There are a few extra days for those who consider participating this year. And new members of RSACS are strongly encouraged to apply already this year, starting participating in EAAS activities. Please see below the information about the conference. The link to the conference website is also in the end.

2020 EAAS Conference — 20/20 vision

2020 EAAS Conference — Warsaw, May 1–3, 2020 20/20 vision: Citizenship, Space, Renewal EAAS 2020 Conference coincides with the 400th anniversary of the establishment of the Plymouth Plantation. Falling on the quadricentennial, EAAS 2020 invites broader contemplations of American history, politics, and culture. The conference seeks to underscore questions of optics, distance, and acuity. The concept of “20/20 vision,” an optical term denoting “normal” visual clarity and sharpness of sight, invites a reflection on historical distance, focal points, visibility and invisibility of socio-historical, cultural, and literary aspects of American citizenship, space, and renewal until today. Citizenship The first thematic scope of “20/20 Vision” is citizenship. We thus welcome papers targeting the idea of citizenship from various historical, political, ethical, and aesthetic perspectives, and addressing questions about the archaic, residual or emergent forms, styles and norms of being a citizen. Papers and pre-formed panels may focus on the following problem points:

• the evolution or devolution of the idea of a democratic citizen in American politics
• legal fiction, the citizen, and citizenship in history and literature
• the problems of citizenship and agency in the days of the early Republic
• the relation between citizenship and economy
• citizenship and mobility
• citizenship and migration
• citizenship and slavery
• citizenship and disability
• citizenship and the changing idea of freedom
• citizenship and community
• civil rights
• limits of responsibility
• limits of engagement

Space The second theme “20/20 Vision” addresses is space, a general umbrella term for the issues related to the environment:

• land exploration and exploitation in the US
• American history of land property
• US borderland issues
• US problem of natural resources
• climate change and the US policy
• climate change and the American landscape
• pollution and toxic waste
• ecological disasters
• space exploration

The theme of space also relates issues connected with spatiality on 
a different dimension such as the issues of

• private vs public space
• social media and internet space
• architecture, mortgage problem
• rural vs. urban space
• utopias in American history, politics and literature
• dystopias in American history, politics and literature
• American heterotopias

Renewal The last focus area of “20/20 Vision” is perhaps the broadest of the three: the idea of renewal. While strongly related to the issues of citizenship and space, where it may also serve as a reflective angle, the theme of renewal on its own relates to a strong appeal in the American culture of the discourse of rebirth, reawakening, and revolution. Long before “make it new” became the slogan of the modernist artists on both sides of the Atlantic, making things new and resetting the parameters had always been part of the American life ethos. We welcome individual papers as well as pre-formed panels. Submissions We welcome abstracts and proposals in a range of formats, including individual papers; complete three-paper sessions (do note that
 a proposed session cannot feature scholars from the same institution and the same country); roundtables; and workshops. Individual paper abstracts should be no longer than 350 words (excluding bibliography, if you choose to have one). Session proposals must include a short description of the session as well as the title and abstracts of all three papers. Deadline for abstracts: December 15, 2019 Acceptance notifications: January 6, 2019

http://eaas2020.eu/