The theme of the conference is Encounters/Rencontres

Encounters are at the heart of human activity and experience and speak to all fields, periods and approaches of historical study.

They may be social, economic, geographical, political, religious, cultural, military, emotional, familial, personal or sexual.

They may be imposed or experienced by travellers, missionaries, migrants, colonists or the colonized, by intermediaries or mediators, but equally by neighbours, family members or partners.

They may take place on a mutual footing or reinforce relationships of power, domination and subordination.

They may give rise to awakenings, understandings and transformations, or else to misunderstandings, mistranslations or conflict.

Encounters are also part of the historical process – with a document, an archive, a witness or an interviewee.

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For more information, please visit the SSFH website