CFP: The Inaugural John L. Nau III Conference on Texas History
Call for Papers
“Racial Justice and Policing in Texas”
Inaugural John L. Nau III Conference on Texas History
University of Texas at San Antonio
March 24, 2022
The University of Texas at San Antonio History Department invites paper proposals on “Racial Justice and Policing in Texas” for the inaugural John L. Nau III Conference on Texas History. The conference will take place on March 24, 2022, on the University’s campus. UTSA’s History Department seeks to facilitate the development and exchange of historical scholarship on the state by hosting an annual John L. Nau III Conference featuring leading and emerging scholars in related fields. Reflecting the Department’s strength in research and teaching in the theme of “empires, states, and borders,” the annual conference will focus on a number of related historical topics, including racial justice and the Civil War, that put the dynamic history of Texas into a larger context.
Across the United States, police take on an incredible and taxing responsibility: the duty of keeping people and their neighborhoods safe. It is a job for which communities are willing to vest much power and authority in police forces. While that power and authority have commonly been used for the good of citizens, they have also too often been wielded questionably. Thus, the relationship between police and some communities has been fraught with tension that has sometimes escalated to violence. Examples in Texas—from the notoriously problematic treatment of Mexicans and Mexican Americans along the border by the Texas Rangers since the mid-nineteenth century to the gross misuse of undercover policing against African Americans in Tulia—illustrate the historical and ongoing need for police transparency and accountability. Against a national backdrop of related discussions, we invite scholars to propose papers that engage the topics of racial justice and policing in Texas.
We invite individual proposals for 20-minute papers from faculty, independent scholars, and graduate students. Proposals should include a title, an abstract of no more than 300 words, and a brief CV. Selected proposals will be organized into conference panels. The conference will also feature a keynote address from Dr. Monica Muñoz Martinez, associate professor of history at the University of Texas at Austin. She is the author of The Injustice Never Leaves You: Anti-Mexican Violence in Texas and a co-founder of the Refusing to Forget Project.
Please submit proposals to UTSANauConference@utsa.edu. Proposals must be submitted by October 31, 2021.
LaGuana K. Gray, Associate Professor, Department of History, The University of Texas at San Antonio