CfP: Third Issue of the Journal of Studies in History & Culture

Events to commemorate the centenary of the First World War have been organized since 2014 and would continue through 2018. It has already sparked of various retellings on the war in fiction and celluloid. The third issue of JSHC attempts to offer renewed perspectives on the First World War. While war and society is the general theme for this issue, all the content in our issues have never been restricted to the pre-decided theme alone. Therefore, we welcome contributors for wide ranging perspectives and discussions on general issues beyond the present theme.

To understand war in the longue durée one needs a comprehensive understanding. We encourage papers which examine comprehensive studies of war using panoptican views, by means of theoretical, political or philosophical scalpels; and papers from diplomacy, strategy and international relations perspectives, as well as papers on individual lives. Besides, papers from a military history vantage point are equally welcome. Papers from a memory studies perspective looking at collective memorialisation around or with relation to a particular war would be particularly interesting for us to consider for publication.

We are also looking for papers from comparative literary perspectives which study literature produced during war or with war as a thematic reference. Analyses of diverse hagiographies and/or their influence on formal histories could also be an important aspect to this. Papers from an environmental perspective are equally welcome.

For historians war has been both a historical schema, within which one could study societal changes as well as a chassis, to locate micro histories of soldiers, technology, techniques, formations, strategies, etc. The moral supremacy attached to professional warriors, wrote Marc Bloch, continuing till present times is symbolic of the divergence between the peasant and the knight right from the emergence of the feudal age. Bloch fought in both World Wars. He was a part of the French Army in the First World War. The experiences affected his personality and his historical output. His experiences during the war produced Memoirs of the War, 1914 – 1915 and is also said to have influenced Réflexions d’un historien sur les fausses nouvelles de la guerre (1922). The Second World War was more defining though. From the campaign of June 1940 to a part of the resistance press, the Second World War affected him personally as a Jew in Germany. This time there was to be no memoir, no Réflexions. He was tortured by the Germans in 1944, inside the fortress of Montluc and finally assassinated on June 16 at St. Didier, near Lyons. In line with Bloch’s work we encourage authors to submit papers looking at variety of topics right from propaganda to underlying conditions of society, in a comparative historical framework.

That said, papers not related to the theme are also welcome.

Increasing budget cuts in the humanities have been seen by many as part of a larger plan to dissolve the humanities. Therefore, papers situating war within the context of epistemological invasions are also welcome.

However, such attempts at dissolution are not merely a warning sign for the humanities but higher education in general, and anything certified as unprofitable by the market. With market forces gnawing into whatever little space for decision making was left within the academia, JSHC sees this as a moment of opportunity – opportunity to seek greater collaboration among disciplines, wherein they can come together in evolving mutually beneficial frameworks for academic exchanges, as well as myriad forms of resistance on scholarly fora to stand united in solidarity against the onslaught.

The last date for submission is 30th of November, 2017. Check out the previous issues on www.jshc.org. Papers can be sent in to editors.jshc@gmail.com. For any specific inquiries write to info@jshc.org.