Friday 28 May 2010

Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History: Tamerlane Award

The Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History, an online-only journal published by the Johns Hopkins University Press, has announced it will award a prize for an outstanding article by a young scholar.

The Tamerlane Award will be given every three years to a contributor who has never published a full book or monograph. Academics from the Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, the Caribbean and Southeast Asia will be eligible for the honor.

“We want to encourage scholars from developing countries to submit articles to the journal in hopes of winning this award,” said Towson University history professor Patricia Romero, founder and editor of the journal. “Our focus of colonialism and imperialism opens the doors for all sorts of topics from across the world.”

The award takes its name from Tamerlane, a 14th-century conqueror of much of western and central Asia. Also known as Timur, he was a patron of the arts and much of the architecture he commissioned remains today in modern Uzbekistan.

The first award will be announced in 2011 for articles published between 2008 and 2010. The winner will receive a small honorarium.

A committee of editorial board members will choose the winning essay. Committee members will be Johns Hopkins University professor Franklin Knight, Antoinette Burton, former co-editor of Journal of Women’s Studies, and History Chair at the University of Illinois, and John Lonsdale, Emeritus Professor of Modern African History at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.

Founded in 2000, the interdisciplinary journal features essays covering the period from the tenth century to modern times that deal with broad aspects of colonialism and imperialism. The journal is published three times a year.

Movement for Colonial Freedom

Institute of Commonwealth Studies

Serving the Next Generation ‐ The Commonwealth in the 21st Century Lecture Series

The Movement for Colonial Freedom
Rt Hon Tony Benn
Wednesday 9th June 2010

Lecture to start promptly at 5.30pm and to be followed by a wine reception

Beveridge Hall, South Block, Senate House
Malet Street, University of London
London WC1E 7HU

Founded by the Labour MP Fenner Brockway in 1954, the Movement for Colonial Freedom was one of Britain’s most prominent anti‐colonial pressure groups in the 1950s and ‘60s. The Movement championed the cause of nationalist movements around the world and worked to expose human rights abuses perpetrated in the counterinsurgency campaigns that preceded the end of colonial rule. It was also a fierce critic of the racist policies of Rhodesia and South Africa. As the Movement’s Treasurer, Tony Benn, witnessed these
struggles at first hand. His lecture promises to provide unique insights into this fascinating chapter in the history of decolonization and to offer important lessons for today’s campaigners against racism and oppression.

The Institute of Commonwealth Studies Library holds a number of Movement for Colonial Freedom publications, including documents on Rhodesia and Swaziland. Material in the archives collection includes pamphlets relating to British Guiana and South Africa.

RSVP to Troy Rutt (troy.rutt@sas.ac.uk or 020 7862 8853)
http://www.commonwealth.sas.ac.uk/

Friday 21 May 2010

Regitration open - Society for Caribberan Studies Conference

34th Annual Conference of the Society for Caribbean Studies



University of Southampton


Wednesday 7th July - Friday 9th July 2010
 
Registration is now open for the 2010 Society for Caribbean Studies conference, this year taking place in Southampton.
Panels include: Writing Windrush; Health and Social Policy; the Caribbean in the UK; Regional Integration; Post-War Politics and Development; Performance; Oral Histories; Education; Migration; Material Culture and Archaeology; Literature and Imagining Caribbean Identities. All in all, a wide range of topics and perspectives will be included, as well as the usual social events, included the famed Rum Punch Reception.
 
The Comonwealth Studies Librarian has convened and will be speaking as part of the following panel:
 
Libraries and Archives


Mandy Banton (Institute for Commonwealth Studies), ‘Records relating to the Caribbean in The National Archives of the United Kingdom’

David Clover (Institute for Commonwealth Studies), ‘The West India Committee Library – The Development, Management and Legacy of a Private Association Collection’

Elizabeth Cooper (British Library), ‘The Caribbean Digitisation Project at the British Library’

Kristy Warren (University of Warwick) ‘The Colonial Archive and the formation of a ‘national’ narrative in the British Oversees Territory of Bermuda’

A full programme and registration can be found at:http://www.caribbeanstudies.org.uk/

Sri Lanka - Voices of Reconciliation VOR Radio

A useful resource of non-print material concerned with reconciliation in Sri Lanka was recently drawn to our attention.

VOR Radio is part of the Voices of Reconciliation project led by the Centre for Policy Alternatives. It has created an online archive of radio programmes (including both interviews and discussion) relating to issues of
reconciliation and post conflict reconstruction in Sri Lanka. Topics covered include civil war, democracy, peace and reconciliation. It is possible to search by keyword or browse by date from 2006 onwards. At present it seems to only include programme up to and including 2008.

Technical and copyright information is displayed on the website. Some materials are offered in Tamil or Sinhala languages.

 http://radio.voicesofpeace.lk/
 

(with thanks to Intute for alerting us to this resource)

Thursday 20 May 2010

The Round Table, the British Empire, and the Commonwealth 1910-2010

The Round Table: The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs


in association with the Rhodes Trust



The Round Table, the British Empire, and the Commonwealth 1910-2010

A conference to mark the centenary of The Round Table; Rhodes House, Oxford, 2 July 2010


11.00 registration/coffee

11.15 welcome: Richard Bourne (Chairman, The Round Table)

11.30- 1.00 session 1: The Round Table ‘Movement’

Chair: John Darwin (Nuffield College, Oxford)

- ‘South Africa and the Making of Milner’s Kindergarten’ – Donal Lowry (Oxford Brookes University)

- ‘The Round Table: Making Politics Imperial’– Simon Potter (National University of Ireland, Galway)

1.00 lunch

2.00-3.30 session 2: The Round Table and Imperial Policy

Chair: Wm. Roger Louis (University of Texas at Austin)

- ‘The Round Table and the Dominions: Significance and Foresight’ –  Ged Martin (University of Edinburgh)

- ‘Reflections on the Round Table and India’– Chandrika Kaul (University of St Andrews)

- ‘International Political Pulpit: Lothian and the Interwar Round Table’ – Priscilla Roberts (University of Hong Kong)

3.30 tea

4.00-5.30 session 3: The Round Table and the Commonwealth

Chair: Richard Bourne (Chairman, The Round Table)

- ‘The Round Table and Decolonization’ – Alex May (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography)

- ‘The Round Table and the Modern Commonwealth’ – W. David McIntyre (University of Canterbury, NZ)


5.30-6.00 summing-up and ‘round table’ discussion

Chair: Keshini Navaratnam (Commonwealth Vision Awards)

Participants: John Darwin, Wm Roger Louis, Richard Bourne


6.00 drinks and book launch (‘The Commonwealth and International Affairs: The Round Table Centennial Selection’)



Registration essential. Cost £15 (includes lunch and refreshments). Free for full-time students and unwaged.

Contact Alex May at alex.may@oup.com or 01865-774362.

The Real Story? Personal Papers, Life Histories and Africa

The final programme is now available for this years SCOLMA Conference, focusing on personal papers. There are limited places remaining for this conference so if you would like to attend please register as soon as possible.

The Real Story? Personal Papers, Life Histories and Africa

SCOLMA (the UK Libraries and Archives Group on Africa) Annual Conference

British Library Conference Centre, London, 8th June 2010

Programme

9.30 Registration
(Refreshments available from the British Library’s Piazza café, The Last Word)

10.00 Welcome (Meeting Room 2)

10.10 Keynote (Meeting Room 2)
David Killingray, Goldsmiths College, University of London '“Tin Trunk Literati” and Beyond: Hidden Sources for Africa’s History’

11.00 Coffee and tea (Meeting Room 2)

11.30 Panels 1 and 2 (in parallel)

Panel 1 (Meeting Room 4)
Private Papers, Politics and Activism

Hakim Adi ‘The Solanke Papers and the West African Students’ Union’
M. Amzat Boukari-Yabara, Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales, Paris ‘Looking at the Walter Rodney Papers: Atlanta, Georgetown and London’
Gwil Colenso ‘The Colenso papers: documenting an extensive chain of influence from Zululand to Britain’
Kate Law, University of Sheffield ‘Making Marmalade and Imperial Mentalities’

Panel 2 (Meeting Room 3)
New Ways with Old Papers

Marion Frank-Wilson, Librarian for African Studies, Indiana University ‘Africana Personal Papers at Indiana University – Issues and Questions’
Rose Kgosiemang, University of Botswana Library‘Libraries and Personal Archives, with Reference to the University of Botswana Library’
Liz Stanley, University of Edinburgh and Helen Dampier, Leeds Metropolitan University ‘The Olive Schreiner Letters Project’

1.00 Lunch (Meeting Room 2)

2.00 SCOLMA AGM (Meeting Room 4) All SCOLMA members and observers welcome

2.30 Panels 3 and 4 (in parallel)

Panel 3 (Meeting Room 3)
Individuals and the State: What Private Papers Tell Us

Ackson Kanduza, University of Botswana ‘Who Leaves Private Papers? The Example of Msindazwe Sukati in Swaziland’

Miles Larmer, University of Sheffield ‘Chronicle of a Coup Foretold: The Life-writing of Valentine Musakanya and the Role of Biography in Post-Colonial Zambian History’

Sylvia Lynn-Meaden ‘The Long Garden Master, Charles Lynn: An Agricultural Officer in Gold Coast and Northern Rhodesia’

Panel 4 (Meeting Room 4)
Diaries and Life-writing

Olufunke Adeboye, University of Lagos‘The Private Papers Of Akinpelu Obisesan: Prospects And Limits’

Victoria Cranna, Archives of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine ‘Life in Uganda in the 1920s – the Diary of Geoffrey and Amy Carpenter’

Aldwin Roes, University of Sheffield ‘Following Milestones and Breaking New Ground: the Robert Williams Papers and the Expansion of the South African Mining Frontier’

4.00 Coffee and tea (Meeting Room 2)

4.30 Rahim Rajan, Content Development Manager, Aluka (Meeting Room 2)
‘Building Scholarly Digital Collections to Enhance the Research and Teaching of Africa’

5.00 Plenary panel (Meeting Room 2)
Personal Papers: What are the Issues for Libraries and Archives?

David Clover, Librarian, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London
Lucy McCann, Archivist, Bodleian Library of Commonwealth and African Studies at Rhodes House, Oxford
Dag Henrichsen, Basler Afrika Bibliographien
Jeremy John, Curator, e-Manuscripts, British Library
Janet Topp Fargion, World and Traditional Music Curator, British Library
Peter Limb, Africana Bibliographer /Associate Professor, History, Michigan State University

6.00 Reception (Meeting Room 4)

SCOLMA would like to thank JSTOR / Aluka and the Cambridge University Press for generous sponsorship of this conference and the preceding librarians’ meeting, and the British Library for providing the venue.

Please note that this programme is subject to change.

To register for the conference, please contact Lucy McCann at lucy.mccann@bodleian.ox.ac.uk.

SCOLMA website: http://www2.lse.ac.uk/library/scolma/

Ururangi: Celebration of the Pacific at Union Chapel on Sunday 20 June 2010

We're pleased to help promote the following event:

Ururangi: Celebration of the Pacific
Union Chapel, London on Sunday 20 June 2010

Ngāti Rānana, the London Māori cultural group, in association with Spacific, is proud to present a one-off concert, at the Union Chapel on Sunday 20 June.


The line-up for the event is something very rarely available to a larger audience in London, as it shows, maybe for the first time, how vibrant and active traditional and contemporary Polynesian culture is in the city.

The event feature talents drawn from across the South Pacific region: log drums and dancing by Beats of Polynesia; the soulful sounds of LA Mitchell; spoken word from Sistar Spacific; art by George Nuku; a dance performance by Ana Lavekau and the grand finale by Ngāti Rānana themselves.

Ngāti Rānana has been invited to compete in an International Māori Song and Dance Competition, Te Manahua, where they will be performing against other groups from Hawai'i, Sydney and the Pacific Islands. The concert at Union Chapel is one of many events the Club are holding to raise funds to help pay for the travel to Hawai'i.

Tickets are on sale now for £12.50 +b/f from TicketWeb – tinyurl.com/ururangi

Door sales will be available for £20 on the day.

Location: Union Chapel, Compton Avenue, London, N1 2XD
Date: Sunday 20 June, Doors open at 16:00pm to begin 16:30pm

Websites:
Ngāti Rānana - http://www.ngatiranana.co.uk/
Beats of Polynesia - http://www.beatsofpolynesia.co.uk/
LA Mitchell - http://www.laurenmitchell.co.nz/
Sistar Spacific - www.tautai.org/rosanna-raymond
George Nuku - www.pasifikastyles.org.uk/artists/george-nuku.php

Friday 7 May 2010

Current Publishing in East Africa and the British Library's Collections

Centre of African Studies - University of London

Africa Seminar

Thursday, 13th May, 2010
Room B102, SOAS, at 5pm-6.30pm

Current Publishing in East Africa and the British Library's Collections


Dr Marion Wallace - Africa Curator, British Library

Although publishing in East Africa (as in the rest of the continent) is fraught with difficulties, there is, nevertheless, a steady stream of books and periodicals from presses in the region. These include works of research, scholarship and journalism across the humanities and social sciences, and imaginative literature - much in English, but some in African languages. This paper will discuss some of the main features of publishing in this area and explain what, and how, the British Library collects, and how scholars could benefit from using our holdings. The paper will concentrate on contemporary publishing in East Africa, but there will also be a chance to discuss the British Library's historic collections, and works about Africa published elsewhere, if participants are interested in these areas.

All welcome

New Institute of Commonwealth Studies website

The Institute of Commonwealth Studies is pleased to announce the launch of its new website http://commonwealth.sas.ac.uk/



The new website, along with providing information about the Institute and its MA Human Rights and PhD programmes, has been expanded to include further information about the Institute’s fellows and more detailed information about upcoming seminar series and conferences.

Further content will be added to the website. An archive version of the old website's content on Library collections has been kept at: http://commonwealth.sas.ac.uk/libraries/library.htm
Over the next few months some of this content will be shifting to the Senate House Library website, reflecting the Library's new physical location.

The Movement for Colonial Freedom - Rt Hon Tony Benn

Institute of Commonwealth Studies



Serving the Next Generation ‐ The Commonwealth in the 21st Century

The Movement for Colonial Freedom

Rt Hon Tony Benn



Wednesday 9th June 2010

Lecture to start promptly at 5.30pm and to be followed by a wine reception

Beveridge Hall, South Block, Senate House

Malet Street, University of London

London WC1E 7HU



Founded by the Labour MP Fenner Brockway in 1954, the Movement for Colonial Freedom
was one of Britain’s most prominent anti‐colonial pressure groups in the 1950s and ‘60s.

The Movement championed the cause of nationalist movements around the world and worked to expose human rights abuses perpetrated in the counterinsurgency campaigns that preceded the end of colonial rule. It was also a fierce critic of the racist policies of Rhodesia and South Africa. As the Movement’s Treasurer, Tony Benn, witnessed these struggles at first hand. His lecture promises to provide unique insights into this fascinating chapter in the history of decolonization and to offer important lessons for today’s campaigners against racism and oppression.

RSVP to Troy Rutt (troy.rutt@sas.ac.uk or 020 7862 8853)
http://www.commonwealth.sas.ac.uk/

Saturday 1 May 2010

19th European Seminar for Graduate Students in Canadian Studies 2010

19th European Seminar for Graduate Students in Canadian Studies 2010


CALL FOR PAPERS

The 19th European Seminar for Graduate Students in Canadian Studies will be hosted by the Department of History of the University of Milano, Italy, September 23-24, 2010.

Any students at European universities working on Master's or doctoral theses in Canadian Studies are invited to share their current research in the form of an oral presentation before a panel of experts and fellow students. Contributions from all disciplines are welcome.

Contributions may be in either English or French, and should not exceed 15-20 minutes. A selection of the best papers will be published after the conference.

Application

Students interested in participating should submit an abstract (1 page) outlining the topic of their research and the nature of their findings, plus a short C.V. Applications may be submitted by e-mail. Papers will be selected on the basis of the abstract. Invitations to participate will be sent out as soon as the selection process has been completed.

Deadline for abstracts: June 15, 2010- at the address below

Accommodation and other costs: Accommodation and meals will be covered by a grant from the Government of Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade to the European Network for Canadian Studies.

Travel costs: please apply to your university or your national/regional Association for Canadian Studies.

Contact address:
Prof. Luigi Bruti-Liberati
Department of History
University of Milano

[BACS members: assistance for travel will depend on the number of students attending the seminar; please send a copy of your submission to BACS canstuds@gmail.com and inform the BACS office as soon as you hear whether it has been accepted, otherwise you may not be eligible for funding]

EU-Canada Study Tour and Internship Programme 2010 - "Thinking Canada"

EU-Canada Study Tour and Internship Programme 2010 - "Thinking Canada"

"Thinking Canada" is an exciting new initiative of the European Network for Canadian Studies, a three-and-a-half week study tour to Canada for European students that will take place 1-26 September 2010, followed for a few selected participants by two-month internships. It will be preceded by four days of briefings in Brussels on the EU and EU-Canada relations.

The aim of the study tour is to offer its participants a unique in-depth experience of Canada through an intensive programme of visits to major private and public institutions, government bodies, think-tanks and NGOs. At each place, the students will receive briefings and have the opportunity to exchange views with representatives of these bodies, many of them leading experts in their fields. The tour will begin in Brussels, and travel to Ottawa, Québec, Montréal, Toronto, Vancouver and Victoria.

This immersion in Canada will offer a unique opportunity for an academic experience in a non-academic setting. The tour is focused on a number of themes, in particular cultural diversity (including the English/French relationship, the First Nations and multiculturalism), political issues (federalism, regionalism, the role of government), the environment (including Arctic issues), urban issues and economic topics (business, finance, trade). EU-Canada relations will also be covered and provide a recurring backdrop to the discussions. Two European academic advisors will be accompanying the tour to serve as resource persons and work with the students in helping them complete the specific academic tasks they have previously agreed on with their academic advisors at their home universities.

In addition to the tour, three two-month internships will be offered to participants immediately following the end of the tour. These will take place at the Institute for Research on Public Policy (Montréal), Canada's oldest public policy think thank; the environmentally-focused David Suzuki Foundation (Vancouver); and a Canadian government department in Ottawa.

For further information on the tour, its programme, internships, costs and how to apply, go to the tour's website http://www.thinking-canada.eu/

Deadline for applications: Monday 24 May 2010