CFP: New Perspectives on Middle Eastern Migrations
The Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies, in conjunction with the editors of Mashriq & Mahjar: The Journal of Middle East and North African Migration Studies, invites conference papers that offer new perspectives on the past and present of migration to, from, and through the Middle East. What was once a marginal, passing interest for scholars of the region and its place in the world is now a flourishing and vibrant field, bringing together a host of disciplines, from history, anthropology, geography, and sociology to comparative literature and cultural studies, and from refugee studies to political economy and settler colonial studies.
With this in mind, we invite contributions that provide original insight, by opening up new paths of inquiry and shedding light on neglected subjects, but also by suggesting methodological innovations and offering perspectives on the field’s development.
These contributions may reflect existing disciplinary approaches or adopt interdisciplinary and cross-disciplinary vantage points. We encourage the inclusion of projects which bring Middle Eastern studies into conversation with South Asian, African, Latin American, and American studies.
Contributions from early-career researchers, and from scholars working in the global South, are particularly welcome.
Potential themes may include the following:
• Race, whiteness, and Middle Eastern migration
• Gender, femininity, and masculinity
• Sexuality and migration
• Queer studies and migration
• Youth, childhood, generational change and movement
• Environmental perspectives on movement
• Law and movement
• Narratives of migration in literature, cinema, and ego-documents
• The archives of migration
• Labor migration and the political economy of movement
• Mobility/immobility
• Leaving/Staying
• Geospatial perspectives on migrant networks
Please send paper proposals in MS Word or PDF format via email to the organizers at the following address: akhater@ncsu.edu. Proposals should have a title and abstract of no more than 300 words, and should include contact information and institutional affiliation. The deadline for receipt of paper proposals April 3, 2020
The conference will be held at North Carolina State University, Raleigh, North Carolina on September 11-13, 2020. It will be hosted by the Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies at North Carolina State University. The organizers will cover all the costs of housing and meals for participants for the duration of the conference, and provide some support toward travel. Some papers will be selected for subsequent publication.