Lagos-ACC Graduate Conference in African Studies

Theme: Studying Contemporary Africa: politics, society and decoloniality

Conference Summary

Graduate students conducting research on themes relating to Africa are invited to apply to participate in the first Graduate Conference organised by the Lagos African Cluster Centre (Lagos-ACC) at the University of Lagos. This conference aims to provide the following:

1. critical peer driven feedback on a substantial piece of work
2. opportunity to share ongoing research with peers
3. training on research design and grant writing
4. opportunities for networking and interaction with graduate students and faculty at the Institute of African and Diaspora Studies and the University of Lagos more broadly
5. mentorship for graduate researchers

The Lagos-ACC is committed to developing a new generation of scholars conducting research in the multidisciplinary domain of African Studies, and this conference represents a major investment towards that goal. Selected graduate researchers would be expected to demonstrate awareness of the growing decolonial debates about the politics of knowledge production and to show how their research contributes to those debates.

Since Lagos-ACC is hosted by the Institute of African and Diaspora Studies (IADS), at the University of Lagos, the conference resonates with our mission “to provide a platform for profound and ground-breaking research, which will help to propel national development and encourage global discourse, especially between Africans at home and the Diaspora.”

Expected result:

Selected papers will be peer-reviewed for publication in either the ADD-Journal or any other Lagos-ACC affiliate journal.

Attendees will be exposed to mentoring programmes in specific areas of African Studies; and interested candidates will be given the opportunity to participate in future Lagos-ACC projects.

Eligibility and application procedure

1. Only currently registered M.Phil/Ph.D. students in Nigerian Universities are eligible
2. We are particularly interested in proposals that boldly re-examine the basic assumptions of African Studies- or of the study of Africa, and which explore relevant theoretically grounded debates about global knowledge production. We are however happy to consider proposals on any excellent research theme focused on Africa.

• Interested persons should submit an abstract of not more than 300 words, by 30^th June, 2021.

1. All submissions are to be sent to: iads@unilag.edu.ng with a mail title: Graduate Conference.
2. Participants’ transportation, accommodation and feeding will be fully funded by the Lagos-ACC.

Important dates

(9^th July, 2021) Deadline for submission of abstracts

(25^th July, 2021) Feedback on accepted abstract

(20^th August, 2021): i) Submission of PowerPoint, not more than 10 slides for presentation and ii) a full conference paper for review.

(Wednesday 22^nd – Friday 24^th September) Conference dates September