Call for Papers: The Archaeology of Internment

 Session for the 6th World Archaeological Congress, Dublin, 29 June – 4 July
2008


Greetings – Find below the outline for a session at World Archaeological
Congress 6, upcoming in Dublin, Ireland, from 29 June to 4 July, 2008.
http://www.ucd.ie/wac-6/  The organisers hope to produce a publication from
this session.

If you are interested in taking part in this session please submit your
proposal online http://www.ucd.ie/wac-6/ and send a concise abstract
directly to [log in to unmask] or [log in to unmask]

The official deadline for submission is 22nd February 2008. We look forward
to your contributions to what will certainly be an exciting and potentially
controversial session.

This call for papers can also be accessed here for viewing or printing:
http://docs.google.com/View?docid=df98j2rs_344v4v4mgv

Of course, do not hesitate to contact us with any questions.

Adrian & Gabriel

_________________________________________________________________


Theme
Critical Technologies: The Making of the Modern World

Session
Archaeologies of Internment: Method and Theory for an Emerging Field

Lead Organizer 1
Adrian Myers, Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre (Canada)
[log in to unmask]
www.vhec.org

 Lead Organizer 2
Gabriel Moshenska, University College London (United Kingdom)
[log in to unmask]

Abstract
Europe in 1945 was a landscape of camps.  These distinctive sites of
internment served as prisons, literally or effectively, for the displaced,
demobbed, captured, persecuted, diseased, exiled, and hunted.  Within a few
years this landscape had vanished, leaving only traces and memorials.
Internment is often a property of societies in transition; the ephemeral
nature of the remains eliding their historical significance.  This session
examines the potential contribution of archaeological approaches to the
study of internment on a global scale.

As archaeological methods are increasingly applied to the interpretation and
management of sites of modern conflict, sub-fields begin to emerge. By
bringing together papers on 'the archaeology of internment' we hope to
increase our understanding of forced mass internment events; events that
were and are deeply influenced by the emerging 'critical technologies' of
the 20th and 21st centuries. The modern and industrial, and increasingly
post-modern and digital, nature of conflict reverberates through the
internment experience.

We invite papers on the material aspects of the relocation and confinement,
typically without trial, of 'enemy aliens', ethnic minorities, political
prisoners, displaced persons, prisoners of war, 'enemy combatants' and
others. The sites of internment include concentration camps, death camps,
prisoner of war camps, 'relocation centres', and others. Topics can include
any geographic or temporal context including recent and current events. We
anticipate contributions that report on field work, but also more
theoretical pieces. The papers should be 5-10 minutes long, and should
situate internment archaeology within one or more of the wider contexts of
conflict archaeology, material culture studies, and contemporary and
historical archaeology.