Conference of the International Federation for Research in Women’s History

Time: 8-12 August 2007
Venue: Sofia, Bulgaria

Cultural history deals with various ‘artefacts’ produced by human activity throughout history: with both practices and representations, with written and visual texts. It is interested in both written and oral (but also visual) aspects of culture (understood in anthropological sense: cultural artefact as locus of meaning).

We welcome interdisciplinary contributions (coming from fields as diverse as history and literary studies, cultural studies, art history, media studies, anthropology, history of philosophy, historiography) dealing with historical aspects of production, signification and reception of culture – all from a gender perspective. We aim to bring together scholars at different stages of their careers from all over the world.

• We are interested in cultural production that deals with individual and collective authorship, with modes of publication (i.e. with the ways that bring cultural artefacts before the public), and with the historical context of production;
• Cultural signification is important for the production and reception of artefacts. It pays attention to the social conventions within which the artefacts are produced (literary language, styles of painting, writing, film genre, etc.);
• Cultural reception/consumption that studies how the artefact was received/read/understood by contemporaries and the meanings it provoked later under new historical circumstances;
We are interested in studies that pay attention on the role gender, class, ethnicity, race, age played in the process of cultural production, transmission and consumption of knowledge, studies that consider:
• oral and written culture, both in traditional and modern societies;
• restricted and mass literacy;
• the role of literate culture in societies with predominantly oral culture;
• the role of oral culture in modern societies of mass literacy/high literacy rate;
• the modes of reading and writing and their role throughout space and time, in various places and historical periods;
• the role of traditional and modern media in the cultural production of knowledge;
We are interested:
● in how cultural memory operates and in the related question about the gender of that memory, and social and cultural production of women and gender in history;
● in the role religion/church, education and state play in the process of cultural production and consumption.

Submission of Abstracts

Abstracts in English (no longer than 300 words) should be sent to the organizers by e-mail: ifrwh_bulgaria2007@mail.bg not later than November 30, 2006.

GENERAL INFORMATION

Venue
The Conference will take place on August 8 – 12, 2007 in Sofia, Bulgaria. It will be hosted by St. Kliment Ohridski University of Sofia, the oldest and most prestigious Bulgarian University.

Web site
A Conference web site www.ifrwh-bulgaria2007.org will be set up and will be available after October 1st 2006.
The web site will provide all the necessary information for Online-Registration, Accommodation, Exhibition options, Social program, Pre and Post conference tours, Important dates, etc.

Registration
Registration fee
Up to January 31st 2007 Delegates EUR 150,-
After January 31st / On spot Delegates EUR 260,-
NB! Students and guests could apply for reduction of the Registration fee.

The Registration fee for Delegates and Students includes:
• Attendance to all scientific sessions
• Access to the exhibition area
• Delegate’s kit
• Coffee breaks in the plenary days
• Luncheons in the plenary days
• Opening Ceremony followed by Welcome Reception on August 8th 2007
• Gala dinner on August 10th 2007

Contact

Local Organizing Committee
Prof. Krassimira Daskalova
President of the International Federation for Research in Women’s History
Faculty of Philosophy and Social Sciences, St. Kliment Ohridski University of Sofia
15 Tsar Osvoboditel Blvd., 1504 Sofia, Bulgaria
e-mail: krassimira_daskalova@yahoo.com

Official Agent of the Conference
Company for International Congresses – CIC Ltd.
8, Ami Bue Street, 1606 Sofia, Bulgaria
www.cic-pco.com
e-mail: m.dobreva@cic-pco.com