Call for Papers for a Conference at The New Jersey Historical Society

Sponsored by The New Jersey Historical Society and the Rutgers University Institute for Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience

Conflicts in Context: Race, Ethnicity, and Urban Unrest in Post-War New Jersey

The New Jersey Historical Society and the Rutgers University Institute for Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience announce a one-day conference on November 13, 2004 and subsequent publication on topics relating to race, ethnicity, politics, and the urban environment in post-war New Jersey.

The conference is inspired by the Historical Society’s upcoming national traveling exhibition on American urban unrest in the 1960s, which looks at the events of the 1960s and early 1970s within a national and historical context.

Conference organizers seek papers (or proposals for panels) from diverse perspectives that address 1960s urban unrest in New Jersey or topics that relate to or inform the events. Papers might explore 20th-century urban immigration and migration, issues involving race, local and/or national politics, de-industrialization, suburbanization, or other topics that provide insight into the massive changes that the state’s urban areas experienced after World War II. We seek presentations from a variety of disciplines, including history, American Studies, sociology, and anthropology, as well as a variety of expressions, including literary and artistic.

To be considered for inclusion, prospective speakers must submit a 250-word abstract or panel proposal no later than May 15th to the address provided below. Those whose papers/presentations are selected must submit their papers by October 1, 2004. All conference papers will be considered for publication in a special issue of New Jersey History, to be issued in early 2006.

The New Jersey Historical Society uses the resources of history to explore the peoples and cultures of New Jersey, past and present. The Rutgers University Institute for Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience is a community oriented, interdisciplinary academic program that promotes interracial and multicultural understanding through public programs that present new scholarship on the social construction of difference and cultural diversity. Partners in the Historical Society’s exhibition development include the Historical Society of Washington, DC, The Charles Wright Museum of African American History, the California African American Museum and the African American Museum and Library at Oakland. Exhibition planning is funded in part by The National Endowment for the Humanities.