The Global Decolonization Workshop (GDW) is a new collaboration between the School of Advanced Study (University of London) and New York University.  It seeks to forge a global forum for knowledge exchange in the interdisciplinary field of decolonization studies.

2017, July 6-7

Argument

The Global Decolonization Workshop (GDW) is a new collaboration between the School of Advanced Study (University of London) and New York University.  It seeks to forge a global forum for knowledge exchange in the interdisciplinary field of decolonization studies.

We are launching this series at the University of London in Paris (ULIP) on 6-7 July with a workshop exploring the ‘Concepts and Connections’ associated with the fields of decolonization and postcolonial studies. These have hitherto largely been defined by a focus on the post-war dissolution of the modern empires of France and Britain.  Consequently, the Cold War ‘last wave’ in Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean has been privileged.  Meanwhile, the earlier, ‘first and second waves’ of decolonization in the Americas, Eastern and Southern Europe, Russia, and parts of the Middle East play little if any role in most ‘global’ accounts of the history of decolonization.  A symposium held at the University of London in March, 2015, however, sought to revise and expand the scope of the field.  The London symposium confirmed Latin America’s vanguard role in the global history of decolonization. 

This Paris meeting of the GDW will explore and debate the connections among and key concepts animating the three waves of decolonization in various locales and linguistic spheres.

We seek papers that address any of the following:

• Key concepts of independence and decolonization movements
• Intellectual history of independence and decolonization leaders
• Connections among empires before decolonization
• History of inter-imperial and anti-colonial warfare
• Connections between global, imperial and local political concepts
• Historical narratives of decolonization in the various ‘waves’
• Translation and traffic in colonial and anti-colonial discourses
• Archival sources of decolonization studies
• Memory of colonialism and decolonization (monuments, museums, etc.)

Submission guidelines

Please submit a 200-word abstract, paper title, and one-page biographical note to Professor Philip Murphy (philip.murphy@sas.ac.uk)

by 5 May 2017.

Selection an organisation

Professor Philip Murphy
Deputy Dean and Director of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies
School of Advanced Study
University of London
email: philip.murphy@sas.ac.uk