Call for Papers and Fellowship applications

Speakers this month are John Michael and Peter Godfrey-Smith. See the calendar for details.

CALL FOR PAPERS
Irvine-Pittsburgh-Princeton Conference on the  Mathematical and Conceptual Foundations of Physics 4 April 2013

CALL FOR PAPERS
Choosing the Future of Science: 
The Social Organization of Scientific Inquiry20-21 April 2013

The Center for Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh invites applications for Fellowships supporting visits in the Center for a term or a year. Deadlines approaching:

Postdoctoral Fellowship
Visiting Fellowship
Senior Visiting Fellowship
So, what's it like?

CFP: Economic Aspects of Science

Call for Papers - Spontaneous Generations: A Journal for the History and Philosophy of Science
http://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/SpontaneousGenerations/

Spontaneous Generations is an open, online, peer-reviewed academic journal published by graduate students at the Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology, University of Toronto. It has produced six issues and is a well-respected journal in the history and philosophy of science and science studies.  We invite interested scholars to submit papers for our seventh issue.

We welcome submissions from scholars in all disciplines, including but not limited to HPS, STS, History, Philosophy, Women's Studies, Sociology, Anthropology, and Religious Studies. Papers in any period are welcome. 

The journal consists of four sections:

A focused discussion section consisting of short peer-reviewed and invited articles devoted to a particular theme. The theme for our seventh issue is "Economic aspects of science"* (see a brief description below).  Recommended length for submissions: 1000-3000 words.

A peer-reviewed section of research papers on various topics in the field of HPS. Recommended length for submissions: 5000-8000 words.

A book review section for books published in the last 5 years. Recommended length for submissions: up to 1000 words.

An opinions section that may include a commentary on or a response to current concerns, trends, and issues in HPS. Recommended length for submissions: up to 500 words.

* Economic Aspects of Science
Nearly every discipline in science studies has considered the economics of science in some fashion. Philosophers have long looked to economics as a resource for understanding science. They have considered how individual scientists might economize time and resources in pursuing a variety of epistemic goals, and have considered how competing scientists might spontaneously organize in ways reminiscent of Adam Smith’s invisible hand. More recently philosophers have begun to consider how science’s changing economic context might be affecting scientific norms. Historians have deconstructed the “linear model” whereby scientific progress leads to technological progress, which in turn drives economic prosperity. They have also considered how science's changing economic circumstances, from the patronage relations of the Middle Ages, to the government-driven funding of the Cold War, to the recent trend toward commercial funding, have affected its operation.  Economists have considered how science might be important for the economy and what  that might imply for science policy.

We welcome short papers that explore these and other economic aspects of science, and especially welcome papers looking to make interdisciplinary connections within the economics of science. Case studies that speak to these issues are also welcome. The questions below might help in further guiding potential submissions:

·      Do philosophers, sociologists, historians, and economists interested in economic aspects of science have anything useful to say to each other?

·      What should science studies learn from the history, philosophy, or practice of economics? For example, should we be applying the results of behavioral economics to our accounts of how scientists operate? Can these lessons be applied to discussions of, for instance, the value of intellectual property as a motivating factor in scientific fields such as genomics?

·      Do, must, or should, scientific methods depend on the economic context of scientific research? For example, does the high cost of randomized controlled trials affect the expectation of repeatability in scientific experiments?

·      What role does Intellectual Property play in science and how has it changed through science's history? Is Intellectual Property just a metaphor, or is it a significant component of an economic system of science?

·      To the extent that they were ever descriptively accurate, are Mertonian norms under threat? What does this mean for the nature of science?

·      Is it illuminating to think about science as an economic enterprise? What do we learn about science in doing so?

·      What does it mean to "commodify" scientific research? Is there a qualitative change underway in what scientists produce?

The seventh issue of Spontaneous Generations will appear in September 2013.

Submissions for the seventh issue should be sent no later than March 15, 2013.

For more details, please visit the journal homepage at http://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/SpontaneousGenerations/

Please distribute freely.  Apologies for cross-postings.

CFP: 13th Annual Conference on Science & Technology in Society

13th Annual Conference on Science & Technology in Society

Abstracts due November 30, 2012

Bridging Boundaries between Science & Technology Policy & Studies

April 5-6, 2013, Washington, DC


Topics: Abstracts are welcome on issues relevant to science & technology policy (STP), science & technology studies (STS), and related fields including but not limited to health; energy and environment; space; information and communications; innovation; education; and ethical, legal and social implications of science and technology.



Two Categories: 

•       Completed Research:  Full paper presentations, moderated by professor

•       Work-in-progress: Presentation of current work-in-progress, emphasis on peer feedback

Eligibility: Open only to students enrolled in a graduate program* at the time of submitting an abstract, for work performed while enrolled. Recent graduates who were enrolled students at the time of submitting abstract are also eligible.

Submission Guidelines: Abstracts should be no longer than 250 words, setting out the main research questions, theoretical framework, methodology, and research findings (tentative for work-in-progress submissions). Submit abstracts via e-mail to abstracts@stglobal.org. Above your abstract narrative (not included in 250 word count), please provide:

•       Whether submission is under "completed research" or "work-in -progress"

•       Title of your research

•       Your full contact information

•       Your expected date of graduation

•       University + name and website of your academic program/department

•       Whether you are applying for a travel grant

Questions?  Email contact@stglobal.org

* Exception made for members of the Triple Helix

CFP: 45th Annual Meeting of Cheiron: The International Society for the History of Behavioral and Social Sciences.

Papers, posters, symposia/panels, or workshops are invited for the 45^th annual meeting of Cheiron: The International Society for the History of Behavioral and Social Sciences.  The conference will be held at the University of Dallas, located in Irving, Texas from Thursday, June 20 to Sunday June 23, 2013.

Submissions may deal with any aspect of the history of the human, behavioral, and social sciences or related historiographical and methodological issues.  All submissions should conform to the guidelines listed below. 

All submissions must be received by January 15, 2013. Please email your proposals to both lstern@collin.edu andblusk@collin.edu

Guidelines

All papers, posters, and proposed symposia/panels should focus on new and original work, i.e. the main part of the work should not have been published or presented previously at other conferences. To facilitate the peer review and planning process, please provide a separate sheet that includes: a) title; b) author’s name and affiliation; c) author’s mail and email address and phone number; d) audio/visual needs.

Papers: Submit a 300-600 word abstract and bibliography that contains the major sources that inform your work. Presentations should be 20-25 minutes in length.

Posters: Submit a 300-400 word abstract and bibliography that contains the major sources that inform your work. 

Symposia/Panels: Organizer should submit a 250-300 word abstract describing the symposium as a whole and a list of the names and affiliations of the participants. Each participant should submit a 300-600 word abstract and bibliography that contains the major sources that inform your work. 

Workshops: Organizer should submit a 250-300 word abstract describing the workshop and, if applicable, a list of the names and affiliations of those participating.

Student Stipends & Young Scholar Award

Student Travel Stipends: Cheiron will make funds available to help defray travel expenses for students presenting at the conference. We encourage students to apply for matching stipends at their home institutions.  Funding is limited to $100 to $300 per accepted submission; co-authored presentations must be divided among the presenters. If you wish to be considered for a stipend, please send an additional e-mail to the program chairs at the time you submit your proposal. 

Young Scholar Award: Beginning in 2008, Cheiron has awarded a prize for the best paper or symposium presentation by a young scholar. To be eligible for consideration, the paper must be by a single author who is currently a student or who has completed his or her doctoral work not more than 5 years prior to the 2013 meeting. If you qualify and would like your paper to be considered, please inform the program chairs at the time you submit your proposal. Three weeks after the meetings, applicants will submit a copy of the presented paper – which may include minor changes – to the Cheiron Executive Officer. The entries will be judged by the Cheiron Program Committee and the Cheiron Review Committee.  The winner will receive a certificate from Cheiron, and will be asked to submit the paper to the Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences within a reasonable period of time. If the paper is accepted for publication, the winner will receive a $500 honorarium from Wiley-Blackwell, the publisher of JHBS.  Winners will receive assistance in preparing the paper for submission to JHBS.

All submissions must be received by January 15, 2013. Please email your proposals to both lstern@collin.edu andblusk@collin.edu

CFP: Feminism, Science & Materialism conference

Call for Papers: Feminism, Science & Materialism conference

Graduate Center, City University of New York

February 14-15, 2013

Keynote Speaker: Karen Barad

In the past decade, feminist theory has elaborated new materialist

perspectives to re-imagine nature, biology, and matter more generally and

to critically address new developments in biology, physics, neuroscience

and other scientific disciplines. This scholarship revisits the

relationship between human corporeality and subjectivity, questions and

redefines the boundaries of human and non-human and nature and culture,

and elaborates on their mutual entanglements. New feminist theories

address materialization as a complex and open process and matter as

lively and productive.

This conference, organized jointly by the Center for the Study of Women

and Society and the Committee on Interdisciplinary Science Studies at the

Graduate Center, will engage with feminist perspectives on the

onto-epistemological questions raised by the materialist turn. We invite

papers from various disciplines that address a wide range of issues,

including, but not limited to:

- The intellectual and scientific context of the new turn toward

materialism

- The relation of matter -- including the biological body -- to the

social.

- The relation between new materialism and previous materialisms (such as

Marxism and phenomenology) and particularly their feminist elaborations.

What are the continuities and discontinuities between feminist

materialisms from the 1970s thru the current moment?

- The insights, knowledge and methodologies offered by the new

materialist studies of science offered.  What new frontiers have they

opened? What can the ³new sciences² offer for feminist theory?

- The political implications of neo-materialism for feminism as a

project, theory and a movement for social justice. How can we account for

durable hierarchies and the normative production of gender, race, class

and sexuality within new materialist frameworks?

- Critical applications of ³agential realism,² as elaborated by Karen

Barad, and other theoretical innovations for addressing

material-discursive relations and the epistemological questions they raise

- Empirical research using materialist feminist frameworks

Space for paper presentations is limited. To apply, please send an

extended abstract of 1000 words and a short bio to

feminism.science@gmail.com by November 1, 2012.

Early Modern Medicine and Natural Philosophy Conference

Early Modern Medicine and Natural Philosophy
Center for the Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh2-4 November 2012

Final Call for Papers; deadline June 1
We invite the submission of extended abstracts (approximately 1000 words) for individual paper presentations (limit 30 minutes).The aim of the conference is to bring to the fore the medical context of the ‘Scientific Revolution’ and to explore the complex connections between medicine and natural philosophy in Renaissance and Early Modern Europe. Medicine and natural philosophy interacted on many levels, from the practical imperative to restore and maintain the health of human bodies to theoretical issues on the nature of living matter and the powers of the soul to methodological concerns about the appropriate way to gain knowledge of natural things. And issues of life, generation, ageing, medicine, and vital activity were important topics of investigation for canonical actors of the Scientific Revolution, from Boyle, Hooke and Locke to Descartes and Leibniz. Recent efforts to recover the medical content and contexts of their projects have already begun to reshape our understanding of these key natural philosophers. Putting medical interests in the foreground also reveals connections with a wide variety of less canonical but historically important scientists, physicians, and philosophers, such as Petrus Severinus, Fabricius ab Aquapendente, Lodovico Settala, William Harvey, Richard Lower, Thomas Willis, Louis de la Forge, and Georg Ernst Stahl. This interdisciplinary conference will bring together scholars of Renaissance and Early Modern science, medicine and philosophy to examine the projects of more and less canonical figures and trace perhaps unexpected interactions between medicine and other approaches to studying and understanding the natural world.Confirmed Speakers include
Domenico Bertoloni Meli (Indiana University)Antonio Clericuzio (University of Cassino)Dennis Des Chene (Washington University)Patricia Easton (Claremont Graduate University)Cynthia Klestinec (Miami University, Ohio)Gideon Manning (Caltech)Jole Shackelford (University of Minnesota)Justin E. H. Smith (Concordia University, Montreal)
Submission GuidelinesPlease submit an extended abstract of approximately 1000 words and a 1-2 page CV to Peter Distelzweig at pmd17@pitt.edu.  Submission should have full institutional and contact information and should be in doc/docx or pdf format.Deadline for submissions is 1 June 2012.Decisions will be announced by 30 July 2012.Partial funding will be available for accepted papers.Organizing Committee

James Lennox (University of Pittsburgh)Domenico Bertoloni Meli (Indiana University, Bloomington)Charles Wolfe (Ghent University)Dennis Looney (University of Pittsburgh)Peter Distelzweig (University of Pittsburgh)Benjamin Goldberg (University of Pittsburgh)This conference is a part of the Medicine, Philosophy and the Scientific Revolution Initiative, a collaborative initiative tracing interactions between medicine and natural philosophy in Early Modern Europe, hosted at the University of Pittsburgh.SponsorsCenter for Philosophy of Science (University of Pittsburgh)Humanities Center (University of Pittsburgh)World History Center (University of Pittsburgh)Department of History and Philosophy of Science (University of Pittsburgh)Medieval and Renaissance Studies Program (University of Pittsburgh)Department of History and Philosophy of Science (Indiana University, Bloomington)

CFP: Early Modern Medicine and Natural Philosophy at University of Pittsburgh

http://www.pitt.edu/~pittcntr/Events/All/Conferences/others/other_conf_2012-13/11-02-12_early_modern_medicine/11-02-12_early_modern_medicine.html

Early Modern Medicine and Natural Philosophy

Friday - Sunday, 2-4 November 2012
Center for Philosophy of Science
817 Cathedral of Learning
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, PA USA

Call for Papers

We invite the submission of extended abstracts (approximately 1000 words) for individual paper presentations (limit 30 minutes).

The aim of the conference is to bring to the fore the medical context of the ‘Scientific Revolution’ and to explore the complex connections between medicine and natural philosophy in Renaissance and Early Modern Europe. Medicine and natural philosophy interacted on many levels, from the practical imperative to restore and maintain the health of human bodies to theoretical issues on the nature of living matter and the powers of the soul to methodological concerns about the appropriate way to gain knowledge of natural things. And issues of life, generation, ageing, medicine, and vital activity were important topics of investigation for canonical actors of the Scientific Revolution, from Boyle, Hooke and Locke to Descartes and Leibniz. Recent efforts to recover the medical content and contexts of their projects have already begun to reshape our understanding of these key natural philosophers. Putting medical interests in the foreground also reveals connections with a wide variety of less canonical but historically important scientists, physicians, and philosophers, such as Petrus Severinus, Fabricius ab Aquapendente, Lodovico Settala, William Harvey, Richard Lower, Thomas Willis, Louis de la Forge, and Georg Ernst Stahl. This interdisciplinary conference will bring together scholars of Renaissance and Early Modern science, medicine and philosophy to examine the projects of more and less canonical figures and trace perhaps unexpected interactions between medicine and other approaches to studying and understanding the natural world.

Confirmed Speakers include:

Domenico Bertoloni Meli (Indiana University)
Antonio Clericuzio (University of Cassino)
Dennis Des Chene (Washington University)
Patricia Easton (Claremont Graduate University)
Cynthia Klestinec (Miami University, Ohio)
Gideon Manning (Caltech)
Jole Shackelford (University of Minnesota)
Justin E. H. Smith (Concordia University, Montreal)

Submission Guidelines

Please submit an extended abstract of approximately 1000 words and a 1-2 page CV to Peter Distelzweig at pmd17@pitt.edu. Submission should have full institutional and contact information and should be in doc/docx or pdf format.

Deadline for submissions is 1 June 2012.

Decisions will be announced by 30 July 2012.

Partial funding will be available for accepted papers.

CFP: Researching Nanotechnology in the Private Sector

Call for Papers: Special issue of
Nanotechnology Law & Business: Researching
Nanotechnology in the Private Sector.

Guest edited by Dr Noela Invernizzi and Dr Sarah R
Davies, in collaboration with the Center for
Nanotechnology in Society at Arizona State University.




Nanotechnology Law & Business (NLB) is a peer reviewed journal devoted to the legal, business, and policy aspects of small scale technologies. NLB provides valuable expert insights and analysis for all professionals involved in these fast-developing fields. The journal is aimed at a broad and interdisciplinary audience of nanotechnology executives, entrepreneurs, investors, attorneys, regulatory analysts, academics, and policy makers involved in small scale technologies.

An upcoming edition of the journal will be developed in collaboration with the NSF-funded Center for Nanotechnology in Society at Arizona State University (CNS-ASU), and will focus on social, legal, and humanistic research on nanotechnology in the private sector. This special issue will be guest edited by Drs Noela Invernizzi (Federal University of Parana, Brazil) and Sarah R Davies (CNS-ASU) to showcase contemporary research on private sector nanotechnology innovation and development. Submissions may include, but are not limited to, treatments of:

· Innovation, publication, and patent analysis;
· Opinion polls of private sector actors;
· Discussion of and research on workforce issues;
· Contemporary legal frameworks concerning EHS and IP;
· How ethical, legal and societal implications of nanotechnology are dealt with in the private sector;
· Studies of responsible innovation;
· The constitution of emergent corporate self-regulation;
· CSR and nanotechnology;
· Meta-industries: consultancy, legal services, and PR in nano-business.

Submission procedure
Those interested in participating in this special issue should submit papers to Noela Invernizzi (noela@ufpr.br) by 30th April 2012. Articles should be no longer than 8,000 words in length, including references, and should use the Chicago footnotes style of referencing.

Please address any queries to the editors at noela@ufpr.br or sarah.davies@asu.edu.

Lancaster Sociology Intellectual Party

Sociology Summer Conference and intellectual party 2012
2-3 July 2012: http://www.lancs.ac.uk/fass/events/sociology/summerconference/

Lancaster Sociology research students would like to invite other PhD students to our annual Intellectual Party in the summer of 2012.

The summer conference in 2-3 July is a great opportunity to present your work at Lancaster, collaborate with other research students, participate in practical workshops, and have a great time. The deadline for abstracts is 14th March 2012.

The 2012 Intellectual Party offers you the chance to meet other Sociology research students; share your work in a friendly, encouraging environment and meet and engage with staff from Lancaster’s department of Sociology. For 2012 we are planning a special gallery of ideas about crises, and a spectacular finale. If you want to stay an extra day, you are welcome to join us on a ‘sociological expedition’ to the Lake District. Our Intellectual Party is more than just another conference; it combines academic challenge with a lot of fun!

All participants have to give a 20 minute talk. This year we are inviting people to submit abstracts in relation to a series of themed ‘Salons’ and more mysterious ‘Secret Gardens’.

Salons: If your research relates to one of the themes listed below, you can submit your abstract for inclusion in a ‘Salon’ – a dedicated session, chaired and hosted by well known ‘Salonnieres’.

Monika Buscher: Digital, mobile methodology, intra-active,
Tim Dant: Stuff, materiality, bicycles, culture, wheels, bags, boxes, things, assemblages, human-thing interaction, guns
Anne Marie Fortier: Multiculturalism, citizenship and migration
Maureen McNeil and Celia Roberts: Gender, sexuality and reproduction
David Tyfield: Crisis, finance, political economy
Elizabeth Shove: Social practice, change and transition, ordinary consumption
Lucy Suchman: STS, feminist technoscience, ICTs, design, innovation
Bron Szerszynski: Climate change
John Urry: Mobilities
Sylvia Walby: Gender, violence and the economy

Secret Gardens: You might prefer to submit your abstract to a ‘secret garden’. Abstracts can be on any theme or topic, but in making your submission we’d like you to pick five key words from the list below that bear some relation to your research. Ambiguity, Body, Complexity, Difference, Energy, Fear, Globalitis (meaning references to globalisation, the global, etc.), Heritage, Income, Justice, Knitting or networks, Love, Myth, Nomadic, Organic, Power, Qualitative/quantitative, Risk, Structure, Time, Un- (as in unnatural, unpleasant, unlikely etc.), Virus, Work, Xperience (deliberately mis-spelt), Yellow, Zone. Secret garden sessions will consist of papers that have key words in common.

If you are interested in joining us and presenting a paper in one of our Salons or Secret Gardens, please submit your abstract by March 14th 2012.

The registration fee for non-Lancaster students is £65. This includes refreshments, dinner and lunches during the two day conference. If you have any queries please contact Angela Loxham.

CFP: Computational Culture, a journal of software studies

Call For Papers: Deadline 30th March 2012

Computational Culture, a journal of software studies
http://computationalculture.net/

The new peer-reviewed open access journal Computational Culture has been
launched. The first issue entitled A Million Gadget Minds is available
online at: http://computationalculture.net/

The journal's primary aim is to examine the ways in which software
undergirds and formulates contemporary life. Computational processes
and systems not only enable contemporary forms of work and play and
the management of emotional life but also drive the unfolding of new
events that constitute political, social and ontological domains.

In order to understand digital objects - such as corporate software,
search engines, medical databases, and their constitutive role in
culture, or to enquire into the use of mobile phones, social networks,
dating, games, financial systems or political crises, a detailed
analysis of software cannot be avoided. A developing form of literacy
is required that matches an understanding of computational processes
with those traditionally bound within the arts, humanities, and social
sciences but also in more informal or practical modes of knowledge
such as hacking and art.

Computational Culture is now inviting contributions for the second
issue. We seek articles, book, project and software reviews, and also
indications of interest for future special issues focusing on
databases and social media.

Please submit a completed paper by the deadline of 30th of March or
contact the editors via the website to express an interest.

Editorial group,
http://computationalculture.net

CFP: Columbia Religion Graduate Student Conference: "Pray, Kill, Eat"

Call for Papers
(DEADLINE EXTENDED TO FEBRUARY 5, 2012)

The Religion Graduate Students' Association of Columbia University is now accepting paper proposals for its Eighth Annual Interdisciplinary
Graduate Student Conference:

Pray, Kill, Eat: Relating to Animals
across Religious Traditions
Friday, April 20, 2012, 9 a.m. - 6:30
p.m.
Columbia University, New York, NY

The keynote speakers for the conference are:

Professor Wendy Doniger,
the Mircea Eliade Distinguished Service Professor of the History of Religions in the University of Chicago Divinity School

Professor Kimberley C. Patton,
Professor of the Comparative and Historical Study of Religion at Harvard Divinity School.


Humans have always had complex and intimate relationships with animals. Animals have been feared, revered, hunted, sacrificed, eaten,
utilized, domesticated, and worshipped for thousands of years. Religious traditions have been instrumental in both reflecting and constructing humans' notions of animals and have integrated such notions into comprehensive mythical, symbolic, and ritual frameworks
of meaning and action. In recent decades, however, many earlier forms of such relationships have been radically transformed in the face of rapid development. At the same time scholars like Kimberley Patton and Wendy Doniger have led efforts to rethink animals
and religion from comparative and interdisciplinary perspectives. This conference, therefore, engages both the shifting complexity of the modern world and a growing body of scholarship in religious studies. We seek papers that explore animals as both religious
objects and subjects, and probe the myriad ways in which religions reflect, shape, and re-shape the relationship between humans and animals.

We welcome papers that address contemporary as well as historical articulations of this topic, drawing on diverse methodologies and sources.
Papers may be on any topic related to animals and religion. Suggested themes include:

- Sacrifice
- The use of animals (or animal parts) in festivals, rituals and other religious contexts
- The deification and demonization of animals
- Religious dietary practices (e.g. prescriptions and proscriptions regarding animals)
- Transgressive practices involving animals
- Animals as the paradigmatic Other
- Blurred categories: hybrids, half-animals, shape-shifting, etc.
- Possession of/by animals
- Animals in religious narratives
- Animal symbolism
- Religion and animals in the 21st century (urbanization, technology, industrialization of animal husbandry)
- Animal rights and the treatment of animals
- Religion, animals, and political discourse
- Evolution and creationism
- Reincarnation

Please submit paper titles and abstracts (300 words or less) to
columbiareligion@gmail.com.

Please include name, institutional and departmental affiliation, and a contact email address.

SUBMISSION DEADLINE (EXTENDED): February 5, 2012
All proposals will receive a response by mid-February, 2012

Roy Porter Prize

The prize of £500 is honour of the Roy Porter, the distinguished historian of medicine, and is open to all students.  The winning entry may be published in Social History of Medicine.  For a list of past winners, please click here: http://www.sshm.org/content/past-roy-porter-prize-winners

The deadline is: 1 February 2012.

SOCIETY FOR THE SOCIAL HISTORY OF MEDICINE

2011 ROY PORTER STUDENT ESSAY PRIZE COMPETITION.

Rules and Entry Form

The Society for the Social History of Medicine invites submissions to its 2011 Roy Porter Student Essay Prize Competition.

1.         Prize: One prize will be awarded for the best original, unpublished essay in the social history of medicine in this competition. The winner will be awarded £500.00. The winning entry may also be published in the journal, Social History of Medicine, subject to the usual editorial procedures, including double blind refereeing.

2.         Eligible Candidates:  Students: undergraduate or postgraduate, part-time or full-time.

·       All candidates must be members of the Society for the Social History of Medicine on the date of submission. A membership form is available on the SSHM’s website http://www.sshm.org. Alternatively, please contact the Membership Secretary of the SSHM. (The membership requirement may be waived for residents of developing countries as listed on the OUP website.  Please contact the Membership Secretary.)

·       The essay competition is only for students registered as of the deadline for submission of entries and for those students whose postgraduate degree (e.g. Masters, PhD, DPhil) ‘date of completion’ occurred in 2011.

·       Candidates who are uncertain as to whether they are eligible to enter the competition should contact the Secretary before preparing their entry.

3          Essays must be:

·       Unpublished and not submitted to any other competition at the same time

·       Written in English

·       Anonymous (Authors must identify themselves only on a detachable cover sheet)

·       5,000-8,000 words in length (including footnotes).

·       In conformity with the bibliographic conventions of Social History of Medicine, available at http://www.sshm.org.

NOTE: The same essay cannot be submitted more than once, and entries from previous years will not be accepted.

4          Assessment Panel: The panel chaired by the Chair of the Society for the Social History of Medicine, consists of the Society's Representative on the Editorial Board, one of the Editors of Social History of Medicine, and another member of the Executive Council of the Society for the Social History of Medicine, with the assistance of other members of the editorial board.

5          To enter:  Please send an electronic version of the essay and a short CV to the SSHM Membership Secretary, Dr Catherine Cox, as email attachments (email address: Catherine.cox@ucd.ie). Please send a hard copy of the completed form (see below) via mail to Dr Catherine Cox, School of History and Archives, John Henry Newman Building, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland. The deadline for mailing entries is 1 February 2012.  All entries must be emailed on or before the deadline date.

Please Note: The announcement of prizewinners will be made at the SSHM AGM held during the Society’s Annual Conference.

NOTES     -       The Editors of Social History of Medicine reserve the right to consider any of the entries for publication, subject to normal refereeing procedures.

-   Members of the Executive Committee of the SSHM or the Editorial Board of Social History of Medicine may not enter either competition, even if otherwise eligible.

-   The prize will not be awarded if the Assessment Panel considers that none of the essays reaches an acceptable standard.

-   Membership Secretary: Dr Catherine Cox, School of History and Archives, John Henry Newman Building, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland.

Constructing Worlds: Making and Breaking Order CFP: 1/15/12

Constructing Worlds: Making and Breaking Order

An interdisciplinary conference sponsored by the Graduate Program in

Visual Studies at the University of California, Irvine

April 5-6, 2012

Irvine, California

“When I ask, ‘What is worlding?’ I’m asking what the material,

semiotic, world-making practices at stake are for whom.

Who-what-lives-dies-how in this worlding? What imaginaries and flesh

are conjoined in these particular acts of worlding?”

- Donna Haraway, Wellek Library Lectures, 5/2/11

Worlding, in Haraway’s model, is an overlapping and intersecting of

both tangible and intangible practices which decide who or what

exists, how, when, where, and why - in short, how worlds are

established, maintained, ordered, and deconstructed. Taking into

account the introduction of various technological, philosophical, and

political developments into our contemporary cultural discourse, the

2012 Visual Studies Graduate Conference at UC Irvine will ask what it

means to make a world, sense a world, exist in a world, or destroy a

world.

The conference will explore constructed worlds in all their visual

manifestations and encourages submissions that deal with the idea of a

world that is not preexisting and fixed, but constructed, or in the

process of creation. This idea of a world is exceedingly supple and

open to numerous complex interpretations. A world can be both tactile

and virtual, exterior and interior. It can be ancient, contemporary

and everything in between. Technology, language, physical migration,

global economics, political discourses, and a litany of other

phenomena contain the power to not only construct new worlds, but also

to redefine and destroy existing worlds. With these ideas in mind, we

seek papers that highlight not only the generation of worlds, but also

their delineation within society. We welcome papers that discuss how

ideology implements and transforms the process of world making or

world breaking, provoking new methods of communication and cultural

interaction.

We hope to receive submissions from across the humanities, arts,

social sciences, and natural and technological sciences which engage

issues of vision, visibility, and visuality, including (but not

limited to) gender and sexuality studies, critical theory, ethnic and

cultural studies, history, anthropology, sociology, environmental

studies, literature and language studies, information and technology

studies, philosophy, political science, classics, art history, and

film and media studies.

Potential topics include:

● The construction and experience of built environments: leisure

worlds such as theme parks, themed attractions,

World’s Fairs and expositions, tourist destinations, malls,

Spectropoli, and virtual worlds

● Distinctions and definitions of urban, suburban, and rural

territories; nature and recreation preserves

● Creating order out of chaos: authority, regulation, and discipline

in the construction of worlds, colonization, nation-building, the rise

of the state, and biopolitics and necropolitics

● The world in binaries: public/private, representation/reality,

utopia/dystopia, creation/destruction, global/local,

universal/particular

● World making as art/art as world making: design practices, museum

exhibitions, and cooperative collaborations

which engage in world making

● Worlds constructed around social categories: ethnicity, cultural

practice, socioeconomic standing, religion, political orientation,

gender, and sexual orientation and practice

● Phenomenological aspects of world making

● Time and space: the evolution of worlds over time, and the

establishment and revision of boundaries

● Rendering worlds: geospatial categorizations, urban planning,

ancient and modern cartography, GIS, digital or

virtual globes, scientific imaging, space, ocean and earth-based photography

The deadline for submissions is January 15, 2012. Please email your

200-250 word abstract to: makingworlds2012@gmail.com.

Final presentation length is 20 minutes. Conference presentations will

also be part of a special online issue of Octopus Journal

(www.theoctopusjournal.org).