This national conference will bring together graduate students from the social sciences and the humanities who research ethnic, racial, and cultural boundaries. Sessions will be organized thematically to allow comparisons of boundaries from diverse regions and historical periods, as well as different disciplinary approaches. With this conference, we aim to shift attention toward the dynamics of boundaries: how they are created, imposed, defended, bridged, subverted, and transformed.

Possible themes might include:

Properties of boundaries: permeability, permanence, salience, etc.
Boundary processes: exclusion, bridging, imposition, etc.
Historical research on racial and ethnic formations over time.
Ethnographic findings on how boundaries are negotiated in everyday life.
Boundaries in cultural production and reception: contesting authenticity, dynamics of collaboration and competition, etc.
Imagery of boundaries in cultural artifacts and performance How boundaries operate in the expression of collective identity, through cultural and linguistic practices.

Keynote Speaker: Fredrik Barth, Department of Anthropology, University of Oslo
Faculty Sponsor: Michele Lamont, Department of Sociology, Harvard University

All graduate students in accredited AM or PhD programs are invited to submit titled abstracts of no more than 300 words to xbounds@fas.harvard.edu no later than August 1. Abstracts should describe the argument of the paper and the text/material/evidence on which it draws. Students selected for presentation will be notified by September 1. They will be asked to submit a completed paper by October 14. Please note that conference attendees will be responsible for finding support for their travel and accommodation expenses at their home institutions. For more information, please visit the conference website at http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/boundaries.

Conference organizers:
Lydia Bean, Department of Sociology
Crystal Fleming, Department of Sociology
Marc Gidal, Department of Music
Michael Jeffries, Department of African & African American Studies
Mark Pachucki, Department of Sociology
Sabrina Pendergrass, Department of Sociology
Yael Schacher, Program in the History of American Civilization