Environmental History of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey

Call for Papers

Workshop – Environmental History of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey

27-28 October 2017

Universität Hamburg, Asien-Afrika-Institut

The TürkeiEuropaZentrum (TEZ) of Universität Hamburg will host a two-day academic workshop to examine new approaches to the environmental history of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey. Environmental history is an emerging field in Ottoman and Turkish studies. Contrary to the growing number  of  environmental historical  studies  in  North  America,  Europe,  and  other  parts  of  the  world,  the number of studies in this burgeoning subfield in Ottoman and Turkish studies still can be counted on the fingers of one hand. This workshop is an invitation to historians, sociologists, political scientists, geographers, environmental and natural scientists, and all other researchers, both early career and experienced, identifying themselves or showing an interest in the field of Ottoman/Turkish environmental history.

The workshop aims to provide an interdisciplinary forum, and therefore, is open to a wide range of subjects, topics, approaches, and methodologies. We invite researchers from any disciplines working on projects related to Ottoman/Turkish environmental history to submit proposals for individual papers or panel sessions. The chronological scope is from the foundation of the Ottoman Empire to the present day.

Possible topics of submissions include, but are not limited to:

1. Changing relationship between the people and their environments in the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey
2. Urban environmental history: cities and their socio-ecological contexts
3. City-country relations in a historical context
4. Mining and environmental change
5. Renewable, chemical, fossil, and nuclear energies and environmental change
6. Water history, water and history
7. Climate history, climate and history
8. Forest history
9. History of consumption and waste
10. History of conservation and management
11. History of commons, commons in history
12. Industrial and post-industrial environmental history
13. Environmental conflicts, environmental movements, and environmental activism
14. Theories, methods, approaches, and sources in Ottoman/Turkish environmental history
15. The historical construction of land and waterscapes and ideas about Ottoman/Turkish natures
16. Histories and theories of literature and the environment

Practical Information:

Organization and Venue

The workshop “Environmental History of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey” is organized by the TürkeiEuropaZentrum (TEZ) and will take place at the Asien-Afrika-Institut of Universität Hamburg on 27-28 October 2017.

Paper Proposals: please submit short paper proposal of no more than 400 words together with personal information of presenter(s) including full name(s), institutional affiliation(s), and contact information to Dr. Onur Inal, TürkeiEuropaZentrum, University of Hamburg (Tuerkei-Europa-Zentrum@uni-hamburg.de) and Dr. Selçuk Dursun, History Department, Middle East Technical University (dselcuk@metu.edu.tr) no later than 1 March 2017. Accepted proposals will be notified by 1 April 2017.

Accommodation: depending on the funding, we hope to be able to cover the accommodation costs for all or most of the participants coming from outside of Hamburg. Please indicate whether you need this kind of support when submitting your paper proposal.

Workshop fee: there is no fee for the workshop.

Language of the workshop: the workshop languages are English and German. Non-English participants are expected to join discussions in English.

Post-workshop publication: we aim to publish selected articles in an edited volume in 2018. Submission deadline will be 31 December 2017. Articles submitted for publication will be subject to the peer-review procedure.