Organised by: Research Committee on Politics and Ethnicity (RC14)

Where: Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia  Google Maps

When: 11-14 July, 2013

Application Deadline: 15 March, 2013

Contact: stephanie.lawson@mq.edu.au

Conference Overview:

The assertion of indigenous identity generally involves claims not just to recognition but to particular rights and interests usually based on prior occupation of territory, a valued way of life associated with the land, and a need to safeguard indigenous heritage for future generations. This further assumes that indigeneity is associated with a degree of dispossession and subordination within a larger sociopolitical sphere dominated by another larger and more powerful ethnic group which effectively controls the state. General questions raised by these issues include: How and by whom is ‘indigeneity’ defined and deployed? Is indigenity necessarily associated with minority status? How are indigenous claims to identity and/or rights theorized? How have different legal and political regimes attempted to reconcile indigenous interests with other interests? What forms might indigenous self-governance take? To what extent have indigenous movements become globalized? What can we learn from the history of indigenous movements?

Paper proposals relating to any of the above themes are invited in the form of an abstract of no more than 400 words to be sent to the chair of the local organizing committee, Professor Stephanie Lawson, at stephanie.lawson@mq.edu.au.

The deadline for receipt of abstracts is 15 March 2013.

The deadline for full papers (of no more than 8,000 words) is June 15th, 2013.