CFP: Rethinking Prisons Conference 2013

May 3-5

Vanderbilt University

Nashville, TN

Deadline for proposal submission: December 1, 2012 (send to [email protected])

The Vanderbilt Committee for Rethinking Prisons invites submissions of workshop presentations that interrogate and share knowledge on issues raised by the American prison system. Participants will have 10-15 minutes to present a current work-in-progress, which will be followed by an extended discussion. We are organizing the conference to promote dialogue and community among activists and scholars who share common concerns and bring different knowledge, methods, strategies and experience to the table. To this end, we invite participants to share the stakes of and motivations behind their research, and we encourage participants to speak extemporaneously of their work.

Our conversations will address (but will not be limited to):

(1)        Intersections between the work of prison activists and research in political, literary, legal and social theory.

(2)        Challenges faced by activists seeking transformational alternatives to the U.S. prison system

(3)        The promise and shortcomings of present death penalty and solitary confinement legislation

(4)        The intersections of the U.S. prison system with race, gender, class, and sexuality.

(5)        The intersections of the U.S. prison system with politics.

In addition to the workshops, we will have two keynote speakers, Joy James and Susan Rosenberg.  Other confirmed plenary speakers include Mark L. Taylor and Colin Dayan.

Guidelines for submission of an individual workshop presentation:

Name

E-mail Address
Affiliation – or independent scholar, activist, educator, etc.
Title of workshop proposal
Abstract of 250-300 words
Equipment needs

Guidelines for submission of group session:

Name of panel contact person, and of each panel member
Address of all panel members, including email
Affiliation – or independent scholar, activist, educator, etc. for each person
Title of panel proposal
Abstract of 250-300 words for the panel as a whole
Titles of individual papers
Abstract of 250-300 words for each paper
Equipment needs

Note: Due to the length of sessions, we will only consider panels of no more than three persons. We will give preference to panels that include both scholarly and activist perspectives.

For more information, see our full CFP (below):