Seventh West Coast Germanists' Workshop: Migration, Mobility, and Exchange

Call for Papers

We are inviting graduate students, postdocs, and faculty in the Western United States, the Western Provinces of Canada and in Mexico who conduct research in German history or German studies to join us at the seventh West Coast Germanists’ Workshop, jointly organized by the Pacific Regional Office of the German Historical Institute Washington and the University of Nevada, Reno, where the workshop will take place on March 7 & 8, 2025.

Alongside informal gatherings to network and exchange ideas, the workshop will comprise paper presentations on German history in the context of migration, mobility, and exchange, as well as contributions on innovative teaching practices. The event seeks to provide both a supportive forum for work-in-progress on German history and culture from the medieval period to the present and be a venue for sharing experiences and best practices for teaching German and European history at our universities.

This year’s theme, “Migration, Mobility, and Exchange,” invites reflection on the many ways in which the history of German-speaking Europe has been shaped by migration and mobility. We welcome consideration of broad perspectives including the experiences of migration, discourses surrounding migration, and the regulation of migration. Moreover, we are interested in topics broadly linked to the exchange of ideas, goods, and services to and from Central Europe. We invite contributions on a wide variety of themes, including but not limited to history, society, culture, and art.

We aim to address the predicament of Germanists in the West, our geographic challenges – our distance from Europe and from each other – as well as the opportunities and possibilities for doing German history and German studies in places with abundant resources from German émigrés and thriving German immigrant communities in the arts, business, and technology. We also consider the potential benefits of seeing Germany and Europe from a Pacific perspective. This is especially relevant given this year’s theme on mobility and migration.

People interested in attending should use our online portal to register for the workshop by November 1, 2024. Individuals interested in presenting a paper or sharing their teaching experiences at the workshop should include a one-paragraph proposal. Please contact Heike Friedman (friedman@ghi-dc.org) if you have problems submitting your information online.

Thanks to the support of the German Historical Institute Washington, the Fritz Thyssen Foundation, and the University of Nevada, Reno we will be able to subsidize participation in this workshop. Priority will be given to paper presenters, graduate students, and anyone in need of financial assistance.