Call for Papers, Annual Meeting, Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut, 9-10 October 2020

The Northeast Conference on British Studies (NECBS) will hold its 2020 annual meeting in Hartford, Connecticut on Friday and Saturday, October 9 and 10. The conference will be hosted by Trinity College, with Associate Professor Jennifer Regan-Lefebvre acting as local arrangements coordinator. 

We solicit the participation of scholars in all areas of British Studies, broadly defined, whose focus is on Britain and its empire, from the Middle Ages to the present. NECBS offers a fantastic venue to make research connections with other scholars and to workshop material at all stages of one’s career. We want especially to encourage scholars who work in Indigenous, South Asian, African, or Caribbean Studies to apply. We welcome proposals for interdisciplinary panels that draw on the work of historians, literary critics, and scholars in other disciplines. Proposals for entire panels on a common theme will be given priority, although individual paper proposals will also be considered if several of them can be assembled to create a viable panel. Proposals for roundtable discussions of a topical work, on current issues in the field, or pedagogical practices with respect to the teaching of particular aspects of British Studies are also encouraged. The typical ninety-minute panel will include three papers (each lasting for roughly twenty minutes) and a chair. (In the interest of allowing greater audience participation in Q&A, the position of “moderator/comment” is optional.) Roundtables may have a looser format.

Proposals should include a general description of the panel or roundtable (including an overall title), a 200-300 word abstract for each paper to be read, and a one-page curriculum vitae for each participant. Please include the address, phone number, and e-mail address of all participants (including the chair and, if applicable, moderator) in the proposal. For panel or roundtable proposals, please note the name of the main contact person. Electronic submissions (as e-mail attachments in Word) are preferred, with all the various materials presented in a single document.

NECBS is committed to promoting diversity in the field. Graduate students, please note: Each year the NECBS Executive Committee awards the David Underdown Memorial Prize to the best graduate student paper presented at the conference. (See details here.) NECBS further hopes to be able to provide graduate students, independent scholars, and early career scholars with some funding towards conference travel. Accepted participants interested in supplemental funds will be asked to submit a funding application in July 2020. We will make virtual participation possible for a limited number of presenters for whom travel costs prove otherwise prohibitive. We will have a lactation room available at the conference and we are working on childcare possibilities; if interested in childcare, please be in touch with Professor Regan-Lefebvre (jennifer.reganlefebvre@trincoll.edu).

All submissions must be received by May 1, 2020 (final decisions will be announced in late June 2020).