We invite your participation in “Climate and Business/The Business Climate,” a conference sponsored by the Canadian Business History Association – l’association Canadienne pour l’histoire des affaires, to be held in Banff, Alberta, 19-21 September, 2024 at the Banff Centre. The planning committee welcomes proposals for papers and roundtables relating to business history within a Canadian or international context.  

Precious objects, and jewelry in particular, have generated repeated and echoed reactions over the centuries and across the globe, despite variations in context and location. Indeed, while the disapproval of an often ostentatious dissipation has been recurrent since Antiquity (Pliny the Elder), the benefits of a precious object has been claimed for aesthetic, symbolic, religious and economic reasons alike, whether it may be an agalma worthy of devotion ; an offering to the gods or the dead ; a symbol of status, power, alliance; a social or family heirloom, both a vehicle and a pledge of transmission or tradition ; an inspiration for artistic creation and the development of techniques ; as majors elements of exchange in the gift economy, and even a driving force behind the capitalist economy as emphasized by Bernard de Mandeville, Jean-Baptiste Say, Werner Sombart, and many others.  

Thus, the precious object and jewelry especially, whether carried on oneself, socially exchanged or integrated into spaces, create distinction at all levels, material and symbolic: they “radiate”, according to the worlds of Georg Simmel, attracting attention, reconfiguring the space of appearances, and establishing cultural and social divides and a “partition of the sensible”. Because of their distinctive value, they influence social taste, originate fashion, encourage imitation and counterfeiting, and fake and kitsch reproductions.

The 20th World Economic History Congress will convene from 28 July to 1 August 2025 in Lund, Sweden. The theme for the Congress is Equality and Sustainability Challenges, which highlights some of the central issues facing humanity today and also connects to a broad and diverse range of historical problems. To address both the challenges and to find insights from the historical record for that endeavor, a range of perspectives will be necessary.

The Centre of Maritime History in the Institute for Mediterranean Studies in Rethymnon announces the Sixth International Conference of the Mediterranean Maritime History Network (MMHN), which will take place at the Institute for Mediterranean Studies in Rethymno from the 27th to the 31st of May 2024.

The ELHN Labour and Family Economy Working Group invites papers for the session:
Elsewhere. The Migration of Families in the Past from a Labour History and Family Economy Perspective (18th-19th Century) . Organizers: Mario Grassi (Yale University & University of Padua), Céline Mutos-Xicola (University of Girona). Discussant: Beatrice Zucca Micheletto (University of Padua). Deadline to receive papers: 10 September 2023.

The ELHN Labour and Family Economy Working Group invites papers for the session "Labour, gender and social mobility during the industrialization". Organizers: Llorenç FERRER ALOS (Universitat de Barcelona) and Cinzia LORANDINI (Università di Trento). Discussant: Manuela MARTINI (Université de Lyon). Deadline to receive proposals: 10 September 2023.

The Programme Committee appointed by the International Maritime History Association (IMHA) invites proposals for panels, papers and roundtables to be presented at IMHA’s 9th International Congress of Maritime History in Busan, Korea. The congress will be hosted by the IMA (Institute of International Maritime Affairs), affiliated with the  Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries and the Korea Maritime & Ocean University, on August 19 – 24, 2024, in cooperation with the Korean Association of Maritime History, KASPS (Korean Association of Shipping and Ports Studies) and WCMCI (World Committee of Maritime Culture Institutes).

The main theme is Oceans: Local Mobility, Global Connectivity, and the aim is to address multiple aspects of the relationship between humans and the oceans. Oceans were regarded by humans as barriers in ancient times, although, in modern times, they became routes for exploring, travelling and connecting peoples and worlds separated by spatial and cultural distance. 

Tα πιο πρόσφατα πορίσματα της ελληνικής ιστοριογραφίας, προκάλεσαν τα τελευταία χρόνια έντονο ενδιαφέρον για την ύπαιθρο, καθώς εστιάζουν σε συγκεκριμένες περιοχές με επίκεντρο μια επαρχία ή ένα δήμο. Οι νεότερες αυτές μελέτες περίπτωσης επιχείρησαν να διεισδύσουν σε πολλαπλά θεματικά επίπεδα όπως, το καθεστώς γαιοκτησίας, η σχέση πόλης-υπαίθρου, η αγροτική εργασία, οι μετακινήσεις των χωρικών, η εισροή προσφύγων, η διανομή των γαιών, τα αγροληπτικά και ζωοληπτικά συστήματα, η φορολογία, οι αγροτικές κινητοποιήσεις, οι πολιτικές σχέσεις, ο τραπεζικός δανεισμός,  η εμπορευματοποίηση των αγροτικών προϊόντων, κ.ά. Ταυτόχρονα, οι αρχειακές πηγές που συνεχώς έρχονται στο προσκήνιο τις τελευταίες δεκαετίες, αποτελούν σύμμαχο σε αυτή την προσπάθεια κι ενισχύουν συστηματικά με τεκμηριωτικό υλικό τα νεότερα ιστοριογραφικά ερωτήματα.

The second globalisation has raised the issue of the cost of labour as a key variable in the competitiveness of economies. Confronted with the extension of value chains and the emergence of new global players in Asia, European governments have chosen to deregulate labour markets, contain wage growth, and lower the cost of labour. More recently, the resurgence of inflation has brought back to the fore the 1970s debates on the Phillips curve and the effects of the labour market on price increases. The emergence of the centrality of labour costs points to the need to examine them as a long-term historical object to understand economic and social policy choices throughout the twentieth century. 

This two day conference aims to bring together researchers working on various aspects of the economic history of East, Southeast and South Asia territories over the past 200 years. Special emphasis is given to papers dealing with the history of intra-Asian trade or its commercial integration with Europe, but any work studying specific elements of the long term economic performance of this region is welcome. The conference offers its participants the possibility to publish their works as part of an edited volume with an international publishing house.

The "Precarious Labour" Working Group will participate in the Fifth ELHN Conference with thematic sessions. We invite members of the Working Group, and all other interested colleagues, to come up with paper and session proposals under the following open call:

Open Call for Proposals – Deadline: September 1, 2023

The Feminist Labour History Working Group (WG) participates in the Fifth ELHN
Conference with several events, including thematic sessions. For the latter, we invite members of the Working Group, and all other interested colleagues, to come up with paper and session proposals under the following open call:

Open Call for Proposals – Deadline: July 1, 2023.