CFP: Settler-Colonial Spaces: Thinking Across Indigeneity and International Relations

International Studies Association - Toronto (2014)

Settler-Colonial Spaces: Thinking Across Indigeneity and International
Relations

CFP Deadline: May 1, 2013



As the ISA moves from Ohlone territories (San Francisco) to Mississauga and
Haudenosaunee territories (Toronto) for its annual convention next year,
this is a call to reflect on the international underpinnings of
settler-colonial spaces. The ISA Toronto 2014 Call for Papers emphasizes
the role of geopolitics in International Relations. The aim of this CFP is
to facilitate the organization of panels that examine intersections between
Indigeneity, settler-colonial spaces, and International Relations theory,
including the gendered, racialized, classed, aesthetic, cosmological, and
political economic dimensions of this under-theorized aspect of IR.



Since the early 2000s, numerous interventions in IR have done much to
deconstruct the Eurocentric foundations of the discipline by inflecting it
with anti-colonial, postcolonial, and decolonial perspectives (Agathangelou
and Ling 2009; Barkawy and Laffey 2006; Blaney and Inayatullah 2004;
Chowdhry and Nair 2002; Dotty 1996; Grovogui 2009; Henderson 2007; Jones
2006; Krishna 2001; Ling 2002; Sajed 2012; Shilliam 2011; Vitalis 2010).
Nevertheless, a virtual silence persists regarding the 'international
relations' underpinning the contested nation-spaces of settler colonialism
and Indigenous self-determination. While other disciplines have
increasingly welcomed settler-colonial studies as a growing field of
academic inquiry, IR theory has once again been late to the table in
incorporating such an important research program into its disciplinary
frameworks. This elision is particularly troubling considering that the
dominant institutional geography of IR often overlaps with and occupies
lands claimed by Indigenous peoples. IR's silence on this front enables the
world's remaining settler colonies to perpetuate laws and everyday
practices that seek the erasure of Indigenous peoples from the realm of the
'international', reinforcing their tenuous claims to territorial integrity
and sovereignty in the process.



The 2008 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) is a
crucial document that clearly 'internationalizes' the rights of Indigenous
peoples by recognizing: inherent rights of self-determination; sovereignty
in governance of lands, resources, and social reproduction; and
Indigenous-settler treaty relationships. Historical studies have also
demonstrated the extent to which encounters between European colonial
powers and Indigenous peoples were generative of key categories of
international law. From its emergence to the present day,
settler-colonialism manages its inter-national relations with Indigenous
peoples by attempting to contain settler-indigenous relationships within
the framework of domestic politics. This colonial maneuver continues to
generate multiple sites of contestation in world politics, as most recently
seen with the #IdleNoMore movement.



Interested presenters are asked to submit 300 word abstracts - along with
their names, institutional affiliations and contact information - to
Konstantin Kilibarda (kole@yorku.ca) and Emily Merson (merson@yorku.ca) by
May 1, 2013. Please also state if you are interested in acting as a Chair
and/or Discussant on one of the panels in this series. Individual papers
will be grouped into distinct panels based on mutual interest and lines of
inquiry, though full panel proposals are also welcome.