Conference
22nd Forum Fronterizo in Partnership with Mexico Business Center's 7th Annual Mexico Economic Outlook
"Renewable Energy: Increasing U.S. Energy Competitiveness Through Crossborder Alliances"
When: Wednesday, October 8, 2008, 7:30-11:40am.
Where: Sheraton San Diego Hotel & Marina, San Diego, CA.

The 22nd Forum Fronterizo will focus on the current capacity and future potential for renewable energy in the San Diego-Imperial-Baja California region. Renewable energy is an increasingly important issue given concerns about energy supplies and addressing global climate change. The keynote address will touch upon these larger issues and how renewable energy resources along the US-Mexico border may help mitigate the looming challenges of achieving energy independence and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, there is a large opportunity to improve our economic competitiveness through the development of new, clean technologies. A moderated panel discussion with renewable energy experts will discuss their current activities and the future potential for solar, wind, and geothermal energy sources in the crossborder region.

For more information and registration, click here.

Conference
TRPI's 5th Annual Education Conference
"Policies, Programs, and Practices: Latino Education for a New Era."
When: October 31st, 2008, from 8:30am to 3:30pm.
Where: Long Beach Convention Center, Long Beach, CA.

The conference will host an array of stakeholders working together for the betterment of Latino students.
For more information click here.

Conference
"Mongrel America"
When: October 2-3 2008
Where: University of Texas, Austin

The American Studies Graduate Committee at the University of Texas at Austin calls for papers for its upcoming graduate conference, "Mongrel America," to be held in Austin on October 2-3, 2008. Our keynote speaker will be Dick Hebdige.
Constructions and representations of America and American identity are fluid and contested. Our conference theme, "Mongrel America," plays on ideas of hybridity and melange, boundaries and transgressions, authenticity and artificiality. In order to complicate the term "mongrel," we seek papers which look at ideas and aspects of America in the musical, literary, artistic, religious, political, visual, psychological, natural, built, social, and transnational realms, including work which looks beyond the political borders of the United States to the "Americas" and beyond. In addition to standard conference papers, we also invite other presentation formats and creative works, such as short films and poetry/fiction/drama readings.

As interdisciplinary work is at the core of American Studies, we encourage different methodological approaches and invite submissions from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including but not limited to: African and African American Studies, American Studies, American Indian Studies, Anthropology, Architecture and Urban Planning, Art and Art History, Asian and Asian American Studies, Borderland Studies, Botany, Chicana/o Studies, Communication Studies, Education, English, Environmental Studies, History, Geography, Government, Journalism, Latin American Studies, Law, Mexican American Studies, Music, Philosophy, Psychology, Public Affairs, Queer Studies, Radio-Television-Film, Religious Studies, Rhetoric, Sociology, Women's Studies, and Zoology.

Call For Papers
North Central Council of Latin Americanists
"Latin America’s Cultural Diversity: Art, Politics and History"
When: October 31-November 1, 2008
Where: University of Wisconsin-Whitewater

NCCLA invites proposals for panels, round tables, and papers from all disciplines that address the conference theme. Interdisciplinary and comparative analyses are most welcome. Proposals may focus on any region and may be written in English, Spanish or Portuguese. Teaching panels concerning pedagogical strategies, teaching and learning methods, and in-class or long distance innovative approaches are especially invited.
Some suggested topics:
• Indigenous influence in Latin America’s History
• Latin America’s New Historicism
• New World consciousness in Latin American politics
• Political and cultural identity as expressed in the arts and letters
• New Criticism and historical conflicts
• The Mexican American cultural conflict
• The Zapatistas and other indigenous based political movements in Latin America
• Old World versus New World elements in Latin America’s art forms
• The Latin American political hegemony and resistance to reform
• Native influence and tradition in post conquest painting, drama, poetics
Proposals (250-300 word abstracts) must be submitted by July 15, 2008. Please enclose a cover sheet stating professional affiliation, address, telephone number, and e-mail address of each participant. Please also state need for audiovisual support. E-mail submissions are encouraged.
Graduate and advanced undergraduate students are encouraged to participate. A limited number of student travel grants of up to $150 each are available. Grants are for full-time students who are not professionally employed. See application at http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/CLACS/nccla/awards.html

Send abstracts and proposals to:
Dr. Dan Breining
NCCLA Program Chair 2008
UW-Stevens Point
Department of Foreign Languages
410 Collins Classroom Center
Stevens Point, WI 54481
715-346-4946
FAX 715-346-4215
dbreinin@uwsp.edu
http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/CLACS/nccla/index.html

Call For Papers
Pacific Coast Council on Latin American Studies
When: November 7-8, 2008
Where: University of Nevada, Las Vegas

This year’s Conference of the Pacific Coast Council on Latin American Studies (PCCLAS) will be held at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, November 7-8, 2008. The conference will bring together scholars, educators, graduate, undergraduate, and high school students, and community members interested in Latin American Studies. Papers from all areas of the social sciences, humanities and the arts and/or cross-disciplinary studies and relating to Latin American/Latino/a Studies are invited. All topics are welcome. Selected papers will be published in the Conference’s Proceedings.

Submissions:
Proposals for single papers and complete sessions are welcome. Single paper proposals should include your paper’s title and abstract (200 word or less), and your name, academic affiliation (if appropriate), and contact information. Session proposals (3 to 4 presenters) should include: the session’s title and contact person; the same information required of single paper proposals for each of the session’s presenters. Proposals to: lead open forums, discussion groups, teaching workshops; to set up booths for graduate or study abroad programs; and/or to screen films or project other media are also welcome.
Email your submissions to the 2008 PCCLAS Program Chair, Robert Kirkland, at pcclas2008@cmc.edu. Receipt of submissions will be acknowledged via email within 48 hours. You may also send your submission via regular mail to:
Robert Kirkland
Department of History
Claremont McKenna College
850 Columbia Avenue
Claremont, CA 91711-6420

Conference
The 16th Annual Charles F. Fraker Conference
"(De) Facing the Limits"
When: November 7th and 8th, 2008
Where: University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

What is a limit? How and by whom are limits constructed and enforced? What assumptions—true or false—do we make about them? How do limits affect our perceptions of what lies inside or outside them? This conference proposes to explore the nature of limits. Limits (and limitations) divide things and ideas—physical and metaphysical, moral and ethical, concrete and abstract—from one another, but the demarcation may be sharp or hazy, firmly established or open to interpretation.
Liminal spaces, we argue, can be crossed or—perhaps—transgressed. What are the possible products of such a crossing? Where can one find their intersection, and what can be produced at these sites? In their absence, what could remain or emerge? Limits may seem arbitrary, yet they signal as well as produce power relations, thus organizing different attitudes and feelings not just in terms of space but also within subjectivities. By surveying these repercussions, we seek to place thought itself at its limit, to test its relation to fields of knowledge.
More specifically, how are limits expressed in practice? What is their impact on daily life? How can we account for their being at once discreet and overlapping? Which are the political and cultural limits that merit further examination? What are the limits of our scholarly disciplines? How do different disciplines help us to question the limits of our own discipline? In short, how can we push limits, and how can limits push back?
Topics may include, but are not limited to:
- Diaspora studies
- The politics of Cartography
- Nation, community, citizenship
- Race, Gender, Identity
- Urban and cultural practices
- Narratives of travel, exile, or displacement
- Law and Public Policy
- The role of academia within society.
- Periodization and Social Change
- Gentrification, biopolitics, marginalization.

Conference
"Rethinking Extractive Industry: Regulation, Dispossession, and Emerging Claims"
When: March 5-7, 2009
Where: York University, Toronto

The Centre for Research on Latin America and the Caribbean (CERLAC),
together with the Extractive Industries Research Group (EIRG), both
located at York University, are hosting a conference entitled
“Rethinking Extractive Industry: Regulation, Dispossession, and Emerging
Claims.” Taking place from March 5 to 7, 2009 as part of the
University’s 50th anniversary and CERLAC’s 30th anniversary
celebrations, the conference will bring together cutting-edge research
on the socio-ecological, spatial, and political-economic dimensions of
industrial extraction. Through critical theoretical reflection and
policy-relevant analysis, three tracks aim to advance our understanding
of the social regulation of extractive industries in its broadest sense.

Call For Papers
The Global South 4.1
"The Caribbean and Globalization"
When: February 2010

The Global South is an interdisciplinary journal, published by
Indiana University Press. Focusing on the literatures and cultures
of those parts of the world that have experienced the most political,
social, and economic upheaval, and which have suffered the brunt of
the greatest challenges facing the world under globalization, it
serves as a signifier of oppositional subaltern cultures ranging from
Africa, Central and Latin America, much of Asia, and even those
"Souths" within a larger perceived North, such as the U.S. South, the
Caribbean, and Mediterranean Europe. The journal equally emphasizes
those populations marginalized within the U.S. as it increasingly
becomes the face and voice of globalization: immigrants, women of
color, and other vulnerable minorities. The global cataclysms of the
last decade have amply illustrated that it is the marginalized that
bears the brunt of the suffering under globalization, and as
globalization conquers the planet, the South, as a synonym for
subalterity, transcends geographical and ideological frontiers. Each
issue of The Global South will contain original work by some of the
foremost scholars from around the world, addressing the most vital
political, cultural, and material issues of our time. The current
Call for Papers is for a special issue on the Caribbean.

The Caribbean is a culturally rich and complex society due to a blend
of cultures and ethnicities, including Native Peoples, European,
African, and Asian. A discussion of the Caribbean in relation to
globalization must, therefore, account for the rich diversity of the
region in language, literature, history, religion, culture, economy,
science, and technology. The Global South 4:1: The Caribbean and
Globalization will feature responses to globalization by scholars of
Caribbean studies and we invite high-quality original essays. As
consistent with the journal's interdisciplinary scope, we welcome
submissions from scholars working in all areas of Caribbean
studies. Possible topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

* The Caribbean as Contact Zone
* The Colonization of the Caribbean and Globalization
* Resistance, Independence, and Post-Independence Struggles in
the Caribbean
* Nationalisms and Ethnic Identities in the Caribbean
* Music (Reggae, Soca, Calypso,etc.) and Globalization
* The Race for Theory: Marxism, Postcolonialism, Feminism,
Globalization, etc.
* The World Bank, IMF, Structural Adjustment Programs,
Capitalism, Communism, and Economic State of the Caribbean
* History, Regional Organizations, and Globalization
* The Caribbean and Natural Disasters (Hurricane, Tsunami, etc.)
* Mineral Wealth, Resource Control, and the Environment
* Political Activism in a Global Age
* Gender and Globalization
* Orality and Globalization
* Hybridity and Globalization
* Popular Culture, Carnival, and Globalization
* Creativity, Production, and Globalization
* Religion and Globalization
* Postcolonial International Relations and Globalization
* The African Diaspora
* The Asian Diaspora
* Reparation and Globalization
* US and British Virgin Islands, the Caribbean Region, and Globalization
* Languages of The Caribbean, including Patois and Nation Language
* Literatures of the Caribbean

This Special Issue of The Global South is scheduled for publication
in February 2010. Please submit abstracts and a short bio by July
15, 2008, final drafts of essays by December 31, 2008, and inquiries
to Adetayo Alabi. Essays should be 25-35 double-spaced pages long and should follow the MLA style.

To send Conference submissions:
E-mail: lasmail@ucsd.edu
Fax: (858) 534-7175