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Largely driven by economics, migration today is a global and globalizing
phenomenon that renders
national borders obsolete and calls into question the viability of nation
states and national identities. Yet
precisely because it undermines national structures, migration also has
contributed to the reinvention of
the historically highly problematic concept of “homelands” and the
reconstruction of increasingly
impenetrable borders. It is, moreover, in local situations and contexts
that the impact of global migration is
experienced, debated, and contested most directly and urgently. This
conference, then, aims to focus on
the ways in which migration matters locally as well as transnationally
and globally, in the realms of
politics and culture, history and sociology, economics and law, language,
literature and the arts in Europe
and the Americas. The following list of topics is meant to be suggestive
rather than restrictive:

Migration and the reinvention of (national and transnational, real and
imaginary) “homelands” and/or
the reconstruction of (external and internal, national, ethnic and
racial, cultural and mental, political and
economic) borders
Global migrations and fluid geographies in terms of
physical mappings and shifting
populations
Migration and national/ethnic/cultural/aesthetic border
crossings
Migration and
modernization
Immigration debates in various national contexts
Images
of the host countries in
countries/continents of migratory origin
Immigration restrictions and
human rights; legal and extralegal
status of immigrants
Circulation and impact of migrant peoples and
cultures in specific rural and
urban spaces; cultural diversity in local societies
New immigrant
literatures as world and/or national
literature; representation in and impact on regional cultures,
literatures, media, and arts

Macrosociological analyses of migration and globalization processes;
rethinking the sociology of literature

Cultural production (literature, film, visual art, performance, music,
blog-culture, web-art) by or about
migrants
Migration and the reinvention of religious identities

Emerging identities/identity
fashioning; ethnic refashioning: conflict and/or reconciliation

Historical case studies of migrancy and
diaspora; evolving diaspora cultures
Migration and gender
Migration
and race/racialization

Forced migration and historical/contemporary slavery or bonded labor

Migration and linguistic
diversity
Immigration and educational reformation(s)

Please submit three hard copies of a 300-word abstract (including a
maximum of five keywords) or full
panel proposals (including a description of the panel, chair,
respondents, and individual abstracts) as well
as an electronic copy to MESEA’s Program Director, Yiorgos Kalogeras,
Department of English, Aristotle
University, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece by November 15, 2007:
(kalogera_at_enl.auth.gr).
Inter/transnational and inter/transdisciplinary proposals and panels will
be given preference.
Note that MESEA will award two Young Scholars Excellence Awards.
For more information: http://www.mesea.org

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Received on Sun Sep 09 2007 - 12:45:55 EDT