CFP: Maritime Missions: Religion, Ethnography and Empires in the Long Eighteenth Century (Workshop) (Washington DC, 24-25 May 2019)

An international workshop to be held at the German Historical Institute (GHI), Washington DC, 24 and 25 May, 2019

Co-conveners: Jenna M. Gibbs (Florida International University) and Sünne Juterczenka (Göttingen University), Binational Tandem Fellows in Global and Transregional History at the GHI, 2018-2019

Beginning in the early modern period, missionaries became crucial to colonial expansion, the broadening of intellectual horizons, and the globalization of Christianity. Often traveling by sea, they were among the first to cover the vast distances that the martime empires of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries would subsequently span.  Transoceanic in scope, "Maritime Missions" will explore the interconnections between the histories of religion, science, and maritime empires. The workshop focuses on the ways in which the Pacific, Atlantic, East Asian and Mediterranean oceans were deeply interlinked by missionary activities from the late seventeenth to the early nineteenth centuries.  It follows the lead of recent scholarship that recognizes the intertwining of scientific and religious missions, whether Roman Catholic or Protestant, and situates these in the maritime spaces that were both the arena and the medium of colonial expansion.

"Maritime Missions" seeks to build on a recent upsurge in maritime history, today one of the most vibrant and multifaceted fields in historical research.  Critical revisions in this field have brought the cultural historical perspective to the fore, highlighted the relevance of the maritime even to hinterland communities, engaged with postoonial analysis of maritime empires, and embraced interdisciplinary cross-pollination.  While rich studies have onceptualized oceanic regions like the Méditerranée, the Black Atlantic, or the Pacific Sea of Islands as discrete but interlinked, this conference also seeks to explore the fluidity between these regions.  Specifically, we will investigate how imperial maritime exploration, transoceanic networks, and global missions fostered the study of ethnography and race, and will also engage recent history of science scholarship that emphasizes globalization and encounters with and awarness of non-Western indigenous knowledge and cultures.  In focusing on the emergence of ethnography out of religious as well as scientific missions in the imperial maritime world, the workshop will also contribute to the ongoing reevaluation of the role of religion in the Enlightenment, pushing back on residual resistance to bringing them together under the same analytic lens.

Potential papers could include, but are not limited to, any aspect of the following:

• The mutually constitutive dynamics between global religious, ethnographic and imperial agendas, as well as the complexity and ambiguities resulting from these
• The scope, dimensions, and impact of maritime missions as catalyists of global and transregional interconnectedness, but also of enduring conflicts, violence, and discontents
• The encounters, networks, exchanges, and transfers with indigenous peoples facilitated by global and transregional maritime travel
• The roles and bi-directional interactions of culturally and religiously diverse protagonists in encounters shaped by and in turn shaping trans-oceanic mobilityX

Scholars at any stage of their career are invited to submit a proposal for a 30 minute papers.  Publication of the workshop proceedings is planned with an academic publisher.  The language of the workshop will be English.  Proposals should be submitted as PDF documents that contain:

• A clear title of the envisaged paper
• An abstract of approximately 250 words
• A short biography with contact information, position, and institutional affiliation

Funding is available to cover travel and accomodation expenses.  Please send the PDF document to the conference conveners, Jenna Gibbs (gibbs@ghi-dc.org) and Sünne Juterczenka (juterczenka@ghi-dc.org) by 30 January 2019.  Selection of the proposals will be based on topic relevance and on the degree to which the proposal answers the call.  Notification of acceptance will occur no later than 15 February 2019.  For any questions, please contact the conveners.

Jenna Gibbs (gibbs@ghi-dc.org) and Sünne Juterczenka (Juterczenka@ghi-dc.org)