Call for Papers. 30th Annual Conference for the Society for the Study of French History. University of Chichester, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 6PE. July 3 to July 5, 2016
We are pleased to announce the call for papers for the 30th Annual Conference for the Society. While we welcome all paper or panel proposals on any theme or period of French history, the broad theme of the conference will be “High and Low Culture: Elite and Popular Constructions”. The theme invites colleagues to interrogate French history through reference to social groups or classes, cultural hierarchies and resistances, socially defined practices (‘high’ or ‘ low’, e.g. court life; political and intellectual elites, mass entertainment, or folk practice), as well as to question how relationships cross or conflict with the ‘top down’ or ‘bottom up’ paradigm. Originally found in art history debates around pop art, the concept of ‘High and Low’ provides a rich entry point for reconsidering what we think we know about the place we call France, as well as all other Francophone territories and spaces. The theme is to be read inclusively and papers or panels that connect it to equally important forms of power and social organization will be welcome, for example, gender and elites, popular culture in colonial/post-colonial sites, etc.
Panels will be composed of 3 speakers and a chair. All proposals submitted should include the title of the paper/panel, the names and email addresses of speakers, plus synopses of individual papers of not more than 350 words including a very brief CV.
This CFP will close on 5 January 2016 and successful speakers will be contacted forthwith with registration and accommodation details.
Invited speakers include, Professor James B. Collins (Georgetown University, Washington); Professor Robert Gildea (University of Oxford) Professor Richard Golsan (Texas A&M) and BenoÎt Peeters (independent scholar and biographer of Hergé, Paul Valéry, and Jacques Derrida). More names to follow shortly on society web site and forthcoming cfps.
Organizers:
Professor Hugo Frey
Dr Mark Bryant
Dr Andrew Smith (Society for the Study of French History/UCL)
Submission of paper or panel proposals to: email. Frenchhistory16@chi.ac.uk