CFP: The Mobility of People, Ideas and Objects between the German-speaking Lands and the World beyond Europe - Wolfenbuettel 20.05.2026 - 22.05.2026, Deadline 15.10.2025
The 10th International Conference of FNI takes as its theme "The Mobility of People, Ideas, and Objects between the German-speaking Lands and the World Beyond Europe." By doing so, it contributes to re-evaluating the German-speaking lands’ share in the early modern entanglement of Europe with African, American, and Asian regions, polities, and cultures. Despite not building formal or informal overseas empires of relevance themselves, German countries participated in military campaigns and colonial projects, and people and social groups from this region, including women and Jews, were to be found among the missionaries, merchants, mercenaries, settlers and scholars travelling and claiming the oceans and landmasses of the world.
The conference will be an on-site event held at the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel. There will be no conference fee. Graduate students can apply for travel support from the American Friends of the HAB via meplummer@arizona.edu.
We invite proposals that shed light on practices, materials, and methods from an interdisciplinary perspective, examining how the German-speaking lands contributed to the worldwide processes, notions, and networks that amount to early modern globalization. Possible topics might include, but are not restricted to
– the presence of German actors in the conquest, government, administration, and exploitation of overseas colonies of the European powers and chartered companies; colonial projects of German scholars and territories;
– the trade with goods from outside Europe to Germany and vice versa, from bulk commodities to luxury goods and collectors’ items; Germany as a market for colonial produce; the role of German merchants and companies in the trans-continental networks; German involvement in the plantation economy and slave labour;
– migration of Germans beyond Europe; the presence and the social and legal status of non-European individuals and groups in the German-speaking area;
– the intellectual and cultural impact of encountering extra-European natural environments and human cultures; the perception and evaluation of cultural, political, social, and religious differences; practices of comparing; the gathering, ordering, publication, dissemination, and reception of relevant knowledge;
– making sense of the global: developing a universal perspective (anthropology, religion, world history, etc.).
Panel proposals (three papers and a chair) and individual submissions are equally welcome. The deadline for submission is 15th October 2025. Please send your contact information, a brief bio, title, and abstract of no more than 250 words per paper to forschung@hab.de.
