Special issue of Global Nineteenth-Century Studies
CFP: Comparative Empire: Conflict, Competition, and Cooperation, 1750-1914
By the time the First World War erupted in 1914, most inhabitants of the globe resided within an empire, either as citizens of a colonizing power or as subjects of colonial rule. The preceding “long nineteenth century” had witnessed the rise of various empires with significant overseas colonial possessions—such as Britain, France, the Dutch Republic (subsequently the Kingdom of the Netherlands), and Meiji Japan—to coexist alongside imperial powers contained within contiguous land masses, including the Ottoman, Russian, and Qing empires.
For this special issue, Global Nineteenth-Century Studies is pleased to invite submissions on the theme of “Comparative Empire: Conflict, Competition, and Cooperation, 1750-1914.” Papers should consider interimperial exchanges between empires during this period. Topics may include (but are not limited to):
• trading, manufacturing, and financial activities between and across empires
• comparative literary undergrounds
• anticolonial aesthetics
• enslavement, exile, displacement, and forced or unforced migration
• microhistorical and biographical comparisons of the experience of empire
• frontiers, borderlands, boundaries
• forms of diplomacy (embassies, consulates, treaties, accords), modes of foreign relations (bilateral, multilateral)
• oceanic and overland journeys, travel, tourism
• comparative figures of empire (portraiture, sculpture, decorative objects)
• cultures of exploration (botanical, missionary, statistical, cartographic)
• historiographies of empire
• explanations for empire: economic, geopolitical, cultural, institutional
• conceptualizations of empire (the what, how, and why of empire) as well as conceptual terminology (transimperialism, postcolonialism, and so on)
• colonial propaganda
• cross-cultural literary texts, theories, and practices as well as comparative realisms, epic, comics/illustrations, etc.
• competition over colonial possessions (wars, conflicts, scrambles) and over expansionist strategies
• continuities and differences among empires across the long nineteenth century
• evidencing empire (photography, oral history, documentation, archives)
• imperial networking and networks
• literary traffic, circulations, contacts outside the centre–periphery model
• cultural traffic between imperial powers and colonies
• movements of animals, objects, ideas, and knowledge across empires
• responses to the global spread of disease (sharing of medical knowledge, differing forms of treatment)
• the language(s) of empire and linguistic homogenization and differentiation
• global theatre and music: colonial music institutions, intercultural collaborations and performances
• religion and colonialism
• the politics of empire and the practices of anthropology
Submissions should be typed and double-spaced in 12-point Times New Roman font, with 1-inch margins on all sides. Supporting files, including illustrations, figures, and tables, must be submitted with the written text. Essays should generally be in the range of 9,000 words (including notes and bibliography).
Because the journal uses double-anonymous review, no identifying information should appear in the manuscript. Your submission should be compiled in the following order: title; abstract (100–150 words); keywords (5–7); main text; acknowledgements (if any); references; endnotes. For initial submission, illustrations/figures/tables should be inserted either directly in the text or appear as appendices in the same file. Although initial submissions may be in any format, essays must, as a condition of acceptance, conform to the journal’s style guide.
An email cover letter should provide the author’s or corresponding author’s contact information. The submission should be saved as <surname given name> with no commas between the two names. For example: Doe Jane.
Manuscript submissions may be sent to global19c@nus.edu.sg by 1 December 2024. The expected date of publication is spring/summer 2026.
To learn more about Global Nineteenth-Century Studies, please visit Liverpool University Press’s website at https://www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/journal/gncs. GNCS is a publication of the Society for Global Nineteenth-Century Studies. To learn more about this geographically and disciplinarily diverse network of scholars who share an interest in the world’s connectedness between 1750 and 1914, visit https://www.global19c.com/
