Recent years have seen historians moving beyond the nation-state as the principal unit of historical analysis. Contemporary globalisation has helped shape a growing interest in the history of world-wide networks of power, communication and social and economic formation. Within an English-speaking world, the repackaging of aspects of imperial history under the heading of the ‘British World’ has added further pressure for global, transnational and comparative histories. This conference aims to explore these issues, with a particular emphasis upon labour and working-class histories. The society wishes to encourage the widest possible definition of labour history and to embrace social, cultural, economic and political approaches to the past. Themes for consideration could include:

Transnational and global institutions
Internationalism in labour history
Formal and informal labour networks
Global examples of associational culture
Activities or campaigners operating in more than one national context
Social and culture rituals across territories
Strikes, violence, and resistance in comparative perspective
International markets and their effect on labour migration
Class, race, ethnicity and gender in transnational or comparative perspective
Transnationalism, globalisation and Diaspora as conceptual issues or problems
The strengths and weakness of comparative labour history

Confirmed keynotes:
Professor John Belchem (Liverpool)
Professor Stefan Berger (Manchester)
Professor Marcel van der Linden (Amsterdam)
Professor Melanie Nolan (Wellington, NZ)

We welcome proposals for individual papers of 20 minutes, or for panels of up to four papers of that length. Some financial assistance may be available to postgraduates travelling from other parts of the UK or Ireland. A selection of the papers may be published in the Society’s journal, Labour History Review.

Please email proposals (300 words maximum per paper) and brief CV (one page maximum) to
Professor Donald MacRaild (d.macraild@ulster.ac.uk); this email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it

or to Dr Charlotte Alston (c.alston@ulster.ac.uk); this email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it by 1 May 2008.