CfP: New Voices in the History of War, Oxford, 18 July 2018

Organisers: Anita Klingler, Dr Ismini Pells, Jan Tattenberg, Louis Morris

It is now more than a half-century since ‘new military history’ began to challenge the traditional orthodoxy among historians of war, and successive waves of social and cultural history during the intervening decades have made an indelible impact on the changing face of the subdiscipline. Despite several methodological revolutions, however, many aspects of the field remain little changed. These include the dominant focus on Western theatres of conflict and the twentieth century, the preponderance of male historians on panels and faculty rosters, and the marginal position of history of war within the academy.

This one-day conference aims to bring together diverse representatives of a new generation of researchers, and use their cutting-edge work as a starting point for discussions regarding the future of the history of war as a broad interdisciplinary enterprise. We invite doctoral students and early career researchers, including those working in other fields who have an interdisciplinary connection to the study of war, to submit papers on any aspect of warfare across all periods and places.

Potential themes include, but are not limited to:
• Past and future developments in the historiography of war
• Transnational networks as military actors
• Cultural and artistic depictions of warfare
• War and peace as evolving concepts in political thought
• Comparative global approaches to conflict
• Soldiers as case studies within the history of gender and race
• New approaches to operational military history

The day will conclude with a plenary discussion of the best way to advance the field and to increase the diversity of its approaches and participants.

The conference will be held at All Souls College, Oxford, on Wednesday 18th July 2018, with the generous financial support of the Pembroke College Annual Fund and the Oxford Centre for European History.

Abstracts (maximum 300 words) for papers of 20 minutes should be submitted to the organisers at newvoicesconference2018@gmail.com along with a CV or brief biographical text by 18th June 2018.

We aim to offer travel subsidies for speakers, and full details will be announced with the start of registration on 21st June 2018.