A conference at Columbia University, Morningside Campus, Maison Française, Buell Hall, East Gallery, 26 March 2010, 9:00am–7:00pm

Until recently the term “postcolonial” and the concepts associated with this notion have not enjoyed much resonance in the French and Francophone contexts. Lately, however, “postcolonialism” has become the object of an intense debate. Notably, several major “postcolonial” texts have been translated from English to French. In this international and multidisciplinary conference, historians, political scientists, sociologists, literary theorists, and philosophers from France, the US, and North and sub-Saharan Africa will reflect on these debates, map out the complex trajectories of the notion of “postcolonial” in the francophone context, and question the potential of this category to illuminate the political, social, and cultural legacies of French colonialism.

Conference agenda:

9:00 am: Introductory Remarks

Philip Watts (Columbia University), Emmanuelle Saada (Columbia University)

9:30 am-12:00 am: Translating Postcolonialism

Speakers: Emilienne Baneth-Nouailhetas (CNRS-NYU), Hafid Gafaiti (Texas Tech University), Achille Mbembe (Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research), Françoise Vergès (Goldsmiths College, University of London) Chair: Souleymane Bachir Diagne (Columbia University)

1:00 pm- 3:00 pm: Historiographical Moves

Speakers: Judith Surkis (Harvard University), Daho Djerbal (University of Algiers-Bouzareah), Pap Ndiaye (Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales) Chair: Emmanuelle Saada (Columbia University)

3:30 pm-5:30pm: The Postcolonial between Literature and History

Speakers: Doris Garraway (Northwestern University), Christopher L. Miller (Yale University), Mireille Rosello (University of Amsterdam) Chair: Madeleine Dobie (Columbia University)

6:00 pm: Keynote Address

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (Columbia University)

A conference organized by Madeleine Dobie and Emmanuelle Saada with Alexandra Perisic and Erin Twohig

Event co-sponsors: Department of French and Romance Philology; Center for French and Francophone Studies; Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race; and Maison Française of Columbia University

See here for more information.