Call for abstracts
Call for abstracts for paper proposals
Historians of the family in Canada and the United States have built a diverse body of scholarship over the past few decades, reflecting the diversity of demographic conditions and data sources across the continent. In Quebec a vigorous tradition of studying family formation and ties through rich church and state sources has continued from the 1960s to the present, connecting family histories over several centuries. However, these sources neglect people and families with transitory or no ties to the church. In the United States church records have been less used, but represent a fast emerging resource as genealogical companies increasingly make church sources available in digitized format. In both the United States and Canada digitized samples, and now complete databases, of the nominative censuses from the mid-nineteenth century on have been central to quantitative study of the family. A rich tradition of community studies that began in the 1960s transitioned to studies of national samples of census records. Complete databases of censuses in both countries offer new opportunities for methodological innovation at the national or local level. Geographic, ethnic, and racial diversity, combined with high levels of long-distance migration have made a narrative synthesis of family history in North America more challenging for qualitatively oriented scholars. Cultures of family life differed widely within the same geographic area in eras of high international migration. But in the twentieth century the advent of a mass media culture has tended to flatten the portrayal of family life across the country towards a common norm, sometimes at odds with what quantitatively oriented demographers may describe. Possible questions to address may include
• How have demographic behaviors changed over time in similar or different ways?
• How have different groups within either country experienced significantly different demographic patterns than numerically or socially dominant groups?
• How have the family experiences of black Americans and black Canadians changed?
• What insights have new data sources given us, and what research possibilities emerge with new data?
• What role has migration played in family histories in Canada and the United States?
• How have ideologies about desirable family life changed?
• What has been the role of popular culture in changing norms about family life?
• How have family behaviors and norms been transmitted across generations, and between different groups?
Abstracts on any other topic in the history of the family in Canada and the United States are welcome. Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods abstracts are welcome. Papers may be explicitly comparative or focus on family history in either country alone. Proposals for paired papers by different authors focusing on similar questions in two countries may be submitted.
Deadline for proposing abstracts of papers (max 500 words) is May 5, 2023
(by e-mail to: eroberts@umn.edu)
Authors interested in presenting a preliminary version of their paper at the Social Science History Association meetings in November 2023 in Washington D.C. should submit an abstract to the SSHA conference at https://ssha2023.ssha.org/ and email eroberts@umn.edu to let me know.
The acceptance of abstracts is announced to authors in June 2023. Authors can present preliminary versions of papers in person at the Social Science History Association meetings in November 2023, and in an online workshop in December 2023. The proposals selected are to be completed as full papers before February 28, 2024 (max 10,000 words), after which they are sent out for peer-review. The final issue is planned to be published in the fall of 2024.
Header image used under Creative Commons license from the Provincial Archives of Alberta: https://flic.kr/p/k5N2E8