Symposium: University of Waikato, 3 December 2010
Law Text Culture: Volume 15 2011

*Guest Editors:
Professor Nan Seuffert, School of Law
Dr Tahu Kukutai, Senior Research Fellow, Population Studies Centre *

This Call for Papers is for volume 15 of *Law Text Culture, *and a symposium at the University of Waikato investigating mobile peoples and populations
who come under the eye of the law in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific
from postcolonial perspectives.  Different areas of this region experienced
settler colonialism in different forms and with different outcomes.
 Postcolonial theory arises with the fall of grand theory and the
destabilisation of history 'as it actually was' or chronological 'facts',
creating space for the theorisation of constructions and dynamics of
nations, and of dynamic histories of peoples, colonisation, 'race',
ethnicity, gender and sexuality.  The reference to linear time and the
apparent presumption of a period after colonisation in the term
'postcolonial' have been critiqued; we see it as usefully indicating
engagement with the imprints and effects of colonisation, unpacking the
colonial circulating through, and repeating in, the current.  Writing
against the colonial, and making visible the persistence of the colonial in
the concrete and material conditions of everyday life, is integral to
postcolonial theory.  Foregrounding the histories of colonisation highlights
shifting geographical centres and margins in the process of mapping, and of
shaping and tracing, mobile peoples.

We seek postcolonial analyses (broadly construed), historical and current,
of mobile peoples and populations.  To members of the dominant 'white'
population these mobile peoples seem to be interlopers, out-of-place, a
source of anxiety. This proposal is concerned with the ways in which the law
(eg. criminal and civil), and other forms of regulation and surveillance
(eg. immigration regulation and policy; official state classifications)
construct mobile peoples.  We are also interested in the shaping of the
categories of gender and sexuality in relation to mobile peoples in and
through these regimes.

In order to explore these, and other related areas, we seek scholarly
articles, artworks, reviews, and creative writing from scholars and
practitioners in law, geography, demography, history, gender studies,
anthropology and other disciplines on themes and topics including, but not
limited to:

·     geographically displaced Indigenous peoples, among them Maori and
Aboriginal workers;
·     Maori and other ndigenous peoples' diaspora;
·     Indigenous peoples' transnationalism;
·     poor whites among European settlers, including labourers;
·     the role of institutions, including medical and legal institutions;
·     convict movements;
·     legal constructions of mobile peoples;
·     colonial administrators and officials, and missionaries, as mobile
polulations
·     mobile laws, policies and regulations
·     immigration law, policy and reform, including for sexual minorities
and couples
·     shifting jurisdictional territories, placements and displacements;
·     shaping and shape-shifting of nations in and through mobile
populations;
·     labor movements, including indentured labourers, to, from and within
the Pacific region, such as Melanesian indentured workers in Queensland,
·     sojourner Chinese;
·     post September 11 tightening and whitening, and other shifts in
immigration law and policy;
·     sex trafficking; and
·     refugee and asylum movements, including analyses of homophobia as a
basis for these claims.

All scholarly articles will be subject to independent peer review, while all
other submissions (artworks, reviews and creative writing) will be
considered by the guest editors in consultation with the Managing Editor of
*Law Text Culture*.


*Deadline for submission of abstracts: Tuesday 31 August 2010
*Abstracts may be submitted for the symposium, for volume 15 of *Law Culture*, or for both.  Please indicate in your abstract whether you are
interested in presenting a paper at the symposium.  Registration for the
symposium is free.
Abstracts should be 300 words.  Please also include a 300 word biographical
statement and your contact details. Abstracts will be assessed for their
appropriateness for the theme of the volume and symposium, and papers willbe due in early 2011.


Confirmed Participants

Professor Sally Engle Merry, Director Programme on Law and Society, New York
University.  Professor Merry is a leader in the field of law and society,
and has produced a large body of literature about colonialism, law, and
history, mostly focused on Hawai'i as a case study, and using Fiji as a
point of comparison (see Law & Empire in the Pacific: Fiji and Hawa'i (Merry
and Branneis, eds, 2003).


*Professor John Taylor*, Director of the Centre for Aboriginal Economic
Policy Research at the Australian National University. Professor Taylor's
research interests have revolved around the measurement of demographic
change among Indigenous peoples and the assessment of their economic status
at local, regional and national scales. A basic tenet of his research is the
need to establish key parameters of population change as the basis for
evaluating policy impacts in areas such as employment, housing, education
and health. He is the author of numerous academic publications and
consultancy reports for government, industry and Indigenous organisations.
Prior to joining the ANU, John held various university research and teaching
positions in Botswana and Nigeria.



*Contact person* for questions and submission of abstracts:
Dr Tahu Kukutai

Senior Research Fellow
Population Studies Centre
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
University of Waikato
tahuk@waikato.ac.nz <mailto:tahuk@waikato.ac.nz>>

Ph:       +64 7 838 4162

<mailto:tahuk@waikato.ac.nz%20>>