Thinking emancipation. Radicalities and Social Movements in a Polarised World.
Historical Materialism International Conference. Barcelona 2019 (27-30 June)
The last few years have been marked by major economic, social and political turbulences. They have been years full of hope, but also full of threats. Years when the range of the possible has expanded. Years when we have seen innumerable injustices within a growing polarisation. In the face of an unprecedented crisis of civilisation, political and social activism has flourished anew, in parallel with the renaissance of reactionary forces and movements.
Emancipatory practice needs times and spaces to reflect upon itself, deepen debates on the period and raise its sights beyond everyday urgencies and passing polemics. Spaces where multiple experiences of the present can be compared with those of the past. Spaces in which to think about present practices that point towards another future.
Taking Marx’s well-known phrase “ruthless criticism of everything existing” as our starting point, our aim is to create a framework of plural, unhurried reflection linked to the major problems of our time. We look forward to providing a space for researchers and activists working from a critical, emancipatory and materialist perspective to meet and discuss with each other.
We hope this first conference will help to create a transversal, pluralist and heterogeneous network of researchers and activists working to achieve emancipation and social transformation.
We want to break down walls. Between academic disciplines, between theoretical perspectives, between the academic world and activism, and between theory and practice. Break down walls to build new emancipatory bridges.
We invite researchers and activists to submit proposals for papers and/or panels to make this conference possible. The closing date for submissions is 10 February 2019.
In order to be able to group the debates, the conference will be organised around the following working topics:
1. Popular movements history, historical memory and antifascism
2. Feminism, LGBTQI
3. Ecology, territory and the rural world
4. Economics, globalisation and financialisation
5. Resistances, strategies, movements, and the politics of the common
6. New cultural and artistic practices and criticisms
7. Power, sovereignty, State and democracy
8. Classes, new subjects and new forms of exploitation
9. Law, social control, the penal state and violences
10. The city and urban space
11. Education and the university
12. Migrations, racism and postcolonialism
However, besides these themes, we also invite submissions on any other subject. Anything related to emancipation is welcome. We want to talk about everything; theoretical debates and practical experiences. We encourage the submission of papers on original topics or with original takes on classical topics.
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