Graduate Program in Social and Political Thought, Annual Graduate Student Conference (Web)

Venue: York University
Time: April 21-23, 2017
Proposals due: February 15, 2017

„Listen to me, metaphoring like crazy. And trying to define time while no longer living inside it.“ Douglas Coupland, Player One, 2010

„Determinism is always bound to be disappointed by history.“ Ellen Wood, Democracy Against Capitalism, 1995

York University’s Social & Political Thought Graduate Program is pleased to invite papers and creative works for presentation at its 31st Annual Conference, Strategies of Critique: Out of Time. In a time of flux, when social conditions dictate a metaphysical shift in the experience of temporality, it is critical to look around, to survey time itself now. We would like to take the time to consider how histories are made distant, lost or silenced, and yet, how they remain as spectres haunting our lives; how our future is indelibly marked with the characteristics of crisis—whether it is ecological, economic, political, or otherwise—alongside progress, and how we can move beyond the horizon of catastrophe. Finally, we would like to take the opportunity to meditate on the present and on presence, on our temporal conditions now, how they fall within the space between past and future, and are unified while being displaced.

The organizing committee welcomes individual and panel proposals critically engaged with temporality in social and political thought. We also welcome proposals from activists and community members. Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

History and/of social and political thought; Social and political acceleration/deceleration; Compression of time, technologies of speed; Social history; „The return of history“; ‚Retro‘ movements (vinyl, slow-food, hispterism, etc.); Progress and atavism; Crisis and calamity (past, present, future); Hope and optimism (past, present, future); Futurity; Herstory; Uncertain futures; Reconciliation/Resurgence; Early-modernity, modernity, post-modernity; „Political Marxism“; „Critical realism“; Presentism; Postcolonial time; Time lost/wasted/well-spent; Technology, determinism, „technological determinism“; (Myth)histories of the past, present, future?; Apocalypse; Moments of (in)decision; Humanisms, post-humanisms and the anthropocene

This year our conference is dedicated to the memory of Ellen Meiksins Wood (1942-2016), one of the founders of our graduate program. The organizing committee warmly encourages submissions from those engaged with Dr. Wood’s body of work. The organizers will also consider and encourage alternative interpretations of the theme. Strategies of Critique: Out of Time will be held April 21-23, 2017 at York University in present-day Toronto, Canada on the territory of the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation. We acknowledge other Indigenous nations who have longstanding relationships with this territory, such as the Huron-Wendat, the Haudenosaunee, and the Métis nations, and welcome suggestions for unsettling the coloniality of our academic conference practices.

Submission Requirements:

Submit to: strategiesofcritique@gmail.com

Submission Deadline: February 15, 2017

Individual submissions (2 attachments):
1) abstract (max. 200 words)
2) brief bio (max. 50 words)

Panel submissions (2 attachments):
1) panel rationale & individual proposal abstracts (max. 1000 words)
2) bios for each presenter (max 250 words)

Please specify if your presentation will require special equipment or venue specifications. For those coming from out of town and needing overnight accommodations, please let us know. We may be able to arrange for you to stay with someone in the program.

Accessibility is a priority at our conference; venue, audio-visual equipment, written information, and food provided have all been chosen so as to facilitate all conference-goers‘ full participation. If you require further accommodation, please let us know.

Inquiries can be directed to the organizing committee: strategiesofcritique@gmail.com

Please visit our website for more information: https://strategiesofcritique.wordpress.com/

Source: H-Net Notifications