International Call for Papers

The Center for Southeast Asian Studies, in conjunction
with the Walter Chapin Simpson Center for the Humanities
at the University of Washington, Seattle (USA), invites
academics, advanced graduate students, and independent
scholars to submit paper proposals for the conference-workshop

"BEYOND BORDERS: ALTERNATIVE VOICES AND HISTORIES
OF THE VIETNAMESE

to be held on the Seattle campus of the University of
Washington from Thursday, March 4th, to Sunday, March 7th, 2010.

Organizers and co-coordinators:
Christoph Giebel and Judith Henchy (Univ. of Washington - Seattle)

Co-coordinators and "keynote speakers in dialog":
Mariam B. Lam (Univ. of California - Riverside) and Jack Yeager (Louisiana State University). These two scholars of the Vietnamese diaspora will help frame the conference-workshop with distinct Francophone and American perspectives.

GENERAL CONCEPT: This March 2010 conference-workshop on the Vietnamese diaspora is the third in a three-part series, constituting a multi-year
research initiative in Viet Nam Studies, "Alternative Voices and Histories in Viet Nam: Colonial Modernities and Post-colonial Narratives." The
initiative's aims are:

* to bring together scholars from around the world who focus on new
interpretations of Vietnamese history and historiography;

* to provide a forum for recent, disparate work on new sources and
under-researched topics to critically engage with one another;

* and to make the results available to the wider academic community.



CALL FOR PAPERS: For this workshop on the Vietnamese diaspora, "Beyond Borders," we are seeking papers that focus on the disparate margins of Vietnamese identities. Papers should explore the particular and multiple histories of Vietnamese overseas sojourn, migration and exile in early modern, colonial, war time, post-1975, and socialist contexts.
At the same time, contributors can help articulate the initiative's
interest in marginal voices in Vietnamese historiography with the
disciplinary concerns of ethnic and global cultural studies.

Papers might illuminate, among many other possible themes:

* colonial politics of exile and punishment throughout the global French empire;

* inter-colonial and transnational connections in exile, for example, by
Vietnamese soldiers, workers, students, political activists, prisoners,
travelers, or those subjected to colonial display;

* literary representations of diaspora, from colonialism and the anomie of "foreigners at home" to the contemporary Vietnamese imaginary of exile and return;

* diasporic community formations, acculturations, as well as ethnic
enclave politics and economics;

* politically diverse exile groups during the war years and their relations with post-war refugee communities;

* comparative diasporic work, or multi-sited anthropological research on, for example, overseas Vietnamese student and migrant/contract labor populations, adoptees, or transnational out-marriages;

* exposure/isolation of particular demographics: e.g.,Israeli-Vietnamese, Versailles-New Orleans, or non-identifying diasporic communities from Viet Nam;

* overseas Vietnamese linkages to Viet Nam, remittances, anti-communist rhetoric, generational concerns, and educational differences.

In general, the organizers welcome papers on the Vietnamese diaspora, broadly defined in time and space, that engage a wide range of sources and literatures, in particular new and under-researched ones.

Please submit, preferably electronically,
(1) a paper abstract,
(2) a brief statement how the paper will engage the larger themes and
concerns of the workshop, and
(3) a short C.V.

BY MONDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 2009

to the organizers of the conference series:

Christoph Giebel, Assoc. Prof. of History and International
Studies, and
Judith Henchy, Head, Southeast Asia Section, University of Washington
Libraries, and Lecturer in International Studies,

c/o Center for Southeast Asian Studies
University of Washington, box 353650
Seattle, WA 98195-3650, USA

Participants should agree to submit their draft papers no later than three
weeks prior to the workshop, be willing to provide detailed comments on
other select papers, engage in group deliberations during the entire
workshop, and, if feasible, commit to actively participate in periodic
follow-up discussions and commentary for possible publications. While
graduate students will receive a modest travel subvention from the
organizers, all other participants will be expected to cover their expenses
through other institutional funds.