CFA: New Research Network on Memory and Identity

Call for New Members!

The Council for European Studies (CES) has set up a new Research Network on Transnational Memory and Identity in Europe. It is chaired by Aline Sierp (Maastricht University) and Jenny Wuestenberg (Free University Berlin). The Network is currently constituted by over 50 academics based in eighteen different countries on five continents. It welcomes new members without regard to disciplinary background, national context, approach or age who are interested in analysing social and political processes of meaning-making in contemporary Europe. Interested new members can join by filling in the sign-up form. The network will be officially launched at the annual CES conference taking place from Wednesday 8 – Friday 10 July in Paris (for the preliminary programme click here).

The Research Network on Transnational Memory and Identity in Europe brings together scholars who analyse transnational politics and policies of memory, processes of memory entrepreneurship, cultures of remembrance and identity construction in the context of European integration. Our aim is to foster exchange between scholars from different disciplines who are working on related subjects – including heritage, public history, political culture, communication, trauma, migration, diversity, religion – and who use memory and identity as the baseline of their research. We want to strengthen research that is cutting-edge and interdisciplinary in nature, approaching memory and identity issues from different perspectives in the social sciences and the humanities (history, sociology, political science, psychology, law, anthropology, cultural studies, literary studies and more).

We facilitate cross-disciplinary and cross-border cooperation though the organisation of goal-oriented workshops and theoretical or methodological training seminars. In order to support in-person networking, we organise Research Network gatherings and special conference sessions that can feed into joint publications and new cooperative research projects. A comprehensive database of scholars enables the search for new partners and allows for enhanced networking between scholars and policy makers.