Calls for Papers: Conferences, Training/Education

CFP – RU Childhood Studies Grad Student Conference

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The Rutgers University – Camden Graduate Student Organization in Childhood Studies is pleased to announce our third graduate student conference, to be held 22-23 April 2016 in Camden, New Jersey. Graduate students and others at a similar stage of career in all disciplines who are engaged in research relating to children and youth are encouraged to submit proposals.

The title of this year’s conference is “Reimagining the Child: Next Steps in the Study of Childhood(s)”.

Since its inception, the field of childhood studies has pushed boundaries in academic approaches to children and childhood. It has challenged scholars to refigure children as active participants in society and constructors of their own life experiences, worked to give voice to young people in research, promoted the understanding of childhood as a socially-constructed category, and encouraged groundbreaking interdisciplinary methodology and analysis. We recognize, however, that innovative thinking about children and childhood is not limited to those scholars working directly in the field of childhood studies. The goal of this year’s graduate student conference is to bring together graduate students and other early-career scholars whose work represents a contribution to expanding academic understandings of and approaches to children and childhood.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
• Theorizations and discourses of childhood
• Representations of children in media
• Relationships between children and technology
• Considering children in approaches to human rights, ethics, and morality
• Children’s culture(s)
• Children as social agents
• Bringing children’s voices to academic study
• Children’s participation in research and as researchers
• Emerging and diverse perspectives on childhood in psychology
• Children and views of “the child” in politics and policy
• Geographies and histories of childhood
• Differences and parallels in diverse experiences of childhood
• Intersections of childhood with other social categories, such as gender, race, and disability
• Changing understandings of childhood and their implications for teaching and learning

Proposals are welcome from scholars in all fields, including sociology, anthropology, history, literature, philosophy, media studies, fine arts, political science, public policy, geography, psychology, and education. We are particularly looking for presenters engaged in interdisciplinary work.

Please send an abstract of no more than 300 words to the conference chair, Julian Burton, at julian.burton@rutgers.edu. Include the words “conference abstract” in the subject line. Please include your name, current level of study, and affiliated institution in the body of your e-mail. Attach your abstract as a separate document containing no personally identifying information.

Deadline: 20 December 2015. Notifications will be sent to accepted presenters by 31 January 2016.

Further information will be made available on the Childhood Studies Rutgers Facebook page at facebook.com/childhoodruc and the event page at http://tinyurl.com/childhood2016

Events, Other opportunities, Training/Education

Project & Upcoming Conference – Childhood Studies in the Global South

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Exploring Childhood Studies in the Global South

The ‘Exploring Childhood Studies in the Global South’ project seeks to bring together researchers exploring childhood and children’s lives in diverse contexts in the Global South to engage in theory development using the various empirical studies that have been produced on Southern childhoods as a starting point for dialogue and action.

The central questions of this project are:  

  1. How, if at all, do theoretical concepts relating to childhood research in the North transfer to various social, cultural and political contexts in the Global South?
  2. What are the key theoretical priorities for child-focused researchers working in diverse contexts in the Global South and why?/What theoretical concepts do childhood researchers focusing on Southern childhoods find most useful and why?
  3. How can these theoretical priorities identified by child-focused researchers working on Southern childhoods be better reflected in dominant discourses within the interdisciplinary field of childhood studies?
  4. What challenges exist which may prevent the incorporation of theories developed by academics focusing on Southern childhoods into more dominant discourses relating to childhood studies?

These questions will be addressed through two initiatives in particular:

  1. The organisation of a three-day workshop in January 2016 for childhood academics and researchers with various levels of experience working within diverse Southern contexts including those based within institutions in the South.

    Dates: 19-21 January 2016
    Venue: The University of Sheffield
    Note Deadline for Registration: 20th December 2015

  2. The development of a website which will host the following:
    • The Southern Childhoods Network which is a virtual network of childhood scholars, policy-makers and practitioners which seeks to facilitate dialogue, action and collaboration.
    • An online database of childhood researchers and academics focusing on the Global South.
    • A database of open access articles in English, French and Spanish with a particular focus on childhood and children’s lives in the Global South.
    • Webinars facilitated by key academics in the area of global childhood studies.

      Please visit our website http://www.southernchildhoods.org/

The project is managed by Dr. Afua Twum-Danso Imoh at the University of Sheffield, hosted by the Centre for the Study of Childhood and Youth and funded by the British Academy Rising Star Scheme.

ACYIG Updates, Calls for Papers: Publishing

Call for Early Neos Submissions

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Dear ACYIG Members,

As you recover from the AAA Meeting, please consider adapting your conference paper for publication as a Neos article. If you attended a session that inspired you, consider writing about it!

ACYIG is now soliciting early article submissions for the February 2016 issue of Neos. Submissions received by the priority deadline of Friday, December 4, 2015 will be reviewed for the February issue. We will also accept contributions during our regular rolling submission period of Monday, December 14–Monday, January 4, but articles received after December 4 will be pushed back to the next issue. All material should be sent to ACYIG.Editor@gmail.com.

Please consider the following types of article submissions for our priority deadline of December 4:

ARTICLES (1000 words or less, including references)

Methods & Ethics in the Anthropology of Children and Youth, in which members explore the methods and ethics of doing research with children or youth. 

Childhood and _______ (you fill in the blank!), in which members discuss a topic of interest to their research.

My Experiences/Intersections with Interdisciplinary Research on Children and Youth, in which members investigate the value, pitfalls, and lessons associated with combining anthropological research with that of other disciplines to study children and youth.

An Ethnography of Children or Youth that has Impacted My Work, in which members discuss their favorite classic or contemporary ethnography of children or youth. Note that this should NOT be written as a book review, but rather as an account of how a particular ethnography has impacted your theoretical or methodological approach, or how it might be used in your teaching.

Children and Youth in Our Lives and Our Work, in which members discuss the challenges and triumphs of balancing their own lives with their research, focusing particularly on the field work stage.

Other contributions will be accepted during the regular rolling submission period of December 14–January 4:

OTHER CONTRIBUTIONS 

Letters to the Editor (250 words or less), in which members comment on Neos and/or its contents.

Photos from the Field, which should be accompanied by a caption of 30 words or less explaining the context of the photo.

New Book Announcements (250 words or less), which must include the title, author, publisher (and the book series, if applicable), date of publication, and listing price of the book, in addition to a description of the contents. If possible, please send, as a separate attachment, a digital image of the book cover.

Member News (200 words or less), in which members may submit job announcements and research opportunities; grants/prizes available; calls for papers and conference announcements; recent appointments; grants received and/or prizes awarded; publication announcements; and other professional achievements.

Correction Notices may be submitted to the editor if Neos has printed an error in a previous issue.

Please refer to the General Submission Guidelines on our website at https://acyig.americananthro.org/neos/neos-submission-guidelines/ for more detailed information.

We look forward to receiving your submissions!

Best,

Kate Feinberg Robins and Aviva Sinervo
Co-Editors for February 2016 issue of Neos

Calls for Papers: Publishing

CFP: Arc | Journal of the Faculty of Religious Studies

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Arc | Journal of the Faculty of Religious Studies
McGill University, William and Henry Birks Building
3520 University St., Montreal, QC H3A 2A7
arcrelg.mcgill.ca | arc.relgstud@mcgill.ca

Call for Papers

The editors of Arc: The Journal of the Faculty of Religious Studies are pleased to announce the call for papers for an upcoming 2016 special issue (Vol. 43). We welcome article submissions addressing the challenges involved in developing educational approaches that promote religious diversity and mutual understanding while preventing forms of religious extremism and radicalization. This theme represents an intersection between the study of religion, education and public policy. Article submissions, however, may address that intersection from a wide range of academic disciples that further include, but are not limited to:

  • Anthropology
  •  Childhood studies
  •  Comparative religions
  • Ethics
  • Gender
  • History
  • Philosophy
  • Psychology
  • Politics
  • Sociology

Arc is an interdisciplinary, refereed journal published annually by the Faculty of Religious Studies, McGill University. The journal combines the talents of professors and graduate students in offering space for scholarly discussions on various aspects of the academic study of religion, including method and theory in the study of religion.

Arc encourages submissions from diverse religious traditions and perspectives. The submission deadline is January 25, 2016. For detailed submission guidelines, please consult the Guidelines for Contributors (PDF) on our website. All electronic correspondence should be sent to the editors of this special issue, Michael Gollner and Jon Waind, at the following email address: arc.relgstud@mcgill.ca.

Publications, Resources

Neos highlights—Children in Transition

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Are you struggling with how to represent the perspectives of vulnerable youth in your research and in your classrooms? Preety Gadhoke and Barrett Brenton share their strategies in “Children in Transition: Visual Methods for Capturing Impressions of Food Landscapes, Family, and Life among Homeless Youth,” in the October 2015 issue of Neos (pp. 8-9): http://acyig.americananthro.org/neos/current-issue/.

Send your reactions to this or other features of Neos to ACYIG.Editor@gmail.com for publication in our Letters to the Editor section of the next issue.

Events

Lecture: Children without borders at Ryerson University

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Children without borders: Child mobilities and transnational duties of care
A public lecture by Dr. Karen Wells

November 25, 6-7:30
Ryerson University (Toronto)
Kerr Hall East 323

Dr. Karen Wells is Assistant Dean Geography, Environment and Development Studies and Senior Lecturer in International Development and Childhood Studies at the University of London, Among many publications, Dr. Wells is the author of Childhood in a Global Perspective (2009).
http://www.bbk.ac.uk/geds/our-staff/full-time-academic-staff/wells
This talk will be followed by a reception in the Early Childhood Studies graduate lounge, which is directly across from the Learning and Teaching Office, Kerr Hall West, Ryerson University (KHW373)
Calls for Papers: Conferences, Events

CFP: Children’s History Society Inaugural Conference

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Horrible Histories? Children’s Lives in Historical Contexts

16 and 17 June 2016
King’s College London

It is now over forty years since the bold declaration of psychohistorian Lloyd deMause that ‘The history of childhood is a nightmare from which we have only recently begun to awaken’. Stirred by such claims, scholars have subsequently tested the ‘nightmare thesis’ for both the pre-modern and modern eras, locating children’s agency in unexpected places and stressing the contingencies of context, gender, ethnicity, age, class, caste and sexuality. Narratives of historic and contemporary institutional abuse, however, together with insights concerning the legacies of forced child migration, children’s labours and other challenging aspects of childhood experience, suggest that sorrow rather than joy characterises much scholarship on children and childhood. Should this be so?

In another context, since 1993 the phenomenally successful Horrible Histories books, stage plays and television series have helped introduce countless thousands of children around the world to the past. As their titles indicate, Horrible Histories also examine difficult and sometimes grisly historical episodes. Progressive narratives are at work here too, reinforced by children’s museum exhibits emphasising an emergence from the ‘dark ages’ of childhood in the twentieth century.

‘Horrible Histories? Children’s Lives in Historical Contexts’ is the launch conference marking the inauguration of the new UK-based Children’s History Society. Offering a forum for historical reflections from established and upcoming historians of children, childhood and youth, we also anticipate that this will be a platform for school-age scholars to reflect on the ways they respond to the history. This two-day conference invites paper proposals on the following themes:

  • Dealing with difficult history and heritage
  • Children’s histories and the longue durée
  • The ‘West and the rest’ in children’s history
  • Definitions of subjecthood and status
  • Pain and resilience
  • Archival approaches for retrieving children’s agency
  • The things of childhood
  • Play as protest, recreation and the ‘work’ of childhood
  • Children’s histories in museums, online and in the media
  • The histories of children’s places and places for children
  • Future trajectories for researching children’s histories

Please submit an abstract of no more than 300 words, together with a two-page CV, to both simon.sleight@kcl.ac.uk and M.C.H.Martin@greenwich.ac.uk by 1 December 2015. Applicants will be notified of the outcome in January. Panel submissions featuring three papers of 15-20 minutes apiece are also encouraged, particularly for panels showcasing in concert transnational and/or long chronological perspectives. Note that our definition of children is flexible, reflecting the multiple constructions through time of childhood as a social category.

The conference will be free to attend, courtesy of the Menzies Centre for Australian Studies and the Department of History, both at King’s College London. Further details will follow regarding accommodation options, conference-related activities and Society administration. If you would like to become involved in the running of the Children’s History Society, please email simon.sleight@kcl.ac.uk and M.C.H.Martin@gre.ac.uk to express your interest by the 1 December deadline.

You can follow the progress of the Children’s History Society on Twitter and Facebook:

https://twitter.com/histchild and https://www.facebook.com/histchild/

 

Warm regards,

Dr Simon Sleight (King’s College London) and Dr Mary Clare Martin (University of Greenwich).

Menzies Centre for Australian Studies, King’s College London // Centre for the Study of Play and Recreation, University of Greenwich

Events, New Books

Book Launch

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The Politics of Childhoods Real and Imagined: Practical application of critical realism and childhood studies by Priscilla Alderson

(Routledge, 246pp, Pb: 978-1-138-94889-1 | £26.99  eBook: 978-1-315-66938-0)

This new book relates critical realism to childhood studies in order to research transformative change over time. It summarises key themes across academic disciplines and policy areas, ranging from climate change and social justice between generations, to neoliberalism and reform of public services, to imagining social reform that benefits all age groups. Each chapter considers how children and young people are largely excluded from political and economic global debates, although they are one third of people in the world and are often especially affected by policies and events.

The book is written for everyone who is researching, studying or teaching about childhood, those who care for and work with children and young people, as well as those interested in critical realism.

All are welcome to the book launch: Tuesday 8 December 5.30-7.30

Institute of Education, University College London
(RSVP: ssruadmin@ioe.ac.uk)