On behalf of the organizing team for the 2027 UT Austin Africa Conference, I am pleased to inform you that next year's conference is scheduled for April 7-11. We now invite paper/abstract submissions related to the conference theme: "Rethinking Global Africa: Diaspora, Knowledge, Transformations, and Futures." Details of the conference can be found on the Department of History website Africa Conference | History | Liberal Arts | UT - Austin, along with the attached Call for Papers.
April 7 – 11, 2027 | The University of Texas at Austin, TX
Theme: Rethinking Global Africa: Diaspora, Knowledge, Transformations, and Futures
CALL FOR PAPERS
Submission Deadline: December 1, 2026
Global Africa presents Africa as central to histories of the world, global thought, and world-making. Africans and the African diaspora have been actors in globalization from the beginning, including the movement of people, migration and forced displacement, trade, religion, colonization and decolonization, culture, knowledge production, and digital transformation. Global Africa troubles Eurocentric ways of writing history by putting Africa at the center of networks, interactions, and flows of information, materials, and power. Africa has always been global, from the trans-Saharan trade and Indian Ocean exchanges to the Atlantic world and now digitization. Recognizing that Africa’s interactions with the wider world did not start with the Transatlantic slave trade, but that they have been intensifying since the onset of modernity, this conference asks how can we critically engage the concept of Global Africa as both a past historical process and as an analytical lens through which we study Africa’s global connections, emphasize Africa’s agency, and decolonize modes of knowledge production in our current multipolar moment.
In calling for papers for a conference on Global Africa, we aim to position Africa at the center of discussions on globalization by emphasizing African agency, interconnectedness, and knowledge production. We seek to expand upon and contribute to work in African historiography, African diaspora studies, and decolonial scholarship more broadly.
We welcome Papers, Roundtable Discussions, Panels, Poster Presentations, and Creative Works/Performances that pose critical questions on Global Africa. Discussions at the conference will engage the following sub-themes:
- Mobility, Environment, and Space
- Histories of Science and Technology
- Global Africa and Political Economy
- Digital Africa and Knowledge Futures
- Histories of Global Interconnection
- Global Africa and the African Diaspora
- Medicine and Healing in Africa and the African Diaspora
- Material Culture and Afro-Futurism
- Epistemologies and Decolonization
- Religion, Cosmology, and Global Circulations
- Click here to locate and learn more about the conference sub-themes
Registration Rate
In-person/face-to-face participation
- Participants from the United States/Canada/South America/Australia/Europe/Asia: $150
- Participants from Africa: $100
- Graduate students regardless of location = fee waived (see website)
Virtual attendees regardless of origin/location: $50
Submission Guidelines
All abstract submissions and correspondence must be submitted via:
Individual proposals should consist of:
- Participant’s name, email address, and affiliated institution
- Abstract (250 words maximum)
- Short biography (150 words maximum)
Panel proposals
- Rationale and presentation of the panel (300 words maximum)
- Indicate the name, email address, and affiliated institution above each person’s abstract
- Abstract of each paper (250 words maximum)
- Short biography for each contributor and the panel chair (150 words maximum)
Notification of acceptance issued on a rolling basis
Conference Team
Organizers:
Convener:
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Department of History, The University of Texas at Austin
Contact:
We look forward to another episode of the UT Austin Africa Conference, where robust intellectual engagement and scholarly collaboration on Africa and its diaspora continue to flourish.
Best,
Sylvester Akyea
Organizing Team | 2027 UT Austin Africa Conference
