Rooted: Legacies of Recovery and (Re)Memory in Cultural Production of the Black Diaspora

“To be rooted is perhaps the most important and least recognized need of the human soul.”—Simone Weil
“My obsessions stay the same—historical memory and historical erasure.” –Natasha Trethewey

In the midst of celebrating the National Museum of African American History and Culture’s historic opening and Howard University’s 150th anniversary as a leading academic institution and “root” in the Black Diaspora, “Rooted” seeks to explore the multiple roots and routes of Black diasporic cultural production as well as sites of memory, heritage, and homage. This includes not only discussions of specific writers, artists, or practitioners but also discussions of various institutions or movements. Open to all disciplines, genres, and periods, this colloquium welcomes presentations on all facets of Black Diasporan cultural production.

Suggested topics include but are not limited to:

• Engagement in or Alterations of Tradition by Authors, Filmmakers, Artists, Musicians, and Other Cultural Practitioners
• Establishment of Intellectual Legacies by Authors and Artists
• Analyzing the Legacies, Antecedents, or Influence of Specific Cultural Practitioners or Specific Texts of the Black Diaspora
• Intertextuality, Signifyin(g), Sankofa (Looking Back), Rememory, or Other Cultural Practices in Black Cultural Production
• Critics, Scholars, and/or Theorists of the Black Diaspora as Mappers of the Tradition
• Recovery of/in Black Literature, Film, Art, and Other Production
• Makers of Movements: Establishing Legacies in Black Arts, History, and Politics
• Toni Morrison, Memory, and “The Ancestor as Foundation”
• Heritage, Homage, and Home in Caribbean Cultural Production
• Edouard Glissant’s Theories of the Rhizome or M. Nourbese Philip’s Routes of the Middle Passage
• Rituals or African Retentions in Diasporan Cultural Production
• HBCU Culture and Folklore
• Ancestry, Tradition, and the Divine Nine
• Howard’s 150th Anniversary: Howard University as the Site of (Re)Memory

Abstract Submission Deadline: January 6, 2017

Please email 250 word abstracts to gesaconference@gmail.com by January 6, 2017.

Also include a brief biographical note, affiliations, and contact information (email, phone number).