Autor: GKS

Centre for Environmental and Minority Policy Studies (CEMiPoS), Sapporo/Japan, 4-6 December 2017

This conference is organized by the Centre for Environmental and Minority Policy Studies, an independent research centre in Sapporo, in cooperation with the Ainu Women’s Association in Hokkaido (Ainu Moshir), the Hugo Valentin Centre, Uppsala University and the Northern Institute of Environmental and Minority Law, Arctic Centre, University of Lapland.

2017 marks the tenth anniversary of the historic adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) by the UN General Assembly with overwhelming favorable votes. The purpose of the Declaration is to remedy the historical denial of the right of self-determination and related human rights. Indigenous peoples are, however, still suffering from and fighting against wounds caused by historical injustices imposed on them as well as ongoing development projects at the cost of Indigenous rights. Furthermore, the linguistic and cultural survival of indigenous peoples are in many ways threatened by the sweeping policies adopted by governments. What progress has been made for Indigenous peoples since the UNDRIP? It is a perfect time to examine, from the standpoint of Indigenous peoples, the outcomes and effects of the UNDRIP on them.

This conference aims to assess the existing policies towards Indigenous peoples at local, regional, and global levels by focusing on four key areas:

1. Redress for historical injustices imposed on Indigenous peoples and their struggle for indigenous rights
2. Exploitation of natural resources by external powers in Indigenous communities and their resistance against them
3. Linguistic and cultural revitalisation led by Indigenous peoples in the wake of cultural genocide under colonialism
4. Indigenous women on the front line of sufferings and struggles.

The conference will feature the participation of Sami and Ainu activists as keynote speakers for the plenary and other sessions, and will include a panel discussion on Japan’s Ainu policy by Ainu women. In addition, invitation to the conference is extended to students and activists interested or involved in Indigenous affairs, policymakers, government officials, journalists, artists, citizens, as well as Indigenous peoples and researchers across the globe. In spite of the size of the conference, we hope that it will mark a watershed in the development of equitable and sustainable policies towards Indigenous peoples.

Hiroshi Maruyama, Principal Organiser
Director, Centre for Environmental and Minority Policy Studies
Honorary Doctor and Guest Professor, The Hugo Valentin Centre, Uppsala University
Professor Emeritus, Muroran Institute of Technology

Call for Papers deadline: 1 May 2017

Registration: Summer 2017 (Deadline: 1 September 2017)

Participants interested in presenting at the Conference are recommended to choose their preferred area from the above-mentioned four key areas and to submit written abstracts (maximum: 250 words) referring to one of the following suggested topics.

Suggested topics:

• Manipulation of colonial history by colonial powers
• The teaching of indigenous history in the face of majority discourse
• Towards the establishment of a truth and reconciliation committee
• Language loss and revitalisation of endangered indigenous languages
• Acquisition of language for indigenous identity
• Promoting multilingualism for the cultural well-being of indigenous peoples
• Security threats imposed on indigenous communities
• Indigenous peoples as actors in the decision making of development projects
• Sustainable development and CBD 8(j) in indigenous communities
• Impacts of the UNDRIP on indigenous communities
• Incorporating international human rights law into domestic law
• Indigenous perspectives on Gender Studies
• Indigenous women’s history
• Women and power in the (post)colonial situation
• Empowering indigenous women
• Prospects for Indigenising academia and education
• Indigenous masculinities

Abstract submission:

• title of the abstract,
• your affiliation,
• email address,
• 4-5 key words,
• specification to which key area the paper is submitted (e-mail title: „Policy towards Indigenous People – Abstract Proposal“)

Whom to submit to: To Prof. Hiroshi Maruyama at this contact email.

A draft programme and initial information regarding acceptance of abstracts will be released at the beginning of June 2017.

Practicalities:

• No fee for participation will be charged.
• Participants, excluding invited speakers, are responsible for the cost of their own travel, accommodation and other relevant expenses.
• Bearing in mind that traffic paralysis caused by a snowstorm in Hokkaido may take place, participants are recommended to come to Sapporo two days before the conference or 2 December.
• Sapporo has many options for lodging. Hotels.com, AirBnb, and Trivago can assist in finding suitable accommodation. Given the recent popularity of Sapporo as a tourist destination, participants are urged to book their rooms well in advance, preferably in the heart of the city, in the vicinity of Sapporo Station.

For updated information, please follow the organizers here.

4th Annual Interdisciplinary Conference, Oct 28-29, 2017, Harbourfront Centre, Toronto (Canada)

The perceived orthodoxy of progressive politics has come under attack in recent years by individuals, groups, and institutions that believe their actions and speech are being policed. The term ‘social justice warrior’ (SJW) emerged in 2011. This has attempted to switch the term ‘social justice,’ which has since 1840 been primarily a positive concept, into a mainstream pejorative used mainly to dismiss individuals and groups who espoused views concerning social progressivism, civil rights, cultural inclusiveness, gay rights, or feminism. For those activists and researchers who have spent their lives attempting to change society for the better, this is a troubling turn.

The conference will examine the current and past state(s) of inequality and social justice from a multi-disciplinary perspective. The conference takes place October 28th and 29th 2017 at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto.

The organizers invite proposals based on (but not limited to) the following themes:

• Indigenous studies
• Democracy vs. capitalism
• Poverty and Economic inequality
• Civil rights
• Social movements
• Anti-globalisation
• Post-neoliberalism
• Past and future of labour
• Identity politics
• Racial inequality
• Retribalization
• Rule of law
• Neo-reactionary
• Post-humanism and social activism
• Decolonization
• Racialization
• Gender inequality, eco-feminism
• Social construction of difference
• Reparations/reconciliation
• Social democracy
• Social justice backlash
• Pluralistic identities
• Peace and justice
• Health inequality
• Ableism
• Heterosexism
• Access to education
• Environmental activism
• Abuse of state power

The organizers welcome proposals from researchers within all relevant academic disciplines.

If accepted, the presenter(s) should prepare a 20 minute presentation each, the oral equivalent of approximately 8 to 10 pages, double spaced, in Times New Roman 12pt font.

Deadline for Proposals: May 30, 2017

Please send in your submissions using the form provided on this website.

International Conference, June 1-3, 2017, Department of North American Literary and Cultural Studies of Saarland University, Saarbrücken, Germany

Indigenous Popular Culture is arguably one of the most vibrant and fastest-growing fields of contemporary cultural production not only in the United States and Canada, but across the globe. Indigenous artists, writers, musicians, filmmakers, and entrepreneurs of all walks of life proliferate increasingly on contemporary popular cultural landscape in all its various incarnations, from popular fiction to animation to the fashion world. While doing so, diverse Indigenous practitioners of the popular throughout the world not only intervene powerfully into the landscape of popular culture and representation—a cultural field which is notorious for its various appropriations and misrepresentations of Indigenous peoples—but also draw attention to the pressing social issues which Indigenous communities of today are faced with. Thus, Indigenous popular culture is not only a field of a dynamic creative expression, but often also in one way or another stands in dialogue with contemporary Indigenous activist groups and causes working towards the goal of decolonization and resurgence.

This conference is dedicated to a multifaceted, multifocal, and interdisciplinary exploration of contemporary Indigenous popular culture in all its various facets and geographical locations. The organizers thus welcome papers from all disciplinary perspectives engaging with any aspect of Indigenous popular culture. Suggested thematic fields include, but are not limited to:

• Indigenous Popular Culture and its role in the project of decolonization
• Indigenous Feminism and Popular Culture
• Comparative approaches to Indigenous Popular Culture
• Indigenous geek cultures
• Indigenous fandoms
• Indigenous Popular Culture and Social Media
• Indigenous film, TV, and animation
• The role of marketing, publishing institutions, and distribution channels
• Indigenous genre narratives of all kinds
• Indigenous popular video and music cultures
• Indigenous fashion

Invited Speakers:
Sonny Assu, visual artist
Taiaiake Alfred, University of Victoria
Sarah Henzi, SFU and Université de Montréal

Registration Fee: 30 €

Abstracts of ca. 250-300 words and a short biography should be submitted to amerikanistik[at]mx.uni-saarland.de by March 15, 2017. Please include subject line “Indigenous Popular Culture Conference Proposal.”

Contact:
Svetlana Seibel, M.A.
Universität des Saarlandes
North American Literatures and Cultures
Campus C5 3, Zimmer 116
66123 Saarbrücken
Mail.

Conference, 18 – 20 May 2017, Institute of Canadian and Aboriginal Studies, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON/Canada

The 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, coming as it does in the aftermath of the landmark Truth and Reconciliation Commission, is an ideal moment to re-examine the stories told of Canada’s past. Restorying Canada will inspire bold challenges to historiographic conventions of how we remember, invite critique as well as celebration, and explore multiple media and genres for evoking and interrogating the past, privileging artistic creativity along with academic rigour.

Religion has played a crucial, if understudied role in Canadian history: serving as the engine of residential schools, forming the still-extant „two solitudes,“ inspiring collective visions of state responsibility for health care, and shaping a multicultural identity. In keeping with the urgency of the TRC’s „Calls for Action,“ the conference will also highlight contemporary explorations of the troubled relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, including the legacies of religious, cultural, and linguistic imposition and resistance. Restorying Canada asks a few fundamental questions: How does our understanding of our past impact our present? What aspects of our nation’s history have gone un-told, been forgotten, or been systematically repressed? How have the complex interrelationships among Canada’s religious communities changed? Perhaps more troublingly, how have they remained the same?

Conference keynote speakers include novelist Margaret Atwood, Poet Laureate of Canada George Elliott Clarke, and filmmaker Zarqa Nawaz. Each speaker’s ground-breaking work in their diverse fields of endeavor has encouraged creative and critical re-imagination of Canada’s collective past and its ambiguous legacy; they have participated in „restorying“ Canada.

The organizers invite proposals for individual papers and full panels from scholars, graduate students, artists, writers, filmmakers, educators, journalists, public policy professionals, community activists and others. The Conference will bring together people from multiple fields of expertise who are working on projects broadly related to the theme of religion and public memory in Canada that consider the multiple nations that brought this country into being. The organizers welcome proposals in areas such as the study of religion, history, anthropology, Indigenous studies, law, museum studies, political theory, literature, art, media studies, environmental studies, and archaeology. Since Restorying Canada is considered to include diverse modes of storytelling, the organizers encourage proposals for both traditional and innovative forms of presentation.

Possible topics include (but are not limited to):

• Creative and ritual practices of memorialization, reconciliation, and storytelling
• Indigenous/settler relations, 1600 to the present
• Religion as inspiration for utopian and dystopian visions
• Museums, collectors, and material culture as agents of religion and public memory
• “Secularism,” “multiculturalism” and “religion” as contested categories
• Environmental, geographic, and ecological aspects of religious engagement
• Religion, immigration, and the “values” of Canadians
• Acculturation, appropriation, and the politics of “majority” and “minority” religions
• Religion and changing economic practices/ideals

Deadline for submissions: 3 March 2017

For more information and to submit a proposal, please go to their website.

Organizing team:
Emma Anderson, University of Ottawa;
Hillary Kaell, Concordia University;
Pamela Klassen, University of Toronto

Contact Email.