CFP: Slavery and Abolition in Eighteenth-Century Philosophy
Submission deadline: October 15, 2025
Conference date(s):
May 13, 2026 - May 15, 2026
Conference Venue:
Department of Philosophy, Emory University
Atlanta,
United States
Details
Slavery and Abolition in Eighteenth-Century Philosophy
May 13-15, 2026
Emory University
Atlanta, Georgia
Call for Papers
Recent studies of eighteenth-century philosophy have generated incisive questions about the limitations of the moral and political insight of British and European philosophers who were invested in (or silent about) transatlantic slavery. During this period, the rapidly expanding traffic and enslavement of African people appears as a topic of common knowledge and discussion in religion, law, economics, literature, and drama. Writings by enslaved and self-emancipated women and men attested to the violence and degradation of the conditions of slavery, as well as to the hypocrisy of much of Western moral and political discourse. This symposium invites proposals (500 words) for 25-minute presentations that consider writing about slavery and abolition both as and in conversation with eighteenth-century philosophy.
We expect to host 15-20 scholars whose presentations engage with these topics directly or indirectly:
Marronage and Slave Rebellions
Theology and Abolition
Economic Theory and Slavery
Black Abolitionists (in context)
Gender and Enslavement
Marriage and Slavery
Natural law and Slavery
Moral Philosophy and Slavery
Women Philosophers on Slavery
Colonialism and Slavery
Reparation and Restitution
Colorism and 18th-Century Theories of Race
Political Slavery
War and Slavery
Local Histories of Slavery in the Eighteenth-Century (Georgia)
Submission Deadline: October 15th, 2025
[Submit Proposals Online]: https://forms.gle/YodCMraMr34W2pA77
Organizers:
Aminah Hasan-Birdwell (Emory University)
Carrie Shanafelt (Yeshiva University)
Keynote Speaker:
Robert Bernasconi (Pennsylvania State University)
Plenary Lecture:
Huaping Lu-Adler (Georgetown University)