The Fifth Regional Conference of the Central Eurasian Studies Society (CESS)

2-4 June 2016

Call for Papers

DEADLINE for Proposal Submissions: January 15, 2016.

The Central Eurasian Studies Society invites panel and paper proposals for its Fifth Regional Conference. The conference will be hosted by Kazan Federal University (http://kpfu.ru/eng) in Tatarstan, the Russian Federation, on 2-4 June 2016.

The conference committee invites submissions of panel and paper topics relating to all aspects of humanities and social science scholarship. The geographic domain of covered by this conference, Central Eurasia, encompasses Central Asia, the Caucasus, Iran, Afghanistan, Tibet, Mongolia, Siberia, Inner Asia, the Black Sea region, East Europe, Central Europe and the Volga Region. We hope that the conference in Kazan will bring together scholars from all over the world, including especially those who study the many Central Eurasian regions of the Russian Federation. Practitioners and scholars in all fields with an interest in this region are encouraged to participate.

Submissions of Pre-organized Panels are strongly encouraged and will be given some priority in the selection process.Click here to submit a Pre-organized Panel. 

A Pre-organized Panel can be of several types. The most common type, Regular Panel, involves three or four Paper Presenters, plus a Chair and a Discussant.  A Roundtable Panel involve a Chair and usually four-five Commentators, who do discuss some topic of importance to Central Eurasian studies, with brief introductory remarks by the Commentators, followed by moderated discussion with audience participation.  An Author-Critic Forum addresses a recently published book with the comments of three-four "critics" followed by a response from the book's author.  A Workshop could address such matters as publishing, field research, ethics, or working with the media.  We very much encourage innovative formats that try new approaches -- the proposal must simply provide a suitable description and justification.

In the case of Pre-organized Panels, a panel may be designated as English only, Russian only, or Mixed English and Russian (this will be reflected in the program).  As our webforms are unable to accept Cyrillic or other scripts, any information provided in such scripts must be included in the same file as the abstract.  Papers to be presented in Russian should be provided with Russian and English versions of the title and the author's name; the abstract and keywords should be provided in English. 

Please note that those organizing panels are asked to provide information about each panelist on their panel (name, affiliation, job title, highest academic degree, email address, webpage, and membership status).  For Regular Panels (with paper presentations), the organizer should upload a file for each of the presenters with author(s), paper title, abstract and keywords. Panel submissions lacking individual abstracts or other key information will not be considered complete, and may not receive full consideration by the Conference Committee.  Panels that lack a Chair or Discussant may be considered, but the strongest consideration will be given to compete panels.

Individual papers are also welcome and will be assigned by the Program Committee to an appropriate panel with a chair and a discussant. Click here to submit an Individual Paper. 

In the case of Individual Paper submissions, only papers to be presented in English are accepted. 

The deadline for submission of BOTH panel and paper proposals is 15 January 2016.

For inquiries regarding the program and registration, contact CESS at: info@centraleurasia.org. For inquiries regarding Kazan logistics, contact the host institution at: islam@kpfu.ru

The Conference Committee may be contacted via info@centraleurasia.org. The members of the Committee are:

Morgan Liu, Chair (Ohio State Univ., USA)
Leila Almazova (Kazan Federal Univ., Russian Federation) 
Liliya Karimova (George Washington Univ., USA)
Marlene Laruelle (George Washington Univ., USA)
John Schoeberlein (Nazarbayev Univ., Kazakhstan)

Leila Almazova may be contacted at leila_almazova@mail.ru.

Conference Participation

The program will feature approximately 50 panels including about 175 presentations, and there will also be a supplementary program including a banquet, cultural program, and two keynote speakers.

Participants are responsible for covering the costs of their own travel and stay in Kazan, and are responsible for making their own arrangements. The host institution will make available a limited number of accommodations in shared dormitory rooms for a minimal cost on a first-come-first-served and financial need basis. There will also be reservations available at nearby hotels at discounted rates for conference participants.

All of those who are included in a panel for the conference program are required to have current CESS membership. Please see the membership page for further details.

2016 (Individual) Membership forms may be found here.

Registration forms for the 5th Regional Conference in Kazan may be found here.