Deadline for submitting proposals: December 15, 2007

The deadline has now been extended to January 15, 2008

The AHA's Committee for International Historical Activities (CIHA) invites proposals from historians in all fields who wish to take part as organizers, presenters, or discussants in the 21st International Congress of Historical Sciences (commonly known after its French acronym, CISH) to be held August 22–28, 2010, in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Proposals relating to any of the themes listed below should be submitted by December 15, 2007, to Eric Van Young (Univ. of California at San Diego), chair of the CIHA, by e-mail (evanyoung@ucsd.edu). The CIHA, which acts on behalf of the AHA, the CISH national committee for the United States, will review all proposals and forward its recommendations to the secretariat of the International Congress of Historical Sciences for final action.

Proposals are invited (for consideration in the first instance by the AHA's Committee on International Historical Activities) under the following heads:

1. Major Themes
2. Specialized Themes
3. Round Tables

Proposals may also be submitted for possible inclusion in joint sessions, which are, however, organized differently (see the detailed description below, under "Joint Sessions").

All proposals should contain the following:

1. The theme/title of the panel that the applicant wishes to participate in (consult the list of themes listed below)
2. The title of the proposed paper
3. A brief description of the paper (not to exceed 200 words)
4. A summary account or listing of academic qualifications (not to exceed 200 words)
5. Contact information (affiliation, street address, telephone/fax, and e-mail)

Applicants wishing to serve as organizers or discussants should make this clear at the start of their applications. They should supply a brief statement (not to exceed 200 words) summarizing their qualifications for the task. They should also provide items 1, 4, and 5 listed above.

Major Themes (Three one-day sessions)

• The Fall of Empires
• The City as Culture
• Religion and Power

Specialized Themes (Twenty half-day sessions)

• Biography and Microhistory
• Conquests and Demography
• Who Owns History? Sources Past and Present
• Colonial Empires in Africa and Cultural Hybridity
• The Changing Culture of Travel
• Emigrants and Immigrants
• Free and Unfree Labor in Modern Times
• The Book in a Transcultural Perspective
• Nation-building in the 20th-Century Islamic World
• Consumer Society and Economic Change
• "We are what we eat and what we wear": Food and Clothing in History
• Social History of Credit
• National Identity and Hegemonic Memory
• Frontiers and Boundaries
• History and Human Rights
• Sexual Violence: History, Cultures, and Representations
• New Republics: Nation-building in 19th-Century Latin America
• Higher Learning in Islam, Judaism, and Christianity
• Religion and Society in Premodern South East Asia
• Towards a World History? Social Policies and Politics in a Globalized World

Round Table Themes (Fifteen half-day sessions)

• Slavery: The State of the Question
• History and Ethics
• Tolerance before the 18th Century
• Conflicting Memories of Colonization
• Astronomy and Astrology in Antiquity and the the Middle Ages
• Imago Mundi: Mapping the World
• Is There a Global Approach to History?
• Emotion as Historical Factor: Perceptions and Feelings in the Ancient World
• The Rights of the Dead
• The Public Sphere: The Uses of a Concept
• Urban Violence, Casual and Extraordinary
• Ethnic Diversity, Cultural Exchanges, and Identity in Ancient and Medieval Societies
• The Confrontation of Oral and Written Cultures
• Female Iconic Representations of Collective Identity
• Women and Learned Culture

Joint Sessions (Ten half-day sessions)

Introduced for the 21st international congress, joint sessions are primarily meant to facilitate presentations under collaborative arrangements between CISH and its various member organizations, including national committees. The organizations listed below under each theme have the primary responsibility for organizing the sessions. However, individual proposals (under these themes) may also be submitted for consideration by the AHA's Committee on International Historical Activities for inclusion in the joint sessions. The committee will forward selected proposals to CISH for further action.

Joint Session Themes

• Gender and Education
  International Standing Conference for the History of Education / Commission internationale pour l'histoire des Universités.
• City, Knowledge and Communication
  Commission internationale pour l'histoire des villes / Comité national de Belgique
• Humanism in History
  International Commission for the History and Theory of Historiography / Verband der Historiker und Historikerinnen Deutschlands
• Political History of Historiography
  Société suisse d'histoire / Giunta Centrale per gli Studi Storici
• Images, Mass Media, and History
  InternationalCommission for the History and Theory of Historiography / Japan National Committee / International Standing Conference for the History of Education / Commission Internationale pour l'histoire des universités / Société internationale pour la didactique de l'histoire
• National Histories and the Globalization of History
  International Standing Conference for the History of Education / Commission Internationale pour l'histoire des universités / Société internationale pour la didactique de l'histoire
• Small Countries as Models for Innovative Politics
  Koninklijk Nederlands Historisch Genootschap / Amsterdam Congress Organizing Committee
• International Relations in Sport: Historiographical Trends and New Challenges
  Commission internationale pour l'histoire des relations internationales / Société internationale d'histoire de l'éducation physique et du sport
• The Concept of Space in Modern History
  International Standing Conference for the History of Education / Société internationale pour la didactique de l'histoire
• Trade and Civilization from Ancient Times to Present
  Korean National Committee / Comité national des historiens de la république tchèque

* * * * * *

The 21st International Congress of Historical Sciences will also have three Special Sessions dedicated to the following themes. These sessions are being organized by the bureau of CISH. Hence proposals for these special sessions are not being invited:

• The History of the UNESCO Project
• Ethics, Historical Research, and Law
• The Modernization of China, India, and Japan: A Comparative Study

* * * * * *

Definitions and Guidelines

Organizers

The organizer is the key person for each session. Chosen for their knowledge of the field and historiography, organizers will have the final say in the choice of participants. For all sessions one principal organizer must be identified. This is to facilitate communications between the secretariat of the ICHS, the secretariat of the Amsterdam Congress, and the participants.

Proposals for organizers should give the reasons for the nomination in a few lines (c.v.'s are not required and should not be sent). Proposers should ensure that those nominated agree to have their names submitted.

Proposers should note that the CISH secretariat tries to avoid selecting the same person from one congress to the other as an organizer. To ensure the true international scope of the congress, CISH takes care to reach a proper balance between regions, countries, and gender.

Discussants

For each session, a discussant must be proposed. This person will be responsible for outlining the synopses of the papers and for guiding the general discussion.

Contributors

Proposals for individual papers may also be submitted.

In all cases, it is essential to provide complete contact information (affiliation, street address, telephone/fax, and e-mail).

AHA's Committee on International Historical Activities

• Eric Van Young (Univ. of California at San Diego), chair
• Leon Fink (Univ. of Illinois at Chicago)
• Emily Rosenberg (Univ. of California, Irvine)
• Dror Wahrman (Indiana Univ.)
• Arnita A. Jones (AHA), ex officio

The secretary general of the International Committee of Historical Sciences is Jean-Claude Robert of the history department at the Université du Québec, Montréal. Details about the International Committee of Historical Sciences can be obtained from the CISH web site at www.cish.org.

Brief reports on the 2000 meeting of CISH at Oslo and the 2005 meeting at Sydney (by the respective chairs of the AHA's CIHA) can be read online at https://www.historians.org/research-and-publications/perspectives-on-history/november-2000/the-19th-international-congress-of-historical-sciences-a-report and https://www.historians.org/research-and-publications/perspectives-on-history/september-2005/international-congress-brings-historians-from-around-the-world-to-sydney.