The deadline for submissions to the 42nd Annual Conference of the Caribbean Studies Association—”Culture and Knowledge Economies: The Future of Caribbean Development?”—has been extended to January 15, 2017. [See previous post CSA CFP.]

The conference takes place June 5-10, 2017, at the Melía Nassau Beach Resort, Cable Beach, Nassau, Bahamas. All proposals must be submitted electronically via the CSA website (NOT via email—Click here to submit an abstract by January 15, 2017).

Description [. . .] The 2017 conference theme—Culture and Knowledge Economies: The Future of Caribbean Development?—focuses on the shifting roles of knowledge, culture and economy in the Caribbean while repositioning the question of “development” historically and in our contemporary moment. “Development”—understood as the way a society manages available resources to drive inclusive, equitable and sustainable growth has often been plagued by narrow economic, technical and public policy paradigms. This conference asks us to (re)consider what counts as economic activity, cultural and creative endeavor, and knowledge regimes from the broad social, cultural, institutional and historic contexts of enslavement, independence, national debt, globalization and reckonings with nature.

Indigenous and African rooted cultural practices, traditional and artisanal forms of knowledge, and our human ability (in sports, performing arts, dance etc) abound across the archipelago whether in music, craft, literary arts, culinary inventiveness, fashion design, festivals, theater, film, “bush” medicine, languages and world athletic dominance. CSA’s 2017 conference will be the occasion to tarry on the complex and heterogeneous cultural and knowledge landscape as offering new and/or different models through which to (re)imagine and (re)theorize “inclusive, equitable and sustainable” growth possibilities for the region.

The CSA Conference Program Committee invites scholarly papers, workshops, and roundtable proposals from individuals spanning the broadest disciplinary and methodological range whose work directly engages the conference theme as well as the complexities of the region, particularly in terms of the intersections of gender, race, class, sexuality, nationality, religion, etc. CSA welcomes a wide range of participants, from independent and emerging scholars to well-known scholars, from professionals in industry, politics, etc. to activists, artists, and community-based researchers. We are also very interested in workshop and roundtable proposals that offer in-depth discussion in any of the proposed topic areas with a focus on viable solutions and applicable models for change.

Fully constituted panels, in particular ones that are multi-disciplinary and multilingual, will be given first priority. [. . .]

For more information, see https://www.eventsforce.net/csa/frontend/reg/thome.csp?pageID=3745&eventID=6&traceRedir=2&eventID=6

For additional information or help with suggested topics, submission forms, author celebration, literary salon, film and arts tracks, and/or translation, please contact the CSA Program Co-Chairs, Guido Rojer, Jr., and Okama Ekpe Brook, at program.chair@caribbeanstudiesassociation.org.