[URBANTH-L]CFP: Conference "The Urban Poor: Mobilities and Mobilizations"

[Jaffe, Rivke]

***CALL FOR PAPERS***

"The Urban Poor: Mobilities and Mobilizations"
An International Conference in Honor of Professor Peter J.M. Nas
23-25 September 2009, Leiden University, The Netherlands

An international, interdisciplinary conference on the mobilities and
mobilizations of the urban poor will be held in Leiden, the Netherlands
on September 23-25, 2009. This symposium aims to bring together experts
from a range of academic disciplines - including anthropology,
sociology, human geography and cultural studies - to discuss urban
mobilities and mobilizations. We invite contributions discussing cities
from both the Global South and the North.

The conference aims to explore the physical, social and imagined
movements of the poor into, within and out of cities, and how these
connect to the dynamics of urban social mobilization. How do the ways in
which urban space is imagined influence possibilities for movement? How
are the networks of the urban poor spatialized within and beyond cities,
and how do these local, national and global connections influence their
mobilities and mobilizations? What socio-spatial forms of individual and
collective agency crystallize within cities? How do virtual forms of
travel and alliance replace or supplement physical movement(s)? When do
the poor coalesce to become visible, and when do they strategically
remain invisible, in both a real and a symbolic, hyperreal sense? To
what extent is immobility a form of poverty in itself, and how can what
sociologist John Urry has termed 'mobility capital' be transformed into
economic capital? We invite papers that address these questions in a
broad range of urban contexts.

Prof. dr. Peter J.M. Nas, urban anthropologist and expert on Indonesian
cities, will retire from Leiden University in September 2009. This
conference is being organized to honor this occasion and celebrate his
long and distinguished career. The conference will focus on urban
poverty, an area of particular relevance to his work.

Interested contributors are invited to submit an abstract, accompanied
by a short bio, by May 1, 2009. Abstracts should not exceed 250 words in
length and should be sent in electronic form to Freek Colombijn and
Rivke Jaffe at the email addresses below. Participants will be expected
to submit their full conference paper by September 1, 2009.

For information, please contact Freek Colombijn or Rivke Jaffe:

Dr. Freek Colombijn                    
Dept. of Social and Cultural Anthropology, VU University       
De Boelelaan 1081      
1081 HV Amsterdam
The Netherlands
T: +31-20-5986704                              
E: f.colombijn[at]fsw.vu.nl                    

Dr. Rivke Jaffe:
Dept. of Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology, Leiden
University
P.O. Box 9555
2300 RB Leiden
The Netherlands
T: +31-71-5273465
E: rjaffe[at]fsw.leidenuniv.nl

**********************************************************************
This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and
intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they
are addressed. If you have received this email in error please notify
the system manager.
**********************************************************************