossip,

    at
    WSQpoetry@gmail.com by March 15, 2012. Please review previous issues of
    WSQ to see what type of submissions we prefer before submitting poems.

    Please note that poetry submissions may be held for six months or longer.

    Simultaneous submissions are acceptable if the poetry editor is notified

    immediately of acceptance elsewhere. We do not accept work that has been

    previously published. Please paste poetry submissions into the body of the

    e-mail along with all contact information.


    Fiction, essay, and memoir submissions should be sent to WSQ's

    fiction/non-fiction editor, Nicole Cooley, at
    WSQCreativeProse@gmail.com by
    March 15, 2012. Please review previous issues of WSQ to see what type of

    submissions we prefer before submitting prose. Please note that prose

    submissions may be held for six months or longer. Simultaneous submissions

    are acceptable if the prose editor is notified immediately of acceptance

    elsewhere. We do not accept work that has been previously published. Please

    provide all contact information in the body of the e-mail.


    Art submissions should be sent to Margot Bouman at
    WSQArt@gmail.com by
    March 15, 2012. After art is reviewed and accepted, accepted art must be

    sent to the journal's managing editor on a CD that includes all artwork of

    300 DPI or greater, saved as 4.25 inches wide or larger. These files should

    be saved as individual JPEGS or TIFFS
  • University of East Anglia , School of World Art Studies and Museology . Postgraduate Symposium on Friday 20th and Saturday 21st April 2012 . The deadline for calls for papers has been extended to 20 January 2012. Please email abstracts to: britartinternational@gmail.com
    There have been two decades of vigorous interest in British art history, but up to now this has tended to assume a more or less unproblematic category of national identity and has not enquired closely into the elusive idea of ‘Britishness’. More recently, the concept of the transnational has proved to be a productive way for art historians in the 21st century to reflect not only on contemporary art, but also that of previous centuries. This graduate conference will address the extent to which these two approaches overlap in British art between 1851 and 1960, not only in terms of British artists working abroad and non-British artists adopting Britain as a base, but also in less tangible or previously unconsidered ways.
    Between 1851 and 1960, Britain’s global position altered radically – from the early consolidation of British imperial power in the mid-nineteenth century, through two world wars, the rise of the US to the reassessment of Britain’s political and cultural position in the post-war world, against a background of increasingly porous national and cultural boundaries. In this context, British art’s relationship with ‘the international’ seems a pertinent topic to consider, particularly from our own, increasingly ‘transnational’ perspective. ‘Transnational’ and ‘international’ are problematic terms here – the former reflects our own, more fluid concept of nationhood in the 21st century, while the latter offers a clearer definition of how nations were considered between 1851 and 1960. But is it possible to study British art of this period from our ‘transnational’ viewpoint? Can we talk of British art as separate from Britain as a nation or nationality? If British art between 1851 and 1960 cannot be considered ‘transnational’ in our terms, nor wholly ‘British’, how can it be considered in ‘international terms’?
    We welcome papers from graduate students working in any field who engage with and reflect upon British art as international art. Keynote speakers will be Michael Hatt of The University of Warwick and Emma Chambers of Tate Britain. Please send an abstract of up to 300 words to: britartinternational@gmail.com by 5pm on Friday 20th January.
    Papers should be no longer than 20 minutes. Please include your name, institutional affiliation, contact details and paper title with your submission. For further information please contact britartinternational@ gmail.com.
    Topics for discussion could include but are not limited to:
    *The continued historical usefulness of ‘Britishness’ in analysing British art
    * Internationalism and the self – roots, rootlessness and the multiple national identities of ‘British’ artists
    *International travel and art
    *Émigré activity and migration
    *Britons and/or Anglophiles abroad
    *Insularity and the failures of British Internationalism
    *British art and fantasies/dreams of other cultures
    *The relationships between British artists and colonialism, empire, the commonwealth, confederacy, NATO, etc.
    *British art as export commodity – Britain as a brand?
    *Internationalism and institutions – the interaction between nationalism and internationalism and gender/sexuality/economics
    *Internationalism and war
  • Interdisciplinary Nineteenth-Century Culture Forum 'Childhood and the nineteenth-century' Programme:
    Week 1 (20 January): MUSEUM TRIP. We will meet at the Museum of Oxford on St. Aldate’s to see the Lewis Carroll exhibit at 1pm
    Week 2 (27 January): SEMINAR. Dr. Tatiana Kontou (Oxford Brookes) will speak to the title “‘Mother! I am Florence!’: Reuniting with Lost Children in Florence Marryat’s There Is No Death & The Spirit World.” Platnauer Room, Brasenose, 12-1:30pm
    Week 3 (3 February): FILM NIGHT. Screening of The Turn of the Screw (1999), with drinks and snacks provided! *Venue tbc.
    Week 4 (10 February): SEMINAR. Erin Johnson (Mansfield) will speak to the title “Africa, Empire, and Masculinity in the Early Writings of Charlotte and Branwell Brontë.” Platnauer Room, Brasenose, 12-1:30pm
    Week 5 (17 February): READING WEE K. Discussion of extracts from Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty (1877). Platnauer Room, Brasenose, 12-1:30pm *For extracts, please email us at the address below!
    Week 6 (24 February): SEMINAR. Maija Kuharenok (Warwick) will speak to the title “Childhood and Motherhood in Mathilde Blind’s The Ascent of Man”; and Octavia Cox (St. Anne’s) will speak to the title ‘My Babe so Beautiful!’ (Coleridge, “Frost at Midnight”): Childhood as Redemption for Past Sins in Coleridge’s and Wordsworth’s Poetry.” Platnauer Room, Brasenose, 12-1:30pm
    Week 7 (29 February): LONDON TRIP. The Foundling Museum, Dickens’house, and V&A Museum of Childhood. Signup Week 4.
    Week 8 (9 March): SEMINAR. Dr. Sarah Hoem Iversen (Keble) will speak to the title “‘Do You Understand This, My Little Pupil?’: Children’s Dictionaries, Pedagogy, and Constructions of Childhood in the Nineteenth Century.” Platnauer Room, Brasenose, 12-1:30pm
    The Interdisciplinary C19 Culture Forum welcomes all scholars, at all levels, who share a common interest in nineteenth-century culture.
    Convenors: Hannah Sikstrom (Brasenose) and Eloise Moss (Magdalen).
  • History Lab NORTH WEST Postgraduate workshop ,Wednesday 25th January 2012 , Lecture Room 1 and Arthur West Room at the Department of History , 9 Abercromby Square , University of Liverpool, L69 7WZ
    9:30 – 10:00 am Registration and Welcome
    10:00 – 11:00 am Panel 1: Understanding the Marginalised: Historians and their Craft , Lucy Williams (University of Liverpool) 'The Dangers of the Social Historian of the 19th century becoming the "New Lady Visitor"', Ian Gwinn (University of Liverpool) 'Worker-historians: Subjectivity, Self, Experience '
    11:00 – 11:15 am Tea and Coffee
    11:15 am – 12:45 pm , Panel 2: Reality, Representation, and Ephemeral Media. Michael Whitman (University of Liverpool) 'A Succession Dispute in the Calendars of Papal Letters: The United Dioceses of Cork and Cloyne, 1455 – 1484', Paula Chorton (University of Manchester) 'Folk Devils and Moral Panics? The Creation of the Council Tenant in the Post- War Period', Nick Barnett (Liverpool John Moores University) "Russia Wins Space Race”: Britain's Sputnik Moment, 1957
    12:45 – 14:00 pm Lunch – a number of reasonably priced food outlets are available on and around campus.
    14:00 – 15:30 pm , Panel 3: Racialised Discourse: Threat Perception in America. Emily Trafford (University of Liverpool) 'American Decline and the Immigrant Gene: The Creation of the “Immigrant Health Threat” and the Regulatory Response during the Progressive Era', Sarah Louise Wood (University of Manchester) 'The Republic on Trial?: The 'Galmot affair' and the Politics of Violence in Interwar French Guiana', James West (University of Liverpool) 'Get up, Get into it, Get involved: James Brown's significance in the Black Power era, c1966-1974'
    15:30 – 16:00 pm Coffee
    16:00 – 17:00 pm , Panel 4: Corrective Reinterpretations . Jim Hinks (University of Liverpool) 'Demons in human shape?: The Representation and Negotiation of Gender in Two Scottish "Baby-Farming" Trials' , Nicholas Wong (University of Liverpool) 'The Rushworth Family of Liverpool, 1828-2002'
    17:00 pm, Close. Join us for a drink, a bite to eat and a chat at a nearby location
    To find us:
    By car: From the M62 at the end of the motorway continue straight ahead onto Edge Lane (A5080 then A5047) and follow signs for Liverpool City Centre and the University. Postcode for satellite navigation or online directions: L69 7WZ . There is pay parking facilities on the campus, but there are limited spaces. Instead a commercial parking garage is located at 38 Mount Pleasant, L3 5SD. Continue down Brownlow Hill, turn left onto Clarence Street, then right onto Mount Pleasant at the lights. To return walk up Mount Pleasant toward the Metropolitan Catholic Cathedral, from which you can follow signs toward Abercromby Square.
    By rail: The Campus is just a ten-minute walk away from the nearest mainline station at Lime Street. Take the main exit and turn left into Lime Street. Then turn left again at the Britannia Adelphi Hotel and continue up Brownlow Hill towards the Metropolitan Catholic Cathedral and Red Brick Building with its clock tower. From across the clock tower head over to the Blackwell’s and follow signs for Abercromby Square.
    By coach: The National Express coach station is in Norton Street, a ten-minute walk from the Campus. From the exit, turn right and cross London Road into Seymour Street and Russell Street. Then turn left into Brownlow Hill and head towards the Metropolitan Catholic Cathedral. Across from the Cathedral you can follow signs for Abercromby Square.




--
Regards,

The History Lab team.

Thursday 5 January 2012

Special Bulletin 4 January 2012

History Lab Special Bulletin 4 January 2012
Dear all,
See below for the call for papers for History Lab Annual Conference.
_________________________________________________
    AGENCY: History Lab Annual Conference 2012
    Institute of Historical Research, London , 13-14 June 2012
    Who makes history? What is the role of the individual, and how much influence can they have? While historians have long debated the meaning and implication of agency, events such as the Arab Spring, in which traditional structures are overturned by collective and individual action, gives the notion of agency fresh urgency. The study of agency, traditionally understood as the ability of the individual to act independently of political, social and cultural structures, has been dominated by social scientists such as Simmel, Elias, Bourdieu, and more recently, Anthony Giddens. With this in mind, the aim of the History Lab Conference 2012 is to investigate the relationships between agents and structures through the analysis of historical example. History Lab would like to bring together postgraduate students and early- career researchers to explore the significance of agency. Potential speakers are invited to submit proposals for papers, or panels of three speakers, on specific topics exploring agency or on wider methodological and philosophical issues. Papers may cover any historical region or period, exploring agency in topics including, but not limited to, the following areas.
  • Religious lives
  • Popular politics, protest and resistance
  • Crown and estates
  • Court culture
  • Administration and bureaucracy
  • Industry and urbanisation
  • Rural lives
  • The family
  • Social mobility
  • Cultural production
  • Labour, business and industrial relations
  • Policing, surveillance and the law
    Some travel bursaries will be available for research students travelling from the United States. Please email historylab2012@gmail.com for further details. To submit a proposal for the conference, please send your title along with a 250-word abstract, your institutional affiliation, and full contact details to:
    historylab2012@gmail.com by the deadline of Monday, 27th February, 2012.

--
Regards,

The History Lab team.

Bulletin 29 December 2011

Dear all,
See below for projects and events that may be of interest to History Lab members.
In this issue:
· Next in History Lab
· Calls for papers
_________________________________________________
Next in History Lab:
· Methods Workshop: Managing the Bibliography, Tuesday 17 January 2012, 18:00 – 20:00, Room S261, Senate House, Malet Street, London, WC1E 7HU
The History Lab Methods Workshop is a programme of workshops which asks PHD students to reveal, discuss and consider each other's research methodologies. Each event features a short presentation by three PHD students on their methods, followed by a chaired discussion.
Other forthcoming History Lab Methods Workshops:
28 February 2012 6pm-8pm, Methods Workshop: Facing a blank page, starting to write
21 May 2012 6pm-8pm, Methods Workshop: The upgrade (from MPhil to PhD)
If you would like to take part in one of these events please email a short proposal to the co-ordinator: Guy Beckett at gbecke01@mail.bbk.ac.uk
· Seminar: Emma Wells (Durham) - *The Fantassie of Idolatrie’* : the ‘Sense’ of Loss in Reformation Saintly Devotion, *c*.1530-1543, Thursday 19 January 2012, 17:30 – 19:30, Holden Room (Room 103), Senate House
· Meet the historian: Antony Beevor, Wednesday 25 January 2012, 18:00 – 20:00, Russell Room (Room G32) Senate House
Antony Beevor is the author of The Battle for Spain, Crete - the Battle and the Resistance, Stalingrad, Berlin - the Downfall, and D-Day The Battle for Normandy. His books have been translated into thirty languages and have sold over four million copies. He is a visiting professor at Birkbeck College and the University of Kent and a former chairman of the Society of Authors.
‘Meet the Historian’ events are an opportunity to hear at first hand from noted historians how and why they became historians in the first place, their thoughts on research and the discipline generally, and about their latest work. There will be the chance to ask questions and enter into discussion, and to join the speaker for drinks after the talk.
· Seminar: Chloe Kroeter (King’s College Cambridge) - The Two Sphinxes: Fighting Poverty with Art on the Covers of The New Age, Thursday 2 February 2012, 17:30 – 19:30, Holden Room (Room 103), Senate House
For more information, see: http://www.history.ac.uk/historylab
_________________________________________________
Calls for papers
· 81st Anglo-American Conference of Historians: Ancients and Moderns, Thursday 5th and Friday 6th July 2012, Senate House, London
Full details of the conference can be found at:
The deadline has been extended to the 9th January 2012.
The Institute’s 81st Anglo-American conference seeks to represent the full extent of work on classical receptions, welcoming not only those scholars who work on Roman, Greek and Judaeo-Christian legacies and influences, but also historians of the ancient kingdoms and empires of Asia and pre-Colombian America. Our plenary lecturers include: Paul Cartledge (Cambridge), Constanze Güthenke (Princeton), Mark Lewis (Stanford), Sanjay Subrahmanyam (UCLA) and David Womersley (Oxford).
Proposals for individual papers, panels (of up to three papers and a session chair) and roundtables are invited. Please send a half-page abstract to the IHR Events Officer at AncientsandModerns@lon.ac.uk by 9th January 2012. Acceptance of proposals will be confirmed by 20th January 2012 and the full conference programme published at the end of January. Registrations open on 1st February 2012. For any queries, please contact the IHR Events Office at IHR.Events@sas.ac.uk on 0207 862 8756.


--
Regards,

The History Lab team.