The 8th biennial conference of the Afroeuropeans Network will take place at Vrije Universiteit Brussel [University in Brussels, Belgium], 7-10 July 2021. The key focus of the discussions at this international, interdisciplinary gathering will centre on ‘Intersectional Challenges in Afroeuropean Communities.’

CONFERENCE THEMES (AND ‘STREAMS’)

Throughout the four-day programme a wide range of panel presentations, artists’ performances and other sessions will be delivered that address the overarching theme, and also foreground the following sub-themes (‘streams’):

• Intersectionality as Theory, Practice and Movement: Re-Centring Black Feminist Legacies
• Religion and Spirituality in Afro-Europe
• Structural Racism, Racialization and Exploitation
• Policy, Activism and Political Representation
• Afroeuropean Arts: Aesthetics and Politics
• Health and Racial Inequalities
• Family, Mixity and Identity
• Media, Digital Technology and Connectivity
• Decolonising Knowledge, Spaces and Institutions: From Activism to Transformative Change
• Pan-Africanism, Global Justice and Human Rights in Europe
• Contemporary Blackness and Black Histories in Urban Europe

The conference organisers have stated that all session will be co-designed, co-produced and collectively delivered for, by, and with scholar-activists, researchers, community campaigners, artists and other creative practitioners with African and diasporic heritage – with the contribution of our allies, and in dialogue with other marginalised and minoritised groups world-wide.

KEYNOTE LECTURES

Three keynote lectures will be given by leading scholars actively engaged in addressing the key issues in focus pertaining to anti-racism, equalities, inclusion, and social justice. The confirmed speakers will be: Professor Philomena Essed from the Netherlands (affiliated to Antioch University, USA); Italian MEP Cécile Kyenge; and Professor Kehinde Andrews, based at Birmingham City University, UK.

DEADLINE FOR PANEL PROPOSALS: 1 SEPTEMBER 2020

Prospective contributors to the conference are required to submit panel proposals by 1 September 2020.

All proposals will be reviewed by members of the Network’s organising committee – an international team of academics, activists, community campaigners, artists and other partners affiliated to Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB), European Network Against Racism (ENAR), the University of Ghent, and Black Speaks Back.

In collaboration with the stream convenors, the organising committee will communicate their decisions about which panels have been selected by 15 October 2020.

For further information about the call for panels, please visit the conference website: https://www.afroeuropeans2021.com/en/ [French translation: https://www.afroeuropeans2021.com/fr/].