Dear colleagues,

I wanted to bring your attention to a conference of interest to those
of you who research slavery or slaving.  The 28th Annual Visiting
Scholar Conference at the Center for Archaeological Investigations
(Southern Illinois University Carbondale) is entitled 'The Archaeology
of Slavery: Toward a Comparative Global Framework.'  The conference
will be held March 30-31, 2012 in Carbondale, Illinois.  All papers
presented at the conference are eligible for inclusion in the
peer-reviewed conference volume, which will be published by the Center
for Archaeological Investigations as part of their Occasional Papers
series <www.cai.siuc.edu/publications.html>.  I have appended the call
for papers below.  More information about the conference and a pdf
version of the call for papers can be found here:
http://cai.siuc.edu/vspages/marshall/vsconf.html

Please feel free to pass this information along to others who may be
interested.  Abstract submission is open to all, and abstracts are due
December 5, 2011.

Sincerely, Lydia Wilson Marshall

This is the first and final call for papers for the 2012 CAI Visiting
Scholar Conference at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.
Abstract submission is open to all who are interested, and early
career scholars are encouraged to apply.

The goals of the 2012 Visiting Scholar Conference are (1) to develop
an interregional and cross-temporal framework of the archaeological
interpretation of slavery and (2) to promote a diachronic approach to
the topic, extending from before the moment of capture to beyond
emancipation.

This conference offers an opportunity for archaeologists studying
slavery to begin building the broader interpretive toolbox necessary
to confront the growing diversity of their field.   The interregional
and cross-temporal dialogue the conference promotes will help
archaeologists develop strategies to confront basic methodological
challenges, such as recognizing material signatures of slavery.
Dialogue will also facilitate productive cross-fertilization between
prehistoric and historical archaeologists interested in similar
interpretive issues—for example, slave identity or slave owners’
strategies of coercion.  A diachronic approach to the study of slavery
offers additional interpretive benefits.  Most importantly, studies
that focus on slaving or emancipation force archaeologists to analyze
the instability of social boundaries and identities rather than to
inadvertently naturalize slave status through inattention to the
process of enslavement.

Prospective conference participants are encouraged to engage one or
more of the following four themes:

A.	The challenges of a comparative interpretation approach, including
•	the diversity of social forms classified as “slavery”;
•	the difficulty of recognizing slavery in prehistoric settings
through purely material means;
•	the frequent discrepancies between archaeological, oral historical,
and documentary data about slavery;
•	the risk of comparisons becoming overly general and insensitive to
the cultural circumstances in which slavery occurred.

B.	The benefits of a comparative interpretive approach.  We are
especially interested in case studies that connect their interpretive
approaches to slavery scholarship with other time periods and/or
geographic locales.  Potentially productive topics to consider include
•	identity creation in captivity;
•	slave owners’ strategies of coercion;
•	landscape versus site approaches to analysis;
•	the role of race and ethnicity in slave systems.

C.	Slaving and enslavement.  We are interested in exploring the
transition to enslavement, including what strategies individuals and
groups used to mitigate their vulnerability to slaving and how the
social identity ‘slave’ was imposed on formerly free people.

D.	Emancipation.  The conference will explore how slavery continued to
shape the lives of formerly enslaved people and their descendants.
Our focus will encompass both ex-slaves in post-emancipation contexts
and self-emancipated Maroons or fugitive slaves living within
still-operative slave systems.

The conference will take place on March 30-31, 2012, in Carbondale,
Illinois. Conference attendance is open to all who are interested and
registration details will be available at
www.cai.siuc.edu/vsprogram.html in the near future.

Participants will also be asked to submit detailed summaries of their
papers prior to the conference, to allow discussion facilitators time
to prepare their responses. Further details concerning these summaries
will be forthcoming upon acceptance of abstracts.

Abstract submissions are due on December 5, 2011, and should be
submitted via e-mail to the 2012 CAI Visiting Scholar, Dr. Lydia
Wilson Marshall, at [log in to unmask]  PDF files are preferred, but
Microsoft Word files are also acceptable.  Abstracts are limited to
250 words (excluding titles, authors, or funding information).  Please
do not include illustrations.  Submissions that do not follow these
criteria will not be reviewed.  See the Abstract Guidelines at
www.cai.siuc.edu/vspages/marshall/vsconf for further information on
preparing your submission.

Abstracts will be reviewed, and applicants will be informed of the
decision in mid-January.  All papers presented at this conference are
eligible for inclusion in the peer-reviewed conference volume, which
will be published by the Center for Archaeological Investigations as
part of their Occasional Papers series
<www.cai.siuc.edu/publications.html>.

We look forward to your submissions, and hope that you will take the
opportunity to join us in Carbondale for this exciting event.


-- 
Lydia Wilson Marshall, Ph.D.
Visiting Scholar 2011-2012
Center for Archaeological Investigations
Southern Illinois University Carbondale