Call for papers
Peoples and Cultures of the World

International Conference
Palermo University, January 24-25, 2019
Building 19, Viale delle Scienze
Rooms: Aula Seminari A and B


Deadline for submitting proposals: 5 December 2018

In this interdisciplinary conference we aim to study different peoples and cultures of the world by taking into account the various ways peoples and cultures define themselves and others, thus shaping their identities. The organising committee (including anthropologists, geographers, semioticians and urban planners) is open to all disciplines and invites contributions from these and other fields of study. We aim to explore the complex relationships being established between cultural dynamics and identities in their spatial and/or chronological dimensions. In our modern world, how can we still talk of homogeneous, spatially defined cultures? In what terms, nowadays, can we conceive a people and a culture stressing their various aspects, as they are stressed in the culture itself? Or, on the contrary, should we resort to other concepts and theories to define peoples by differences and by comparison? In its turn, how does globalization contribute to the delineating, crystallizing or altering of identities? How can we look more effectively at cultural differences through the lens of social sciences? And, most of all, what is the role played by natives and ethnic minorities in our modern world? We are interested in discussing these questions and many others freely posed by speakers in this context. More particularly, we would like to focus on the variety of cultures in the world, on their diversity comparatively studied, but we are also specially inclined to discuss top-down or externally imposed politics and the types of resistance used by natives to escape these hegemonic strategies. We invite papers that analyse peoples and cultures (social communities, ethnic groups, indigenous minorities, etc.) considering their specific features and differences, possibly taking into account the theorizations underlying the construction and deconstruction of collective identities. In this sense, we are interested in the role played by the scholar analyzing different cultures and their spatial dynamics, often fluid and somewhat controversial according to a political perspective.

The list of the themes we aim to discuss includes, but is not limited to, the following:

• Cultural dynamics and single/plural belongings
• Cultural contacts
• Identity hybridizations and new forms of cultural belonging
• Cultural theories and geo-anthropological mappings
• Symbolic, real and virtual spaces
• Centres and peripheries
• Globalisation, difference and identity
• Nations, territories and global systems
• Food, nutrition and identity
• Cities and visual narrations
• Ethnographic documentaries and visual imaginaries
• Ethnographic methods, fieldwork and epistemology of social sciences
• Ethnographies and case studies
• Rites and cultures
• Language, thought and reality
• Culture and ecologic and social sustainability
• Tourism and belonging
• Ethnic minorities, human rights and resistance
• Diasporas and migrations
• Colonialism and imperialism

Scientific coordination:
Leonardo Mercatanti and Stefano Montes

Organizing committee:
Irene Majo Garigliano, Leonardo Mercatanti, Giovanni Messina, Stefano Montes, Alessandro Morello, Gaetano Sabato, Flavia Schiavo, Licia Taverna

Administration:
Department of Cultures and Societies
Palermo University
Viale delle Scienze, 90128, Palermo, Italy

Please send your paper and short biodata to:
Leonardo Mercatanti (leonardo.mercatanti@unipa.it)
Stefano Montes (montes.stefano@tiscalinet.it)
Gaetano Sabato (gaetano.sb@gmail.com)

Information:
Leonardo Mercatanti (leonardo.mercatanti@unipa.it)
Stefano Montes (montes.stefano@tiscalinet.it)
Gaetano Sabato (gaetano.sb@gmail.com)

Deadline: 5 December 2018
Abstract: 250 words (max)
Duration of each paper: 20 minutes
Official languages: English, French, Italian, Spanish

Registration to the Conference is free of cost. Travel, accommodation and food costs are to be covered by participants.