The Swiss Studies Network announces its call for papers for the 2012 annual conference of the GSA in Milwaukee, WI, Oct. 4-7, 2012. The new Swiss Studies Network seeks to promote the study of Switzerland from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including--but not limited to--history, political science, literature, business and economics, cultural studies, and linguistics.

Because the 2012 conference will mark the formal inauguration of the Swiss Studies Network, this first call for papers invites contributions on the general theme, "Switzerland Today." We seek papers addressing the contemporary significance of Swiss history, culture, and politics. Papers might address topics such as the following:

• Switzerland's unusual mixture of local particularism and Weltoffenheit, as it relates to issues of identity and globalization
• Rituals of longing: Heimweh and Fernweh as Swiss specialties
• Diversity and difference: Switzerland as a multi-national, -lingual, and -confessional society; the Swiss experience with immigration (including German immigration)
• Characteristic Swiss political institutions: direct democracy, referenda, the plural executive, federalism
• Switzerland's complex relationship with European and international institutions
• Switzerland as a brand, and the contemporary crisis of values: from cheese and chocolate to Nazigold and the Minarettenverbot

We invite papers addressing these, and other topics related to the continuing importance of "things Swiss," from all disciplinary perspectives. While we especially encourage the submission of entire panel proposals, we are also happy to accept proposals for individual papers and will work to combine them into appropriate panels. Proposals are due by Feb. 6, 2012, and should be sent to Peter Meilaender (Professor of Political Science, Houghton College) at peter.meilaender[a]houghton.edu. Questions can be sent to the same address.