Coming Together and Breaking Apart: Teaching and Scholarship on Contradictions

Call for Proposals

The Fourteenth Annual Conference of the Midwest World History Association

September 27-28, 2024

Lewis University (Romeoville, IL)

Proposal Deadline: June 21, 2024

The 2020s have so far been a decade of great contradictions. Greater technological connectivity, worldwide social, political, cultural, environmental movements, and the desire on the part of many people for greater inclusivity has been tempered by brutal warfare, civil unrest, and divergent political perspectives. World History offers many instances of similar moments. How have societies navigated great moments of transition? What political and economic contexts are necessary for greater understanding? What political and societal factors encourage states to diverge? The Midwest World History Association (MWWHA) invites papers which explore this theme, but also address other issues in World History.  

This conference will be held in person at Lewis University in Chicago’s Southwest Suburbs.

Please submit a 250-word proposal abstract and short CV to this website (click here) by June 21, 2024.

Questions about the conference can be directed to MWWHA's public discussion forum on its site, or you can email the conference chair at chair@mwwha.org. Where a complete panel of papers, roundtable, or workshop is proposed, the convener should also include a 250-word abstract of the panel theme. Individual paper presentations should be planned to last no longer than 20 minutes. 

The MWWHA will offer up to three competitive Graduate Student Awards to help offset travel costs. Graduate students interested in applying should include a letter with their conference proposal explaining how the conference helps them with their studies, teaching, and/or future career plans as well as how their paper fits with the conference theme and the mission of the MWWHA. 

We also invite accepted papers to be submitted to our journal, The Middle Ground Journal, for potential publication: http://themiddlegroundjournal.org/. Extra consideration will be given to papers for a special issue of the journal based on the conference theme.