Scholarship  drawing on theories of post-colonialism, gender, material and visual  culture, cognitive studies, posthumanism, and other critical paradigms  has challenged our understanding of the impact—not just aesthetic, but  also commercial, martial, and religious—of travel in the eighteenth and  nineteenth centuries. This work has made strides in elucidating a more  dynamic picture of the way travel and cultural encounter could transform  (or fail to transform) prior understandings of both time and space.  Moreover, it has allowed for a more capacious appreciation of how  influence happens, extending beyond more uni-directional, Eurocentric  approaches.

Continuing  this work, the University of Michigan’s Eighteenth-Century Studies  Group and Nineteenth-Century Forum will co-host an interdisciplinary  graduate student conference on these topics, to take place in Ann Arbor  on September 15, 2012. We are pleased to announce that Kate Flint,  Provost Professor of English and Art History (University of Southern  California), will be our keynote speaker.

Graduate  students are encouraged to submit papers that explore the implications  of travel, tourism, boundary crossing, exploration, and other related  topics—from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives. Submissions of  either individual papers or full panels are welcome. Please send  abstracts of no more than 300 words to Karen McConnell  (mcconnka@umich.edu) by May 1, 2012.

Suggested paper topics include (but are not limited to):