TOWARD AN INTELLECTUAL HISTORY OF BLACK WOMEN
Toward an Intellectual History of Black Women is a research project dedicated to recovering the history of black women as active intellectual subjects. A collaborative effort, it aims to encourage scholarship on black women’s intellectual activities among a diverse and enduring community of senior and junior scholars, whose intellectual exchanges will cross generations and foster a scholarly tradition that outlives this particular project.MOREPROJECT FELLOWS
WORKING GROUP SCHEDULE
Call for Papers -- Intellectual History of Black Women
Date & Time: October 15, 2010 - 12:00pm
Project: Toward an Intellectual History of Black Women, Semester: Fall 2010The Black Women's Intellectual and Cultural History Collective (BWICH) is seeking paper submissions for a broad-ranging conference on black women's contributions to black thought, political mobilization, creative work and gender theory. We are interested in work on any time period that explores black women as intellectuals across a broad geography including Africa, the Caribbean, North and South America, and Europe. BWICH aims to piece together a history of black women's thought and culture that maps the distinctive concerns and historical forces that have shaped black women's ideas and intellectual activities. To this end, we are interested in papers exploring subjects including, but not limited to, the genealogy of black feminism, the patterns of women's leadership and ideas about religious culture and politics, the scientific work of black women, the economic ideas of black women, the politics of black women's literature, and the history of black women's racial, sexual or social thought. We encourage submissions from scholars of all ranks, and any relevant discipline.
Accepted papers will be featured at a conference on the Intellectual History of Black Women in New York City on April 28-30. The conference is sponsored by Columbia University's Center for the Critical Analysis of Social Difference (CCASD), which will also cover participants' travel and lodging expenses. Submissions are due no later than October 15, 2010, and should include a one-page abstract of the projected paper, as well as a short C.V. Paper proposals and C.V.s should be submitted by email to: bwhichconference@gmail.com
About BWICH
BWICH is an interdisciplinary, collaborative effort dedicated to recovering the history of black women as
active intellectual subjects. We aim to encourage scholarship on black
women’s intellectual activities among a diverse and enduring community of
senior and junior scholars, whose intellectual exchanges will cross generations
and foster a scholarly tradition that outlives this particular project.PROJECT DIRECTORS
Mia Bay, Rutgers University
Farah Jasmine Griffin, Columbia University
Martha S. Jones, University of Michigan
Barbara D. Savage, University of Pennsylvania
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In an effort to move the study of black thought, culture, and leadership beyond the “Great Men” paradigm that characterizes most accounts of black intellectual activity, we have initiated this three year research project. The goal of this project is to address the lack of attention given to the work of black women intellectuals historically and in the contemporary moment. In doing so we hope to challenge the perception and construction of black intellectual leadership as male and to explore African-American women’s contributions to black thought, political mobilization, creative work, gender theory and identity politics. In the course of the three-year project, we aim to generate a body of innovative scholarship on black women intellectuals that maps the distinctive ways in which black women have engaged and challenged the ideas of both white American intellectual traditions and the racial and political ideas of black male thinkers. Designed to support the development of the next generation of scholars in this field, our project brings together scholars at different stages in their careers. With this end in mind, we hosted a preliminary brainstorming meeting in the spring of 2006. Twenty-two scholars attended this first meeting. Participants assessed the state of the field today, shared descriptions of their individual research projects and set goals for the outcome of the project. We plan to convene more times over a period of three years to address this tremendous void in the field of African American Studies, African Diaspora Studies, African Studies, American Studies and American History. In the first year of the project we will hold a day long symposium for participants of the April meeting to share their works in progress. The following summer we plan to host a week long workshop that will focus on finalizing drafts for a volume on Black Women’s Intellectual History. In the third year of the project we plan to host an international public conference. Participants, members of the working group as well as those who have responded to a call for papers, will present their work to the larger public. Following the conference we plan to gather some of the essays for publication. We will also include sample syllabi and reading lists in the appendices. During the course of this working group we hope to encourage and generate scholarship on black women as intellectuals. Working as a collective, we hope to piece together a history of black women’s thought and culture, that examines the distinctive concerns and historical forces that have shaped black women’s ideas and intellectual activities. To this end, we are interested in subjects such as the genealogy of black feminism, the patterns of women’s leadership and theological commitments in the black church, the politics of black women’s literature, and the history of black women’s racial thought. In addition to assembling the collection of essays that will appear in our volume, we want to provide intellectual support for individual projects, to help the development and creation of courses and syllabi and most importantly, encourage the work of younger scholars in this area. Our project aims to define and promote black women’s intellectual history as a field, and in so doing to generate compelling scholarship that challenges the traditionally male dominated accounts of intellectual work. We also believe that in taking on this important and much neglected subject we will help to create and sustain a community of scholars, nurture and mentor junior professors and graduate students and help to develop the leadership skills of young women.
