Deadline for Submissions, October 1, 2010

Contemporary debates about food, agriculture, and rural life are often framed in opposition with little attention to historical context. Proponents of the local, slow, and organic often emphasize quality while advocates of the global, fast, and industrial stress quantity to satisfy world demand for food. The Agricultural History Society invites proposals for papers that engage or transcend these debates by examining questions about quality and quantity as they relate to food, farming, and/or rural life from a historical perspective. We especially welcome submissions that counter or reframe the accepted narratives of the field. Topics from any time period and location are welcome.

The AHS encourages proposals of all types and formats, including traditional sessions with successive papers and commentary, thematic panel discussions or debates, roundtables on recent books/films, and poster presentations. The program committee prefers complete session proposals, but individual paper proposals are welcome. The AHS extends a special welcome to graduate students and provides up to $250 in travel reimbursement to each graduate student whose paper is accepted for the conference.

Paper proposals should consist of a 200-word abstract and one-page CV. Session proposals should include a 200-word session summary to accompany the 200-word paper abstracts as well as a one-page CV for each participant.

Submit all proposals to:
Joe Anderson
Mount Royal University
jlanderson@mtroyal.ca

Questions may be directed to any member of the program committee:
Jenny Barker-Devine
Illinois College
Jenny.barkerdevine@ic.edu

Susan Sessions Rugh
Brigham Young University
susan_rugh@byu.edu

Mark Hersey
Mississippi State University
mhersey@history.msstate.edu

David Vail
Kansas State University
ddvail@k-state.edu

Deadline: 31 March 2010

The Society for the History of Technology will hold its annual meeting in Tacoma, Washington from September 30 to October 3, 2010. The Program Committee invites paper and panel proposals on any topic in the history of technology, broadly defined. Sessions dealing with non-Western technologies are particularly welcome. Of special interest for 2010 are proposals that engage in themes that resonate with the concerns of the specific locale. These include:

Consumption: In the popular imagination, the Tacoma-Seattle area is associated with several important corporate entities (Boeing, Microsoft, Nintendo, Starbucks, etc.) whose goods and services are deeply embedded in global consumer culture. At a moment in time when consumption, sometimes excessive, sometimes globalized, sometimes exploitative, is of great concern to both the public and policy-makers, Tacoma is an appropriate place for historians to (re)consider technologies of consumption. We are especially interested in papers that see production and consumption as coterminous processes and which historicize consumption as part of broader processes in the history of technology. We define consumption very broadly to include the public’s active engagement with technologies and technological systems, which may include environmental, communications, and obsolete technologies.

The Program Committee encourages sessions dealing with topics appropriate to the meeting location, such as aerospace and maritime history, labor history, forest products, information technology, and themes relevant to the Pacific world. We also encourage historians of technology to reach out to scholars in aligned and/or related fields when constructing research proposals as one way to create a more interdisciplinary environment. Finally, we invite papers and panel proposals that emphasize the longue durée, particularly those that problematize demarcations such as modern/premodern, colonial/postcolonial, and preindustrial/industrial. As always, sessions dealing with pre-modern, Medieval, and ancient topics are especially welcome.

The Program Committee’s highest priority in evaluating paper and panel proposals is scholarly excellence. The Committee welcomes proposals for individual papers or sessions, as well as works-in-progress from researchers of all stripes (including graduate students, chaired professors, and independent scholars). It welcomes proposals from those new to SHOT, regardless of discipline. Multinational, international, and cross-institutional sessions are also desirable. We especially encourage proposals from non-Western scholars.

For the 2010 meeting the Program Committee continues to encourage unconventional sessions; that is, session formats that vary in useful ways from the typical three/four papers with comment. These might include round-table sessions, workshop-style sessions with papers that are pre-circulated electronically, or “author meets critics” sessions. We also welcome poster proposals for presentation in poster sessions. Please note that in general we discourage panels with more than three papers.

The deadline for proposals is 31 March 2010.  Please submit your proposals to shot.tacoma2010@gmail.com.

Proposals for individual papers must include:
1. a one-page abstract (maximum 600 words)
2. a one-page curriculum vitae, including current postal and e-mail addresses

Proposals for complete sessions must include:
1. a description of the session that explains how individual papers contribute to an overall theme.
2. the names and paper titles of the presenters
3. for each presenter, a one-page summary (maximum 600 words) of the paper’s topic, argument(s), and evidence used
4. for the commentator, chair, and each presenter: one-page c.v., with postal and e-mail addresses

Please indicate if a proposal is sponsored by one of SHOT’s special interest groups.

Submission Instructions:
1. Materials should be sent as a single text attachment to an e-mail message to the Program Committee Chair, Asif Siddiqi at shot.tacoma2010@gmail.com

2. Proposals for complete sessions as well as individual papers should be submitted in one file.
3. Please adhere to the 600-word limit for each paper. Use no unusual fonts or special formatting, and save your attachment either as a Microsoft Word document (.doc or .docx) or as a Rich Text Format (.rtf) file. Nearly all word processing programs, including those used on Apple computers can save text in the Rich Text Format. Do not use Adobe Acrobat (pdf).
4. Name your attachment with your last name and the word ‘proposal’, e.g. ‘Smith_proposal.doc’.
5. A session organizer should also deliver a description of the overall session.  If you are organizing a session and proposing a paper in that session, you will be delivering both an “abstract” and “proposal”, plus your c.v.
6. If you are proposing a non-traditional session you may indicate that in the “abstract.” These also require a curriculum vitae.

General information:
While SHOT rules exclude multiple submissions (i.e., submitting more than one individual paper proposal, or proposing both an individual paper and a paper as part of a session), scholars may both propose a paper and serve as a commentator or session chair.

Generally speaking, the Program Committee discourages scholars from presenting papers at two consecutive meetings held in North America.  Exceptions can be made for scholars traveling from overseas.  Individuals are always welcome to serve as chairs and commentators and are encouraged to let the Program Committee know if they are available.

For more information about the Society for the History of Technology and our annual meeting, please see the SHOT webpage:

http://www.historyoftechnology.org/

For questions, please contact SHOT Secretary Bernie Carlson at shotsecy@virginia.edu.

Jane Carlson
Admin Assistant to Exec. Sec
Society for the History of Technology
Charlottesville, VA
(434) 975 2190 (fax)
(434) 987 6230 (cell)

Reusing the Industrial Past
Tampere, Finland
10–15 August 2010

A Joint Conference between the International Committee for the History of Technology (ICOHTEC) and The International Committee for the Conservation of the Industrial Heritage (TICCIH). The International Association of the Labour Museums (WORKLAB) is a minor partner in the conference.

Deadline for Proposals is 16 November 2009.

Conference language: English

As a joint conference, the primary theme ‘Reusing the Industrial Past’ is intended to be a broad idea covering various approaches. Clearly, the industrial past is reused whenever old industrial installations are renovated or adapted. There have been many attempts to preserve the most significant aspects of old industrial areas after productive activity has ceased, by giving them a new viable function. However, the idea of reusing the industrial past need not stop there.

Old industrial and handicraft technology can also be reintroduced and reused in manufacturing various products or in explaining how they work to the public in exhibitions. Various kinds of ‘retroproducts’ are now in vogue, while people are looking for alternative technological solutions for plastics, electronics, concrete, artificial chemicals and fertilisers. Knowledge of old technologies is in demand. What technologies do historians suggest could be reused?

Manufacturing still has a strong impact on culture, working habits and ethics. The industrial past and obsolete technologies are also present in the way people think and use their language. For instance, “put the small pulley on” continues to be used as a metaphor in British English for speeding up. Similar examples can be found in other languages as well. For social historians, it would be interesting to discover practices and ethics of factory work that continue to be used in offices and shops today. The culture of work seems to change more slowly than work itself and technology in use.

The conference programme will include scientific and plenary sessions, poster presentations, business meetings and general assemblies of the organising societies, excursions, social events such as receptions and the banquet, and pre- and post-conference trips. The premises of the University of Tampere and the historical industrial buildings on the in the City Centrum will serve as
conference venues.

Download Call for Papers as PDF here: http://www.tampere.fi/industrialpast2010/doc/cfp_tampere_2010.pdf

The conference website at http://www.tampere.fi/industrialpast2010/ also has more details on the program, keynote speakers, travel, and accommodation.

Conference Subthemes
In order to make the conference theme as strong as possible, the programme committees have decided that all papers must fit within one of the following sub-themes (which must be indicated on the proposal). The bullet points under the subthemes are simply examples of topics that fit into the each subtheme. Papers need not deal specifically with a particular bullet point:

1. Nuts and Bolts Keep on Rolling
- Deindustrialisation and restructuring: Threat or opportunity?
- Stubborn technologies: Resistance to change
- Technological outcasts: Products and solutions rejected by consumers
- Technological comeback: Retroproducts and retrodesign
- Reinventing the industrial past: Innovations that never existed
- Legitimising competitiveness: Political and economic actions to support
technological image and performance
- Processes in change: Technology of textile manufacturing and papermaking

2. Artefacts and Experiences in Transition: Challenges for Industrial Heritage
- Canonisation of the symbols of industrial revolutions
- Living and dead industrial landscapes
- Regeneration through heritage
- Reuse of industrial environments
- Societal aims for the conservation of industrial heritage
- Adapting technology and reforming industrial heritage
- Contested pasts – the heritage of science, technology and industry in
geo-political conflict

3. Social History of Industry
- Reinterpretations of the First Industrial Revolution
- Social history of factory work
- Identities of blue-collar workers and white-collar workers in industry
- People and machines in industrial history
- Masculine machines and female labour: Gender in industry
- Local experiences: changes in work, vanishing employment, emerging opportunities
- Twins astray? Labour history and industrial history
- Serfs of looms and slaves of mobile phones

4. Cultural History of Technology
- Emotions and machines: Adored and hated technologies
- Technological optimism and pessimism
- Company cultures: Breaks and continuity
- Ethics of factory work
- Workers’ culture: Legitimising hard work
- Long shadow of history: Influence of the industrial past in our present way of life
- Fossilisation of factory rhetoric in language
- Exploiting images of the industrial past

5. Environmental History of Industrialisation and Deindustrialisation
- Harnessing nature: Environmental exploitation
- Interdependence of energy and mechanisation in the smoke-stack industries
- Smoke-stack industry as an environmental burden
- Environmental heritage of the First Industrial Revolution
- Environmental consequences of deindustrialisation

6. Museums and Industrial Memories
- Collection policies for the industrial era
- New perspectives for exhibiting industrial heritage
- Challenges for museums in the postindustrial society
- Museum architecture in old factories

7. Posters

8. Others / Special issues
- Open subtheme to any session or paper proposals related to the history of technology and/or industrial past

Proposal Guidelines
We urge contributors to consider organizing a full session of three or more papers. Individual paper submissions will, of course, be considered.

Note: Membership of ICOHTEC, TICCIH, or WORKLAB is not required to participate in the conference.

INDIVIDUAL PAPER proposals must include: (1) a 250-word (maximum) abstract in English; and (2) a one-page CV. Abstracts should include the author’s name and email address, a short descriptive title, a concise statement of the thesis, a brief discussion of the sources, and a summary of the major conclusions. Please indicate one of the specified subthemes for your paper.

In preparing your paper, remember that presentations are not full-length articles. You will have no more than 15-20 minutes to speak – depending on the number of speakers in your session – which is roughly equivalent to 6-8 double-spaced typed pages. Contributors are encouraged to submit full-length versions of their papers after the conference for consideration by ICOHTEC’s journal ICON or TICCIH’s journal Industrial Patrimony. For more suggestions about preparing your conference presentation, please consult the guidelines at the conference web site: http://www.tampere.fi/industrialpast2010.

SESSION proposals must include: (1) an abstract of the session (250 words maximum), listing the proposed papers and a session chairperson; (2) abstracts for each paper (250 words maximum); (3) a one-page CV for each contributor and chairperson. Sessions should consist of three or four speakers and may include several sections of three to four speakers each, which might extend over more than one day. We also encourage “untraditional” session or roundtable proposals.

POSTER proposals must include (1) a 250-word (maximum) abstract in English; and (2) a one-page CV. Abstracts should include the author’s name and email address, a short descriptive title, a concise statement of the thesis, a brief discussion of the sources, and a summary of the major conclusions. Please indicate one of the specified subthemes for your poster.

Proposal submissions
The final deadline for all submissions is Monday 16 November 2009.

Please submit proposals for papers and sessions via the website of the Tampere conference at https://secure.tavicon.fi/abstracts/index.php?conference_id=16

If web access is unavailable, proposals may be sent by fax to ICOHTEC 2010 at: +358 (0) 3 5656 6808. Otherwise they may be sent via regular mail or courier, postmarked not later than 9 November 2009. The mail address is:

ICOHTEC 2010
c/o Museum Centre Vapriikki
PL 487
Alaverstaanraitti 5
33101 Tampere
Finland

All questions about the programme proposals should be submitted to the local organizing committee, icohtecticcih2010@tampere.fi. Queries about the conference venue should be made to the same address.

Further information on host organisations
ICOHTEC: http://www.icohtec.org/
TICCIH: http://www.mnactec.cat/ticcih/
WORKLAB: http://www.worklab.dk/
University of Tampere: http://www.uta.fi/english/
Museum Centre Vapriikki: http://www.tampere.fi/english/vapriikki/index.html
The Finnish Labour Museum Werstas: http://www.tyovaenmuseo.fi/?q=en

We hope to see many of you there.

Reusing the Industrial Past

10–15 August 2010 Tampere, Finland

A Joint Conference between the International Committee for the History of Technology (ICOHTEC) and The International Committee for the
Conservation of the Industrial Heritage (TICCIH). The International Association of the Labour Museums (WORKLAB) is a minor partner in the conference.

Deadline for Proposals is 16 November 2009.

Conference language: English

As a joint conference, the primary theme ‘Reusing the Industrial Past’ is intended to be a broad idea covering various approaches. Clearly,
the industrial past is reused whenever old industrial installations are renovated or adapted. There have been many attempts to preserve the
most significant aspects of old industrial areas after productive activity has ceased, by giving them a new viable function. However, the
idea of reusing the industrial past need not stop there.

Old industrial and handicraft technology can also be reintroduced and reused in manufacturing various products or in explaining how they work to the public in exhibitions. Various kinds of ‘retroproducts’ are now in vogue, while people are looking for alternative technological
solutions for plastics, electronics, concrete, artificial chemicals and fertilisers. Knowledge of old technologies is in demand. What technologies do historians suggest could be reused?

Manufacturing still has a strong impact on culture, working habits and ethics. The industrial past and obsolete technologies are also present
in the way people think and use their language. For instance, “put the small pulley on” continues to be used as a metaphor in British English
for speeding up. Similar examples can be found in other languages as well. For social historians, it would be interesting to discover
practices and ethics of factory work that continue to be used in offices and shops today. The culture of work seems to change more slowly than work itself and technology in use.

The conference programme will include scientific and plenary sessions, poster presentations, business meetings and general assemblies of the organising societies, excursions, social events such as receptions and the banquet, and pre- and post-conference trips. The premises of the University of Tampere and the historical industrial buildings on the in the City Centrum will serve as conference venues.

Conference Subthemes
In order to make the conference theme as strong as possible, the programme committees have decided that all papers must fit within one
of the following sub-themes (which must be indicated on the proposal). The bullet points under the subthemes are simply examples of topics
that fit into the each subtheme. Papers need not deal specifically with a particular bullet point:

1. Nuts and Bolts Keep on Rolling
- Deindustrialisation and restructuring: Threat or opportunity?
- Stubborn technologies: Resistance to change
- Technological outcasts: Products and solutions rejected by consumers
- Technological comeback: Retroproducts and retrodesign
- Reinventing the industrial past: Innovations that never existed
- Legitimising competitiveness: Political and economic actions to support technological image and performance
- Processes in change: Technology of textile manufacturing and papermaking

2. Artefacts and Experiences in Transition: Challenges for Industrial Heritage
- Canonisation of the symbols of industrial revolutions
- Living and dead industrial landscapes
- Regeneration through heritage
- Reuse of industrial environments
- Societal aims for the conservation of industrial heritage
- Adapting technology and reforming industrial heritage
- Contested pasts – the heritage of science, technology and industry in geo-political conflict

3. Social History of Industry
- Reinterpretations of the First Industrial Revolution
- Social history of factory work
- Identities of blue-collar workers and white-collar workers in industry
- People and machines in industrial history
- Masculine machines and female labour: Gender in industry
- Local experiences: changes in work, vanishing employment, emerging opportunities
- Twins astray? Labour history and industrial history
- Serfs of looms and slaves of mobile phones

4. Cultural History of Technology
- Emotions and machines: Adored and hated technologies
- Technological optimism and pessimism
- Company cultures: Breaks and continuity
- Ethics of factory work
- Workers’ culture: Legitimising hard work
- Long shadow of history: Influence of the industrial past in our present way of life
- Fossilisation of factory rhetoric in language
- Exploiting images of the industrial past

5. Environmental History of Industrialisation and Deindustrialisation
- Harnessing nature: Environmental exploitation
- Interdependence of energy and mechanisation in the smoke-stack industries
- Smoke-stack industry as an environmental burden
- Environmental heritage of the First Industrial Revolution
- Environmental consequences of deindustrialisation

6. Museums and Industrial Memories
- Collection policies for the industrial era
- New perspectives for exhibiting industrial heritage
- Challenges for museums in the postindustrial society
- Museum architecture in old factories

Proposal Guidelines
We urge contributors to consider organizing a full session of three or more papers. Individual paper submissions will, of course, be
considered.

Note: Membership of ICOHTEC, TICCIH, or WORKLAB is not required to participate in the conference.

INDIVIDUAL PAPER proposals must include: (1) a 250-word (maximum) abstract in English; and (2) a one-page CV. Abstracts should include the author’s name and email address, a short descriptive title, a concise statement of the thesis, a brief discussion of the sources, and
a summary of the major conclusions. Please indicate one of the specified subthemes for your paper.

In preparing your paper, remember that presentations are not full-length articles. You will have no more than 15-20 minutes to speak – depending on the number of speakers in your session – which is roughly equivalent to 6-8 double-spaced typed pages. Contributors are encouraged to submit full-length versions of their papers after the conference for consideration by ICOHTEC’s journal ICON or TICCIH’s journal Industrial Patrimony. For more suggestions about preparing your conference presentation, please consult the guidelines at the conference web site: http://www.tampere.fi/industrialpast2010.

SESSION proposals must include: (1) an abstract of the session (250 words maximum), listing the proposed papers and a session chairperson; (2) abstracts for each paper (250 words maximum); (3) a one-page CV for each contributor and chairperson. Sessions should consist of three or four speakers and may include several sections of three to four speakers each, which might extend over more than one day. We also encourage “untraditional” session or roundtable proposals.

POSTER proposals must include (1) a 250-word (maximum) abstract in English; and (2) a one-page CV. Abstracts should include the author’s name and email address, a short descriptive title, a concise statement of the thesis, a brief discussion of the sources, and a summary of the major conclusions. Please indicate one of the specified subthemes for your poster.

Proposal submissions
The final deadline for all submissions is Monday 16 November 2009. Please submit proposals for papers and sessions via the website of the
Tampere conference at http://www.tampere.fi/industrialpast2010.

If web access is unavailable, proposals may be sent by fax to ICOHTEC 2010 at: +358 (0) 3 5656 6808. Otherwise they may be sent via regular mail or courier, postmarked not later than 9 November 2009. The mail address is:

ICOHTEC 2010
c/o Museum Centre Vapriikki
PL 487
Alaverstaanraitti 5
33101 Tampere
Finland

All questions about the programme proposals should be submitted to the local organizing committee, icohtecticcih2010@tampere.fi. Queries about the conference venue should be made to the same address.

Further information on host organisations
ICOHTEC: http://www.icohtec.org/
TICCIH: http://www.mnactec.cat/ticcih/
WORKLAB: http://www.worklab.dk/
University of Tampere: http://www.uta.fi/english/
Museum Centre Vapriikki: http://www.tampere.fi/english/vapriikki/index.html
The Finnish Labour Museum Werstas: http://www.tyovaenmuseo.fi/?q=en

To be held at the Fraunhofer IGD, Darmstadt, Germany, 7 – 9 October, 2009

Phenomena recognized as spatial arrangements are complex—thus we need tools to cope with them. Models can serve as tools for researchers and practitioners alike. There are two distinct yet interwoven aspects of models, both of which will be addressed by this conference: models as analytical devices and models as a reference for intervention. Models and other forms of abstract representations are generated to organize findings and to simulate options. In decision-making processes models have  an enormous impact in that they provide guidelines for implementations as well as legitimation in situations of conflict, even though they are also increasingly understood as constructions.

Out of the great variety of spatial phenomena, climatology is a good example to show how models are constructed and affect society. They are used to analyze spatial patterns theoretically as well as to legitimize intervention in the political sphere. Global climate models are approximations of complex physical processes and enable researchers to simulate the climate system. The General Circulation Model allows predictions of various scenarios. Such
scientifically-based statements simplified the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol. They increased public awareness and led to a growing market for renewable energy. Similarly, the case of modernist urban planning highlights how the analysis of problems was recast in plans for action. Population densities and the variety of space usages in the industrializing cities were perceived as the root of various social deficiencies. Subsequently, abstract models based on the ideals of dispersion and the separation of functions shaped cities throughout the latter half of the 20th century.

Both examples show that the status of models depends significantly on the contexts in which they are developed and employed. First, the nature of any model is determined by the goal to be achieved; modeling is always designed to serve a particular aim and can take on many forms. Still, the applicability of models is related to the specific conditions under which they are designed, proposed and tested—therefore, the transfer of a model from one area to another is not always justified. And, furthermore, the way in which models are perceived often endows them with considerable normative power. Is it perhaps the case that model-building in research and society are deeply problematic in that such abstractions may develop into self-fulfilling prophecies? Moreover, models govern planning and simulation, processes which are in many ways interwoven with model-building. Hence, models do not only provide systematized information, but are also explicitly directed at the future.

While it is beyond doubt that models create instrumental knowledge, the distinctive spatial dimension of models is open to discussion. Are there specific ways of modeling three-dimensional spaces, for example particular forms of visualization? Do spatial arrangements offer specific kinds of information for analysis and intervention—as is probably the case in logistics and architecture? Is a model more forceful if it refers to certain localities, because attachment to place gives rise to a feeling of involvement or concern—as in the rapidly growing interest in Geographical Information Systems (GIS)? Or is the spatial distribution of researchers and practitioners themselves an issue that reflects on model building?

This conference aims to increase our understanding of the power and limitations of models, their construction and effects in the sciences and in fields of practice. It provides a forum for the discussion of qualitative and quantitative models composed of verbal propositions, numerical abstractions, and visualizations. Of particular interest are issues that cut across established scientific disciplines and analyze the boundaries between science, technology, society, and politics. A preliminary list of subject areas comprises:
- architecture and social work
- urban planning and policies
- system sciences and management
- the history and future of infrastructures
- sustainability science and resources management
- climate science and emission regulations
- geography (incl. GIS and GPS and their commercial application)
- behavioral sciences and human health
- philosophy, ethics and spatial order

The conference explicitly aims at bringing scientists and practitioners from outside the academy together. To simplify discussion and the exchange of information and experience, plenary speeches will be complemented by smaller workshop-like sessions. Keynote speeches will be held by:
- Paul N. Edwards (University of Michigan): “Versions of the Atmosphere: Climate Models, Data Models, Global Space and Time”
- Amy Hillier (University of Pennsylvania): “Mapping Social Patterns: The Making and Unmaking of Inequality”
- Roland Scholz (ETH Zürich): “Transdisciplinarity, System Sciences, and Prospective Modeling in Regional Transformation”
- Oskar von Stryk (TU Darmstadt): “Models and Simulation in Engineering: Dynamics of Motion and Robot Intelligence”

The conference is organized by the graduate program Topology of Technology of Darmstadt University of Technology and is financed by the German Research Foundation (DFG). The interdisciplinary graduate program focuses on the interdependencies of technology and space.

The conference will take place at the Fraunhofer IGD, Darmstadt, Germany, 7–9 October, 2009. Darmstadt is situated 30 kilometers south of Frankfurt am Main.

We invite proposals that include an abstract of no more than 2,000 characters and a brief CV. Deadline for submission is May 31, 2009. Proposals should be submitted to the conference website at www.modelingspaces.com. Applicants can expect approval by July 15. The final program will be advertised in the second half of July.

Accommodation will be provided for accepted presenters and their traveling costs will be covered up to 150€ for participants from Germany, 300€ for participants from within Europe and 600€ for international participants. The conference fee amounts to 130€ (applications for a fee waiver may be filed).

For further information please visit our website at: www.modelingspaces.com.

Professor Mikael Hård
Dept. of History
Darmstadt University of Technology
Schloss
D-64283 Darmstadt
Germany

Phone: +49 6151-163097
Fax.: +49 6151-163992

hard@ifs.tu-darmstadt.de

The 2009 SHOT meeting will be held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, October 15-19, 2009. See http://historyoftechnology.org.

Eligibility for the WITH Travel Award is open to individuals who are giving a paper at the SHOT annual meeting. Priorities for the WITH award will go to: (1) a scholar or graduate student new to SHOT belonging to a group underrepresented in SHOT, whose paper addresses issues of gender, race, ethnicity, and/or difference in the history of technology; (2) a non-US, non-Western graduate student or scholar new to SHOT presenting on any topic.

The award will include registration for the Pittsburgh meeting, a year’s membership to SHOT and WITH, the WITH breakfast or lunch, the graduate student breakfast (if appropriate), and the awards banquet; the balance of funds will be allocated to travel expenses.

Application deadline for the WITH Travel Award is June 15, 2009. For more information and the application form, go to the WITH homepage at http://www.women-in-technological-history.net/ or contact Joan Rothschild, chair of the award committee, at jrjar@nyc.rr.com.

CALL FOR PAPERS
– Energy and Innovation –

The International Association for the History of Transport, Traffic and Mobility (T2M) invites proposals for papers to be presented at its Seventh International Conference to be held at the Verkehrshaus der Schweiz (Swiss Museum of Transport), Lucerne, Switzerland from November 5th till the 8th, 2009.

The conference is organised by historians from different universities as well as by the Swiss Museum of Transport. Switzerland’s most visited museum celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2009 and is being rebuilt and expanded for this occasion at the time. This year the conference theme is ‚Energy and Innovation’. The CfP asks for papers in this thematic field but it is at the same time open to all subjects in the history of transport, traffic, and mobility.  The language of the conference is English.

Traffic is motion and therefore energy is imperative. It doesn’t matter what, how or where to one moves – performance, or the conversion of energy into motion, is always preconditioned. The modernisation of traffic since the 18th century can be seen as a process in the course of which means of transport that relied in the end on solar energy were replaced by means of transport that relied on nonrenewable energy. Thus, the focus was shifted from the likes of walking, rowing, sailing, horseback riding and the usage of animal traction to mechanical means of transport such as the steam engine, the combustion engine and rocket propulsion.Where did the question of energy figure in the acceleration and intensification of traffic? Where in the choice of a means of transport, in the question ‘street or ship’? How was energy efficiency for new machines increased? Conversely, how was their environmental pollution reduced? Why did one choose a specific propulsion? How did the price of energy affect the price of transport and mobility? How big was the influence of private traffic and energy business thereby, how great the weight of governmental politics?

According to economist Joseph Schumpeter, innovations are elementary improvements that shake the economy and the community which means in this case that they produce new means of transport such as train, car or plane. Which economical, social, cultural and political conditions leveraged which means of transport? Innovations never were the result of mere business calculations and engineering efforts. Behind those were always sociocultural factors such as the ideology of freedom, the appetite for adventure and discovery or the play instinct and surge for fame. Also, new combinations of existing means of transport could lead to innovation.

Proposals which connect the two conference topics (energy and innovation) are eminently favoured: How was the velocity of a means of transport increased without a multiplication of energy consumption? Do new means of transport prevail mainly in times of war and crisis? Could premodern and antiquated means of transport increase their efficiency under the pressure of competition of new modes of drive as for example the fast sailing ships that came up under the pressure of the steam boat around 1850? Is a renaissance of premodern and environmentally sound means of transport imaginable?

Participants are encouraged, though not required, to organize panels on these themes. A panel consists of a chair and normally up to three speakers; no commentator is required. We especially encourage transnational, comparative and transmodal approaches, and welcome proposals exploring theoretical or methodological issues as well as those of a more empirical nature. Relevant contributions are welcome from historians as well as from cultural geographers, sociologists, anthropologists, economists, and other scholars who do not define themselves as historians. We especially invite recent entrants to the profession and doctoral students to submit proposals.

T2M 2009 wants to invest more energy into communication. Posters of all oral presentations will be exhibited in the public area of Switzerland’s most visited museum. This innovation will contribute to better promotion of the history of transport, traffic and mobility as a scientific discipline and as a public service. Submission of a fully completed poster form (1 page A4) is mandatory for all speakers. Posters will be judged. Poster forms will be made available later on the website of the programme committee.

The deadline for abstracts and a short CV (max one page each; Word or rich text format only) is the 15th of April, 2009. Session proposals should also include a one-page overview of the session. Please send proposals to: t2m_content@verkehrshaus.ch. Submitters will be notified by the programme committee during the first week of May 2009 on the success or status of their submission. The full paper of all accepted submissions and of the posters must be delivered on or before August 15th, 2009. These papers will be copied onto a conference CD-ROM for distribution in advance to all conference participants. Individual presentations at the conference are therefore to be limited to a fifteen-minute summary to allow for debate and discussion within the session. All participants are required to register.

For details of T2M and of previous conferences, please visit: www.t2m.org. Further details of the conference (including the poster form) will be posted on a website of the Programme Committee which is currently under construction and will go online later.

Programme Committee:
Laurent Tissot (University of Neuchâtel) (Chair); Stéphanie von Erlach (sbb historic/Bern); Ueli Haefeli (University of Bern); Gisela Huerlimann (University of Zurich/Swiss Federal Institute of Technology); Christoph Maria Merki (University of Bern); This Oberhaensli (Swiss Museum of Transport); Christian Pfister (University of Bern); Hans-Ulrich Schiedt (ViaStoria/University of Bern); Henry Wydler (Swiss Museum of Transport)

Scientific Committee (for paper acceptance):
Laurent Tissot (University of Neuchâtel), Gisela Huerlimann (University of Zurich/Swiss Federal Institute of Technology); Hans-Liudger Dienel (Berlin University of Technology, Germany), Garth Wilson (Canada Science and Technology Museum, Ottawa/Canada)

“Natural” disasters are just as social as they are natural. Their impact depends heavily on social issues such as vulnerability while the work done by society to mitigate their impact is obviously social. However, social aspects of “natural” disasters have often been neglected and they have frequently been understood as caused solely by nature or by divine intervention. The different causal narratives of disasters have given rise to different understandings of responsibilities and blame. Despite their recurrent nature these sudden extreme events are often portrayed as exceptional.

This session will explore the histories of (un)natural disasters across time and space. Paper proposal on any aspects related to any aspects of this topic are welcome. A general theme may be how knowledge and practices have worked to change the likelihood, nature and impact of disasters. How have physical and human geography interacted around disasters historically?

Papers for the session could for example discuss how natural disasters have been framed as “natural” and/or “social” and the implications of different framings. How has the knowledge or understanding of disasters as “natural”, “Acts of God” or “social” developed throughout history? Who or what was blamed?

Today the impacts of these events are managed by warning systems, emergency planning and physical defences. These systems have a long history, and are dependent on complex scientific and social networks. What is this history and how does it link to narratives of causality and blame? For example, whose responsibility have extreme events been seen to be and whose work was it to deal with the consequences of them? Who paid for defensive work? Individuals or the state? National or local government? What were views on how defensive work should be organised?

Many other topics are also possible. If you are interested in submitting a paper, please contact Anna Carlsson on anna.carlsson@postgrad.manchester.ac.uk. The deadline for submission of abstracts is February 3rd 2009. Please include the following information:
Name:
Affiliation:
Contact email:
Title of proposed paper:
Abstract (no more than 250 words):
Any technical requirements (video, data projector, sound, etc.):

The deadline for submitting paper & panel proposals for SHOT 2008 in Lisbon, Portugal is March 14. The CFP is available online: http://shotnews.net/?p=401.

The deadline for booking hotels at the conference reduced rate is April 30, so don’t wait until the last minute to book! Information can be found at http://shotlisbon2008.com/