The Department of American Studies

News and Events

 

THINKING BEYOND THE NATION-STATE: A SYMPOSIUM ON EMPIRES, DIASPORAS, AND INDIGENEITY 

Friday, November 20, 2009, 8:30 am to 5:30 pm

Baldy Center/Law School Conference Center - 509 O'Brian Hall

Sponsored by:
Buffalo Seminar on Racial Justice (Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy)
Haudenosaunee-Native American Research Workshop (Humanities Institute)
Canadian-American Studies Committee

"Thinking beyond the Nation-state" brings together faculty and graduate students from Western New York and Southern Ontario to examine racial and indigenous rights in a global context. The University at Buffalo is the perfect location for comparing Indigenous, African American, and Ethnic Studies approaches to the global. After all, it sits on land formerly held by the Haudenosaunee people (Six Nations). Its two campuses are also in the midst of a metropolitan area that is segregated along racial lines. Furthermore, the university is just minutes from the United States-Canada border – a border that crosscuts a region in which Western notions of nation-building, citizenship, and economic development have long collided with the interests of people of color. The purpose of this symposium is to spark conversations and to build relationships between scholars who have been traditionally separated by national and disciplinary boundaries. For more information and to RSVP, please contact Professor Theresa Runstedtler at tr23@buffalo.edu.

8:30                 Breakfast

 

8:45                 Welcome and Opening Remarks

                        Theresa McCarthy and Theresa Runstedtler, Assistant Professors of American Studies,

                        University at Buffalo

 

9:00-10:30       Alternative Geographies and Communities beyond the Nation

                         Chair: Katie McMahon, American Studies, University at Buffalo

A Nation against a Nation: W.E.B. Du Bois and Intellectual Legacy of David Walker’s Appeal

Marta Cieslak, American Studies, University at Buffalo

Locating Diaspora: Afro-Caribbean Narratives of Migration and Settlement in Toronto, 1914-1929

Jared Toney, Department of History, University of Toronto

Project for the Establishment of the Congress of Caribbean Cities (CCC)

Jose Buscaglia, Associate Professor of American Studies, Director of Caribbean Studies, University at Buffalo

Flying while Brown/Muslim: Exploring the Relationship between Race and Space beyond the Nation

Nafisa Tanjeem, Women and Gender Studies Institute, University of Toronto

10:30-10:45     Coffee Break

                        

10:45-12:15     Rethinking Citizenship and Nation for Indigenous Peoples

                         Chair: Rick Monture, Acting Academic Director of Indigenous Studies,

                          McMaster University

Haudenosaunee Nation-building and Decolonization

Bob Antone, American Studies, University at Buffalo

Let us Put our Minds Together as One: To be a Citizen of the Haudenosaunee

Aaron Van Every, American Studies, University at Buffalo

Haudenosaunee and Palestinian Resistance to Capitalist-imperialist Articulations of ‘Nation’ and ‘Citizen’

Rachel Gorman, Undergraduate Coordinator, Women and Gender Studies Institute, University of Toronto

Re-reclaiming our Culture and Spirituality:  Responding to the Transnational Assail of Non-Indigenous Ethnic Frauds

Joe Candillo and Steve Demchak, American Studies, University at Buffalo

 

12:15-1:00         Lunch and Featured Commentators

  • Richard W. Hill, Associate Director, First Nations Technical Institute

  • Rinaldo Walcott, Canada Research Chair, Associate Professor of Social Justice and Cultural Studies, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), University of Toronto

1:00-2:15       Creating Ideal Subjects at Home and Abroad

                       Chair: Jeff Iovanonne, American Studies, University at Buffalo

White Gazes, Brown Breasts: Desire, Anxiety, and Regulation in the Colonial Tropics

Roland Sintos Coloma, Assistant Professor of Sociology and Equity Studies in Education, OISE, University of Toronto

Anthropology and Imperial Knowledge Construction in St. Louis in 1904 and Toronto in 2008: Analogies between First Nations Groups and Filipinos

Bonnie McElhinny, Professor and Director of the Women and Gender Studies Institute, University of Toronto

Salvaging Human Wastage for the Great Industrial Army: Race, Rehabilitation and the Federal Board for Vocational Education, 1917-1924

Paul Lawrie, Department of History, University of Toronto

 

2:15-2:30         Coffee Break

2:30-3:45         Immigrant Women and Belonging, within and beyond the Nation

                         Chair: Tara Viceconte, Global Gender Studies, University at Buffalo

From Youthful Sexuality to Chaste Tradition: The Politics of Ethnic Authenticity among Indian Immigrants in the United States

Kritika Agarwal, American Studies, University at Buffalo

Remembering ‘Iraq’: Indigeneity, Identity, and Difference in Diasporic Narratives of Iraqi Women in Toronto

Nadia Lewis, Department of History, University of Toronto

Negotiating Precariousness: The Effects of the Racialized and Gendered Labor Market on Immigrant Women of Color in Canada

Nel Coloma-Moya, Department of Geography, York University

Srabani Maitra, Department of Adult Education, OISE, University of Toronto

3:45-4:00          Coffee Break

4:00-5:30          Indigenizing Settler Relations

                          Chair: Nancy Napierala, American Studies, University at Buffalo

“It would be most unfair and un-British to dismiss a good teacher on account of his colour”: African Canadian Teachers at Grand River

Alison Norman, History of Education, OISE, University of Toronto

Thinking beyond Worms, Weeds and Water: Reconnecting Family and Culture through Indigenous Gardening Practices

Sierra Adare-Tasiwoopa api, American Studies, University at Buffalo

Carolyn Stirling, Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education, American Studies, University at Buffalo

‘Reconciliation’ in the Aftermath of Anishinaabec-Settler Conflict: Theatre in re-membering Indigenous Claims to Land in Canada

Margot Francis, Assistant Professor of Women’s Studies and Sociology, Brock University