Call for Papers: Caribbean Irish Connections

Professor Maria McGarrity (English Department) is an organizer, along with Alison Donnell (University of Reading, UK) and Evelyn O’Callaghan (University of the West Indies, Barbados), of the conference Caribbean Irish Connections, and she sends along the following call for papers.

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In the middle of a story about a Jamaican woman called Miss Manda, whose speech acts reveal her as both multiply situated and ‘out of place’, the prominent Jamaican novelist Erna Brodber issues a surprising provocation to scholars of Caribbean studies,

I want to know what the Irish, the Scottish, the Welsh gave to the Creole mix as much as I want to know…what particular part of Africa is my heritage…I will solve the African riddle but who will tell me about the others? (Brodber 1998: 75)

Although there has been more recent scholarship on the connections between Ireland and the Caribbean, such as the The Black and Green Atlantic: Cross-Currents of the African and Irish Diasporas edited by O’Neill and Lloyd, there remains still too little conversation between scholars based in Caribbean Studies and those in Irish Studies. This conference aims to open up these conversations as they pertain to history, politics, language, geography, expressive cultural forms, and everyday practices (such as the use of a shamrock passport stamp in Montserrat). We seek the active engagement of scholars working within this highly focused yet potentially broad field to further shape this emerging critical discourse.

Please send abstracts of 250 words and a brief bio to a.j.donnell@reading.ac.uk by June 29, 2012. Presenters will be notified by first week in August.

A special accommodation rate has been negotiated for presenters at Beach View, Paynes Bay, St. James, Barbados, and all conference sessions will be held there. 
beachviewbarbados.com

Registration fees: (including lunches & BBQ supper with drinks on Saturday night):

US & Europe : US$150

Caribbean : US$75

Selected papers will be considered for an edited collection in Palgrave’s New Caribbean Studies series.