Engagement with local communities is an essential aspect of the OMAA project as it links communities from various language backgrounds. It allows community groups, teachers, and researchers to find new angles on Australia’s history.
We are holding a conference at the end of the year:
Call for papers
The University of Sydney will host the 2024 Opening the Multilingual Archive of Australia (OMAA, https://omaa-arts.sydney.edu.au/) Conference, which will explore themes of ‘Multilingual archives and histories’ and ‘Multilingualism in translation’. The call for papers for the Conference is now open for abstracts and panel proposals. The Conference will be held in Sydney on December 2 and 3, 2024.
Australian Anglocentrism raises essential questions about the dynamics of living in a multilingual society. This conference aims to mobilise Australia’s considerable, under-utilised non-English language resources to rethink our migrant and settler history.
Contributors are grappling with the following question:
- How do non-English language sources challenge and enrich ‘mainstream’ narratives of Australian history by generating new perspectives?
- What difference does language make in the ways people engage with and ultimately think of themselves as ‘Australian’ or not?
- What constitutes a ‘multilingual approach’, and what theoretical insights from other disciplines help us import pluralism into historical narration?
- How can language diversity equip scholars, policymakers and the public to confront the challenge of cultural pluralism today?
- How does the history of translation and translation theory challenge dominant modes of historical practice in Australia?
OMAA invites scholars, practitioners, early career researchers, and postgraduate students to submit their research at all stages. Papers can cover a wide range of topics and use a broad range of sources: from Australia’s multilingual archives and libraries to multilingualism, historiography, immigration history, museum studies, ethnic studies, linguistics and translation studies.
Deadline for submissions: Wednesday, 31 July 2024, 11:59 pm AEDT.
Please send abstracts and proposals (300 words) and a short bio to Adrian Vickers (adrian.vickers@sydney.edu.au) and Judith Rozeboom (judith.rozeboom@sydney.edu.au)