The Black Atlantic at Thirty

A one-day symposium organized by the Twenty-First Century Anglophone World Literature research forum at the Department of English, Germanic and Romance Studies.

Paul Gilroy’s pioneering book The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness (1993) has had a profound impact across numerous academic disciplines ranging from literary studies and history to musicology, postcolonial studies, and black studies. On the (almost) thirtieth anniversary of The Black Atlantic’s publication—and on the sixteenth anniversary of the Engerom conference “Denmark and the Black Atlantic” (4-6 May 2006)—this symposium brings together a range of local and international scholars from various departments and disciplines to discuss various facets of Black Atlantic studies today. Participants will consider subjects ranging from Denmark’s role in Black Atlantic history and culture, via the Caribbean’s role in what Gilroy called the Black Atlantic’s “counterculture of modernity,” to the relationship between the Black Atlantic and Afrofuturism.   

Please contact Dr. Martyn Bone at bone@hum.ku.dk for further information about the symposium. No registration is necessary and all are welcome, but please note that the room capacity is 60 maximum.

Programme

9.15 am: Introduction and welcome (Dr. Martyn Bone, organizer)

9.20am-10.35am: Opening keynote (introduction, Dr. Helene Grøn)

  • Dr. Kiron Ward (University of Essex), “‘Cadbury’s, Cocoa, and the ‘counterculture of modernity’ in the Caribbean”

10.35-11am: Coffee break

11am-12.15pm: Panel session #1 (chair: Dr. Sarah Gleeson-White, University of Sydney)

  • Dr. Erik Steinskog (IKK), “The Black Galactic: Towards a History of Afrofuturism”
  • Dr. Helene Grøn (Engerom), “I am Queen Mary: On Sustained Protest and On Teaching Denmark’s Colonial Past”
  • Dr. Martina Koegeler-Abdi (SAXO/Lund University), “‘Brown Babies’ in post-WWII Denmark: The Trans/national Racialization of African American German Children Born of War”

12.15-1.15pm: lunch break

1.15pm-2.30pm

Second keynote (introduction, Dr. Martyn Bone)

  • Dr. Jon Ward (King’s College, London): “Looking for Home with 20:20 Vision - What Are We Learning from #Black Lives Matter?”

2.30pm-3pm: Coffee break

3pm-4.15pm

Panel session #2 (chair: Dr. Jenna Grace Sciuto, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts)

  • Dr. Gunvor Simonsen (SAXO), “Fugitive collectives and small craft in the Lesser Antilles, c. 1700 – 1850s”
  • Dr. Christa Holm Vogelius (IKK), “Philis Wheatley and Nationalism”
  • Dr. Martyn Bone (Engerom), “The U.S. Virgin Islands, Denmark, and the U.S. South in Tiphanie Yanique’s Land of Love and Drowning”

4.30pm-5.45pm

Closing keynote (introduction, Dr. Martyn Bone)

  • Lesley-Ann Brown, author of Decolonial Daughter and the forthcoming Blackgirl on Mars, “Blackgirl on Mars: Notes on a Life in Copenhagen”