CfP: Malmö Conference on Refugees, Borders and Membership

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Malmö University and its recent inauguration as full university, Malmö Institute for Studies of Migration, Diversity and Welfare, MIM, is organizing a large international conference on the subject of refugees, borders and membership, which is free to attend. More specifically, we seek to highlight the complex and evolving relation between refugee migration, the legal and socio-cultural borders between and within states and continents, and questions of membership and belonging.

We welcome contributions from all disciplines, theoretical as well as empirical, normative as well as explanative, qualitative as well as quantitative, micro as well as macro. We also encourage contributions from scholars who do not necessarily think of themselves as migrationists, since we believe in the value of new and unconventional approaches to the development of migration research.

Keynotes

The conference takes place at Malmö University between the 24th and 26th of October. It includes one keynote address by Professor David Miller of Oxford University and another keynote address yet to be decided, with ensuing panel discussions, and two full days of in-depth workshops on different subjects related to the conference theme.

Workshop format

The conference contains two extensive workshop time slots with parallel workshops running from Wednesday (24 Oct) afternoon to Thursday lunch (25 Oct) and Thursday afternoon to Friday lunch (26 Oct), respectively. Each workshop slot amounts to approximately six hours including coffee breaks etc. Workshop organizers may can apply for one or two time slots.

To offer sufficient space and time for each paper (presentation and discussion) organizers are advised to calculate 30-40 minutes per paper, which makes 6-10 papers per workshop slot. Papers should be circulated well in advance within the workshop group and assigned individual discussants. Workshop organizers may be asked to include a few additional papers submitted separately through an open call (see below).

Workshop proposals (deadline 1st May 2018)

Workshop organizers are asked to submit their proposal by completing the online application that opens on February 15th (on this webpage) and close on May 1st . Each organizer will be primarily responsible for selecting the participants and papers for their workshop.

When proposing a workshop, we ask that workshop organizers provide a preliminary title and abstract for their workshop, as well as the names of participants, and the titles and abstracts (200-300 words long) of the papers to be included. The workshop abstract should be a 300–500 words long description and motivation of the workshop theme as well as the specific questions and problems it addresses. We will only accept one workshop proposal and maximum two paper proposals per person. Workshops can be organized by one, two or three people together.

Paper proposals (deadline 15th June 2018)

There will also be an open call for paper proposals not included in any of the proposed workshops. The separate paper proposal online application opens on March 1st and closes on June 15th on this webpage. Paper proposals should consist of a title and a 200-300 words long abstract submitted through the online application form no later than June 15th. The separate paper proposals will be assigned to existing workshops or to additional ones constructed by the conference organizers.

Decisions about paper acceptance will be communicated by June 15th.

Conference registration

Registration for the conference is made via the online form no later than September 1st.

Getting to Malmö

The nearest big international airport is in Copenhagen (Denmark) just across the Öresund strait from Malmö. From the airport it is easy to take the train or taxi to Malmö. The train takes about 20-30 minutes to reach the Central Station in Malmö, which is just next to the university. Malmö airport is a smaller airport with some international flights. From there it takes about 50 minutes to reach the Central Station in Malmö by bus and 30 minutes by taxi.

Accommodation

There is a large variety of hotels close to the university.

Contact

Contact Christian Fernández (academic organizer) for question about the conference, workshop proposals, etc. via email: christian.fernandez@mah.se

Contact Anastasia Egorova (administrative assistant) for questions about communications, accommodation, registration and other practical matters via email: anastasia.egorova@mah.se

Venue

Malmö University, Nordenskiöldsgatan 1, 205 06 Malmö, Sweden

Visit the Malmö Institute for Studies of Migration, Diversity and Welfare, MIM, website.