Call For Papers: RGS-IBG Annual International Conference 2017
‘Alternative narratives of Mashriq and Maghreb; the politics of
situated, practiced and indigenous knowledges’
Jonathan Harris, Cambridge University and Olivia Mason, Durham University
Sponsored by PolGRG
In recent years an increase in studies of skill, knowledge, and
learning in place (Hunt, 2016; Ingold, 2000: 2011), alongside calls to
engage with ‘indigenous knowledge’ in the context of the
(post)colonial global south (Radcliffe, 2015) have lead cultural
geographers to engage increasingly with the ‘more-than-human’,
‘indigenous’, ‘performed’ and ‘situated’ accounts of spatiality.
However, for reasons that may be examined through this panel, the
politics of situated, practiced and indigenous knowledges within the
Mashriq and Maghreb have tended to be overlooked in much contemporary
scholarship. As this region is increasingly embroiled in international
geopolitics, the topography of its lands and people is lost; everyday
life is often forgotten. However, the Mashriq and Magreb have not been
exempt from what Tania Murray-Li (2001) has called the ‘Global
Conjuncture of Belonging’ as locally specific, ‘traditional’,
non-Western knowledges and practices are revived and revalorized in a
variety of social, political and economic fields. Such knowledges have
strong links with national identities, and are important for
accounting for the ways in which heritage and culture are represented.
We believe that political and cultural geographers working in this
region are well-placed to challenge some of the essentialist
terminology and categories by which knowledge of the region is often
structured, and suggest that explorations of the ways different
subaltern, indigenous, religious or national minority groups in this
region use, relate to, and understand the land could lead to a more
nuanced understanding of the region’s politics around territory,
identity, and knowledge.
This paper calls for a postcolonial approach to geographical knowledge
production in order to complicate three aspects of its production:
first to add to debates on the politics of knowledge production
especially ignored/erased knowledge and the subjects who (re-)produce
knowledges (Tribe, 2005); second to draw more attention to
postcolonial/decolonial approaches rooted in specific places and
particularly the ground/land; third to draw attention to the doing,
performed, and embodied aspects of knowledge in these places to ‘tease
out geographies that are subaltern in the context of the discipline’s
hegemonic theorizations and concept-metaphors’ (Jazeel, 2014: 2). We
welcome contributions from across the discipline (and from historical
or contemporary perspectives) that address issues including but not
limited to:
- New practices reviving situated, practiced, indigenous knowledge:
particularly spaces of tourism and leisure
- Political movements that address situated, regional and indigenous claims
- The politics of knowledge production in geography
- Questions of identity and its relationship to knowledge at various scales
- Minority or unorthodox knowledges and practices
- Methodological challenges in conducting research ‘on the ground’ in
the Mashreq and the Maghreb
We propose 4-5 papers of around 15-20 minutes (depending on
submissions). Please send abstracts of no more than 250 words to both
conveners by Friday 10th February 2017: [log in to unmask] &
[log in to unmask]
The RGS-IBG Annual Conference 2017 takes place in London between 29th
– 1st September.
More details on the conference/registration can be found here:
http://www.rgs.org/WhatsOn/ConferencesAndSeminars/Annual+International+Conference/Annual+international+conference.htm
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